Yeeeee Haaaaawwwww!

it's rodeo time in houston, ya'll, and along with that come various local celebrations like Texas Independence Day and even more locally, "Western day" at annie's school on wednesday and boy did a lot of things happen. for one, annie was actually participating this year. which is totally new. secondly, she actually got ON a pony. TWICE. and loved it. you hear that, papa? maybe you should look into some horsies after all. ha!

by the time i arrived, the kids had already done some square dancing and were on to the hay ride.

after the hay ride we moved on to the watering hole, had a little snack, took a little potty break, and headed up to the pony ride. when i asked annie if she was going to ride a pony she said "yes!" and i completely thought she was lying. every other time we have had the option to ride ponies - which, believe it or not, since we moved to texas has been quite frequently - she has refused. in terror.

but not on wednesday. on wednesday you could have mistaken her for a rodeo star. she hopped up on her horse, Patrick, and was laughing and talking to the folks in charge. she asked questions, she let go and rode one-handed...it was HI-larious. she was only sad when it was over and she had to leave without riding Sugar, the white horse. allll the little punks were racing to get to the white horse first. but stay tuned, annie's little affair with the ponies is not yet over. but first...

on the way back from the pony rides, the kids got to stop and pet the camel. they were supposedly too little to ride, though later on we would get a chance to do that, but they were all over petting the loverly gal.

then we were on to the guitar, where the kids all sat down and sang - what else? - "deep in the heart of texas". after that we sauntered on over to rope some calves - an activity in which our little rodeo star again excelled. we then took our lunch break - hot dogs, tater chips and candy, and then moseyed down to pan for gold and let the lil' cowpokes play at the playground for a few minutes.

the life of a cowboy is a darn tiring one, and soon the little cowpokes were losing steam. they started melting down, losing patience and were just plain tuckered out. the last thing we did was hike back up to our camel friend to give rides to those who wanted...and though annie was excited about the prospect, when it came time to get on the camel, she was like "i think i'll just sit and watch". so MOMMY got to ride with a few of her classmates. that was something. i can't imagine riding on one of those babies all day through the desert, i'll tell you that much.

at that point, we were done. annie and i were about to head out and she started talking about riding the other pony again. and by talking i mean verging on total mental collapse - so i asked her teacher and she said by all means we should ask the people in charge if annie could sneak in another ride on the white pony. fortunately for the entire western world, the dude in charge was more than happy to oblige, so annie got her ride on Sugar. a happier little girl i never did see.