County Fair - Day Three...Keeps Getting Better

Well I had my goat milk latte this morning and sweetened it with some cinnamon dulce de leche from said goat milk then headed down to the county fair to see how the producers of that milk would do in today's 4-H conformation dairy goat classes. While yesterday's classes focused on the showman, today's classes focused on how well the 4-H member's project animals fit their purpose...in this case as a dairy goat, their milk production and breeding capacity. Pretty simple.



Of course before I could head out there were horses next door to tend to, things to remember to take back to fair, camera memory cards to clear, and the like. Today was another one of our non-summer mornings and required a sweatshirt to stay warm. No complaints though. County fairs with temperatures in the 100s are definitely no fun for anyone.

Upon getting to the campgrounds, I found Goat Princess in her sleeping bag catching forty winks and trying to warm up. After getting up at 5:00 a.m. today, she bathed the four goats that hadn't been shown in the showmanship class yesterday and got them prepped for their show. I guess it was a pretty chilly morning to get wet, both for her and them. I noticed that they were all sporting their 'blankets' won from previous shows.





As you never know exactly when your breed of goat will be called into the show ring, parents and spectators have to just hang around in the area and keep tabs on things. Thank goodness we weren't going to walk all over the fairgrounds again. My feet probably couldn't take it again. There were still the butterflies to visit in the same vicinity, or the cattle to watch



or the llama agility course



or check out the sheep, dressed in their jammies to stay clean for their show



or the rest of the club members to watch show.

When the miniature dairy goat classes were called, it became apparent that there were not a lot of entries besides the ones from our family. Too bad. Plenty of competition is a good thing. But the judge did an excellent job commenting on each of the five does Goat Princess brought to show and had nothing but praise for several of them. She walked away with Grand Champion Miniature Dairy Goat Doe with her primary breeding doe and Reserve Grand Champion Miniature Dairy Goat Doe with her dry yearling from the aforementioned doe. Lots of blue ribbons, purple championship ribbons, and cool looking signs to hang above their pens.





With the showing done for the day, Hubby and I along with H-Bob headed home for awhile. Goat Princess had a four-hour barn duty shift and wouldn't be free until evening. At home time flew as I fed and cleaned next door, fed our animals, tried to squeeze in a little watering, make dinner, and scoot back out the door in time to return to the fairgrounds for the Parade of Champions.

Any 4-H or FFA member who took the Champion Showmanship title for their age category and species was invited by the Fair Board to parade around the rodeo arena before tonight's rodeo. Quite a sight. It's one of those opportunities that I hope each one of those kids will remember. Their moment of glory was due to nothing less than a lot of hard work and skill. Congratulations to all of them!





Hubby and H-Bob stayed to watch the rodeo



while I became the sounding board for Goat Princess's hectic day. Nothing greater than the feeling that your teen can unload to their parent. Worth every minute of my time. Then it was back home to wash a load of show whites, deal with the kitchen and baskets of unfolded laundry before whipping up this post.

Tomorrow should be a fun day of sorts. Classes like milking relays and obstacle courses. Pictures should be worth a thousand words tomorrow, I hope!