An Ill Father's Day Omen

We didn't have anything planned this evening, and we knew that the city of Meridian, Idaho was planning on having the annual Dairy Days festival they do every year. There was a parade yesterday, various events showing off dairy animals (although, gratefully, I don't believe they have a dairy cat competition yet), and a small carnival with a couple of fun houses and carnival rides. Nothing too bit, but for Munchkin, we knew it would be a great time.

We drove over to Storey Park, right next to the speedway, where the carnival was all set up. The strange thing was, there were no lights on, and a very minimal throng loitering about. By very minimal, I mean that I am pretty sure I saw one adult and two children who were not working there walk through the carnival. Wondering if there was some strange set of rules regarding what hours the carnival could be open this year, we consulted the Internet.

And we found that the carnival was cancelled because they failed an electricity check.

Munchkin was slightly devastated that she would not be able to ride the merry-go-round that we had told her about. She loves the one at the zoo, but it is small, as merry-go-rounds go.

So, on to plan b—go and check out the animals in the Speedway. As we were walking there, we noticed another severe lack of a throng, so we consulted the trusty Internet again. This time, we found that the animals had all left by 3:00 in the afternoon today.

Once again, Munchkin's hopes were dashed to pieces. She really wanted to see the animals.

On the brink of tears, she conceded to go play on the slides at the park. And that was fun, as it was a park we don't frequent. The evening was slightly saved. And we were still planning on grabbing a sno cone later in the evening.

But before we claimed the snow cones, we decided to make a few stops, as the night was still young, and the outdoors were warm enough to make my children's Swedish heritage shine through their ruddy cheeks. Wifey can run for five minutes and have fiery red cheeks. Munchkin and Munchkenna follow suit.

Stop number one was at a used clothing store for kids. Munchkenna is growing out of anything and everything we have for her (as in she is wearing Munchkin's clothes from five months ago), so some new leggings were in order. Munchkin loves the fact that there is generally a Disney flick playing near a bunch of toys there, so she was eager to go.

She had a full-blown meltdown when she was not able to close a door that another child was opening. I escorted her from the store and stopped the tears and screaming. The night went back down a notch.

Our last stop before sno cones was a book store chain. We just went to browse, and as Wifey was showing me a book in the kid's section, Munchkin and Munchkenna meandered over to a rack of stuffed toys ten feet away. A creepy guy was looking directly at Munchkin and Munchkenna, and popped his head around the corner. He might have just been a concerned person seeing if the children's parents were around, but I got the heebie-jeebies, so I stuck in the kids books for the whole night. This man left shortly after I saw him, so I would like to think my instincts were right.

Night goes down another notch.

We put everything away that Munchkenna pulled from the shelves (her new favorite game, by the way), and left to claim our sno cones. We ordered three kiddie sizes, as this place puts them in a ten ounce cup, then heaps a snowball at least five inches around on top. I don't know how anyone would want to order more than a kiddie from this place, but they do.

The sno cones were quite tasty, and we figured that we would have a relatively good end to our evening, despite all the set backs and potential stained clothing from the messy Munchkin, and then our luck struck anew. Munchkenna was sitting peacefully in a chair that decided to tip over. She face planted into the grass, which was made exponentially worse by how tired she was. Large tears streamed down her face.

The one saving grace of tonight was the fact that Munchkin needed to go potty while we were eating sno cones. Missy had already brought her to the bathroom once before while we were at one of our stops, so it was my turn. We had to run across the parking lot to the nearby gas station to get to the nearest bathroom, so Munchkin was holding my hand as we ran. She started giggling up a storm, and looked up at me with a look of pure delight. Her eyes sparkled, her cheeks were no longer flush, but the grin on her face was possibly bigger than a smirk you would see on a billboard.

I never knew you could have so much fun on your way to use the restroom. Maybe that is why many girls choose to go in herds. But needless to say, no matter if our luck stays the same tomorrow, I know it will be a great Father's Day, because Munchkin is going to need to go to the bathroom.