Most definitely the highlight of our May Faire this year was the fact that Bracken participated in the Maypole for the very first time. It was a very big deal for him (thus all the pictures I took to capture it.) Last year and as we got nearer to this year’s May Faire, Bracken was upset by the fact that he didn’t get to do the Maypole. I’d explain that it was the bigger kids that did the Maypole. But that explanation didn’t matter to him or change anything, he still wanted to do the Maypole. The night before May Faire he was in tears on the phone to grandma because of it. Oh boy. I was wondering how our day was going to go and hoping he would enjoy watching the Maypole even though he wouldn’t be participating in it.

We watched the first Maypole dances of the day. And then something amazing happened. The teacher announced it would be a community Maypole dance and anyone who would like to join could come up. I’d never seen them offer this in years past and it was a dream come true for Bracken! He got to pair up with a bigger kid who showed him the ropes. As if that wasn’t enough, then he got to do the Maypole all by himself. What a day!

Jeff and I looked at each other with smiles on our faces. We were so delighted for Bracken and so happy watching him walk around the Maypole. (The next day, at home, Bracken played Maypole with his toys and I listened to him teach them “under, over, under, over.” He later turned a vase of flowers into a Maypole and had them dance around that.)

On another note, I decided to do something different this year. I guess it’s because I feel sort of boring most of the time. I usually don’t do anything to my hair, wear the same colors- browns and greys (though I do have a favorite blue shirt and more recently a purple one, so I am trying to branch out in the color department), and pretty much don’t dress up ever. (Bracken is constantly picking out clothes for me with sparkles, trying to convince me to buy them. He thinks I need more pizzazz.) So I thought it would be fun to do my hair differently. I have three different friends who have worn braids over their head and I thought it was the most adorable hairstyle ever. I looked it up on youtube and saw it referred to as Milkmaid Braids. I watched a tutorial how to do it. I located a few random bobby pins and woke up extra early the morning of the May Faire to get ready. I had to search the house for a mirror so I could see the back of my head to part my hair down the middle. My hair doesn’t seem to part like hair normally should and I always find it incredibly frustrating (otherwise I would probably wear my hair in braids more often.) I was wishing my mom or sister was there to part it for me! Finally I got the part as good as it was going to look, did two braids, and then preceded to bring them over the top of my head. That’s when I realized my hair wasn’t long enough. Whoops. The braids didn’t cross and I couldn’t hide the end of one braid behind the other, like you’re supposed to. By this point I had invested too much time in my hair to want to undo it and I knew Bracken would be waking up soon. I remembered a part of the tutorial that mentioned weaving fabric into the hair as an option. I cut a strip of white fabric and sewed it around the braids to try to hide the fact that the braids didn’t go all the way across the top of my head and also to hide the rubberbands at the end of each braid. In the early morning light in the bathroom and in my sleepy state, it looked okay enough. But later all the fabric slid and the rubberbands showed and it probably ended up looking funny. Oh well, though, because I was glad I had attempted to do something different!

Bracken and I also used some face paint for the day’s festivities. Jeff passed on the face paint because the forecast said it might get hot and he said it would just sweat right off his face anyway. Bracken had some of these natural face pencils from his aunt and uncle. I was actually surprised by how well they lasted for the entire day. We love them. (Later I wished I would have brought the face pencils along with us because many of our friends wanted some too. I want to remember that for next year.) Lots of people asked us about our knitted flower garlands. Some of you may remember I shared a tutorial on how to make them from last year’s May Faire. This year I wanted to get some updated pictures, though, and also make some updates to the tutorial. So I will be sharing that soon.

Jeff was in our booth while Bracken and I went around to the activities. There were lots of fun games. Ring toss. Fishing. Tumbling gnomes. (We missed the bubbles this year.) Bracken got to do the dunk tank for the first time. After getting to throw the ball three times, they were letting the kids go up and push the button. A big hit with them all, as you can imagine! Oh, and Bracken got to make his own terrarium, which was a favorite activity last year as well. He even found a funny container with feet on the bottom, which he proudly showed everyone who would look. He also got to make wildflower seed balls with clay and compost. He brought some of the dried seed balls home and planted them with Jeff in the garden the next day.

At the end of the day, with his sciatic pain, Jeff had his limit of walking for the day. I could tell it was going to take me quite awhile to transport everything over to our car from our booth while he loaded it in the car. Some friends helped us carry the rest of everything over and we were so grateful to them! It helped us so much.

Jeff was really thirsty and wanted to get a drink on the way home. We drove by a favorite spot, thinking they would probably be closed (and we’d have to just go to the nearby market instead) and were delighted to see they had just changed their hours to stay open later. We tried some incredibly delicious hibiscus ginger jun at the Green Plow Juicery and smoothies. It was so fun to come home that night, see that there was a recent message from my mom (meaning she was still awake in Florida), and being able to call her back and say “you’ll never believe what happened today…”, then passing the phone to Bracken and having him exclaim “Maypole! Me!!” Yep, definitely the highlight of May Faire this year.