Southern Hospitality: Lions, Elephants, and Toucans

These are just a few of the things seen today at the circus. We also saw Acrobats, Magicians, Miniature Horses (One full sized Horse), and as always Clowns. It was a new adventure for Christopher and Mommy too!

Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey are in town this weekend. When we saw the billboards a few weeks ago we decided it might be worth a try to take Christopher to see it. In normal circumstances I would NEVER consider taking a one year old to the circus, however Chris LOVES animals. Not to mention the clowns visited Jacob at school, and that’s all he talked about from then on.

We opted for an earlier show today, because Christopher and Savannah would be needing naps at some point in time. Savannah happened to take hers during the show (she wasn’t feeling well today). Even with choosing the 11 o’clock showing, we wanted to be there at 10 for the all access pre-show. This was something I had never heard of before, granted this was my first real “Circus” experience. They allowed anyone who bought a ticket to come in an hour early and meet all of the actors and animals. This was probably my favorite part. We got to see the elephant, Susie, up close, (By the way, they are a LOT bigger up close that what they seem at the zoo), we danced with the Clowns (watch the videos below), and saw some fun magic tricks.

The show started exactly at 11, this was a surprise because I would never imagine that something so complicated could ever be on time (take my Aunts and Christmas for example… NEVER on time). It lasted about an hour and a half, with an intermission, and kept us entertained the ENTIRE time (great job Ringling Brothers!!). Christopher did fall asleep right after the acrobats preformed, and slept for about 10 minutes. He missed part of the Lion act, but was wide awake for the elephants. I have never heard him laugh and squeal so hard.

All in all it was an amazing experience for us, and we will definitely do it again.