the great minnesota get-together

with the end of summer closing in and perfect weather in the forecast, we did our annual trek to the State Fair yesterday. Started with a breakfast of a footlong hot dog, pancakes and sausage and went from there. emma and doug drove race cars, we went to the miracle of birth center, saw the big pig and some swine judging, had all the milk we could drink for $1, watched a lumber jack competition, ate a meatball sundae from the Salem Lutheran stand, and voted for our favorite artwork. Took an afternoon break to take care of some errands, work, and football practice, and arrived back with avengence for the evening session. Found a great, free parking spot on a block from Snelling, had some of our traditional food favorites (spaghetti with meatballs for emma; giros for terri and ben) while watching the annual amateur talent show. then went and saw some of the horseshow at the collesium (kids more enthused about the free milk we indulged on the way out and the promise sweet martha's cookies). then a big surprise and standout highlight: while we were eating our cookies and hanging out near the grandstand hoping to evesdrop on the Randy Travis concert, some kind soul gave us free tickets to the show! Ben couldn't believe his first big-time concert was from a traditionalist country twanger like this guy but Randy was in great voice, threw out some cornball lines that you couldn't help but smile about, and the crowd was really into it--especially the ladies. having also gotten to see the nightly fireworks show we usually just hear, we went home tired but happy.