We woke up this morning to a day full of promise, a grand Celtic adventure awaiting us at Fair Park in Dallas. We even compiled a mixed cd of Irish/UK bands (Snow Patrol, U2, Florence + The Machine, Adele, Tired Pony, to name a few), and were all decked out in our verdant finest. The morning was crisp with a promise of latter-day warmth, and the sun shone brightly upon us. Spirits were high (as were (my) expectations). From the pictures below, it might actually look as though we merely found a petting zoo that happened to have some bagpipers playing nearby, but such is an "Irish Festival" with a 21-month-old with a mind (and extremely strong will) of his own. Still, it was our day, and it was pretty darn beautiful. My favorite memories will be us eating ice cream on the grass (see below), and holding Dresden in my lap to watch the bagpipers. I will let the pictures do the rest of the talking...
Watching the bagpipers play, completely in awe.
He spent the rest of the day asking "Bagpipes? Bagpipes?")
The North Texas Caledonian Pipes and Drum band. Absolutely amazing!
The bright blue sky that covered our day
I LOVE kilts!
Dresden's favorite little goat (that tried to eat my skirt!) He actually kissed this goat. And then the potbellied pig that was also there. I was tickled and overwhelmingly disgusted all at the same time. (Alex got it on video, no pictures unfortunately)
Dresden and the goat paying rapt attention to me...
Ice Cream break!
Ice cream kiss (I tried not to think about the fact that he'd kissed a goat a half hour earlier)
Me and my Little Leprechaun
Happy face
More bagpipes. This drummer was so cool.
We quickly straightened Dresden's normally unruly hair for some sans-hat shots
(kidding...must have been extremely low humidity today!)
And then it was back to the petting zoo, because the kid was LOSING it by this point.
I'm not sure who is more traumatized, the ducks or me, because Dresden (who again, was completely beside himself with fatigue at this point) was chasing those poor ducks all over the place and kicking at them, and even pinned the sweet white one down at one point by (accidentally? I hope!) stepping on the poor thing.
Proud of himself for chasing the ducks so well (I'm watching in horror on the side going "Noooo!!!")
Some serious contemplation around the water cooler
I think a big goat scared him...
On our way out of Fair Park
If I had it to do over again, I would probably decide to have just Alex and I come on the Friday night that it first opened when you can get in free at a certain time, and make a date night out of it. There was just WAY too much to see and do and eat when you have to make sure the 21-month-old is happy. I really would have liked to have seen the Irish dancing, but so many of the shows and stages were actually inside the buildings, which we had no idea about, seeing as they did not give us any kind of map or program upon entry. It just wouldn't have been possible to do all of that and keep Dresden occupied (especially because we had to skip his nap to even come down and attempt the festival in the first place, so he was already tired to begin with). Still, I am glad we went, and I am so happy and proud that my son, while his Irish heritage is decidedly diluted, has an inexplicable love for "bap-pipesss" (that's the closest I can spell how it sounds when he says it; so cute). That's good enough for me, for now :-D
I hope you all had a great weekend. (It's fun to have things to do over weekends, but man do they make you feel exhausted and like you need another weekend to rest!)
Love,
Cassie, Alex and Dresden
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