We have fallen into a bit of a habit of how we "do" the Show. We try and get their reasonably early Friday afternoon, race around the Pavilion and see how the kids all did with their handicraft/art enteries. Look around at other things, including the Youth Pavilion where the Homeschoolers have a display. We then buy burgers from the local Rotary guys and sit down – shivering and freezing – till the fireworks, after which we go home and rest so we can repeat it all again the next day!
I must clarify the "shivering and freezing" because it was probably only just under 10degrees so that isn’t very cold but to us who live in the tropics it is cold!! It is a night to remember the woolies!
Our Saturday varies a little – but we mostly head off mid morning in time for the dog show. We eat lunch while watching dogs walk, jump and parade. The kids then have some time off roaming with their friends. By mid afternoon we are all tired and decide that it is time to head home. We leave the Saturday night at the Show to those who like partying and loud music.
We call in at the local grocery store to buy an icecream, head home, and crash! But very happy.
Sunday morning we have to head back into the Show grounds to pick up all the entries. I have worked out a system to keep this organised. Each year our family puts more and more entries into the main pavilion so a system did have to happen else we would have had people, and projects and bits all over the place! But more about the children’s crafts another post.
The other thing that happens for our family at the Show is that I co-ordinate a pavilion called the Reg Bolten Youth Pavilion. It is named in remembrance for a clown that spent many years entertaining our children at the Show with balance tricks. Our children went to a couple of his workshops and had a ball. He died one year, at Show time, so the pavilion is named after him. This pavilion is a place for the youth services and groups in town to show their presence. The homeschoolers have had a display every year.
We have two aspects to our display – a poster display showing the lifestyle learning opportunities in our family life and second is a 3 dimensional display of varying themes each year. This year our theme was "Learning from Books". It was a very simple display to put together – each family brought a 3d project that their children had made as well as a laminated photocopy of a book – fiction or non-fiction that they had studied.
Sunday morning was a bit rushed this year as I had to pack up the Youth Pavilion as well as pick up all the kids projects (all 45 of them) and then get to church. As it turned out lots of folk arrived to help so it really was a case of many hands make light work.
We thoroughly enjoyed our Show this year.
