Bailey's First Trip to the Circus!!!

One of the perks of working for the nicest hotel in town is that you sometimes get free tickets for some pretty good shows. Such was the case for last weekend's Ringling Brothers & Barnum & Bailey Circus in Greenville. Mel was offered the tickets so we thought we'd see what Bailey thought about it. Our suspicion was that it was going to be too loud for her or that all the action would be so far away that it wouldn't keep her attention for very long. But, like I said, we decided to try it out anyway since the tickets were free. Worst case scenario...Bailey freaks out and we're out of there in five minutes.

We reached our seats about two minutes before the show started. About three minutes later we realized that we had better get comfortable b/c we weren't going anywhere soon. From 3 - 5pm last Saturday, Bailey was totally focused on one thing...actually, lot's of things were going on but they were all in one central location. Mel and I ended up enjoying it a lot more than we expected, as well. All in all, a great way to spend a Saturday afternoon.

This was actually part of the finale, but it was a good overall shot of what the circus had to offer. There were also horses, zebras, tigers, and a wide array of pooches that did all sorts of tricks.

We had three seats so Mel and I spent some of the show being the bookends so Bailey could stand and move around in front of the seat in between us. Here, she's gripping the seatback in front of her excitedly watching whatever was going on at the time. It's probably a good thing that no one ever sat down in front of us.

"This is the coolest thing ever, Daddy!"

I can't be positive, but I'd bet the ranch that the elephants were on their way out into the arena. The elephant tricks were, by far, Bailey's favorite parts of the whole show. In fact, we've got her on the camcorder crying when she realized the elephants were leaving during one part of the show.

Me and my girl after the show. Thankfully, Bailey was old enough to enjoy the show and young enough not to know what cotton candy and circus souvenirs are. I doubt we'll be so lucky next year.

As I mentioned, I've got some video footage, as well, but I'm having trouble transferring both video and sound to the computer. Once I figure it out, I'll be sure to post some footage.