The Circus is Coming! The Circus is Coming!

I remember when I was 9, we lived in the small town. One morning my dad ran outside where we were playing and told us to hurry up and jump in the truck. We ran to the truck and he headed to the center of town, about 15 minutes from our house. He parked the truck in a parking lot with the pickup bed facing the street and threw down the tailgate and sat us up there. When we asked him what was going on, he just said "Wait and see." He ran across the street to grab us an ice cream cone from the Dairy Queen (you could do that back then, no one would come steal your kids or your truck and we sat there because it never occured to us not to sit there like he told us to do. There were about 50 other kids running around by us waiting for their folks to come back from Dairy Queen too.)

Just as he ran back across the street and shoved the cones into our hands, we heard an incredible roar of music and some weird animal sounds. Suddenly a very tall man and some other performers appeared from around the corner and started down the street toward us, with a full band and a bunch of stuff behind them! What ensued was my first experience with the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey Circus. It was AWESOME!! It was a parade down Main Street and it was incredible to watch! My dad watched us as we watched the parade and the performers and it was one of the best days of my young childhood.


The elephant part looked a lot like this, only there was a scantily dressed lady riding one of them. I remember the elephants had a particularly stong impact on me, partly due to their size and partly due to the giant poo! I remember feeling so sorry for the guy who had to clean it up. The clowns ran and drove around like hilarious madmen and there was confetti and balloons and music and candy being thrown by performers...it was such a great day!

Then, as if that weren't great enough...we got to go to the circus that night and see the show! It was the perfect end to a perfect day. Kids remember perfect days...I remember this one.

My kids get to experience the circus this year for the first time! Mom Central and Feld Entertainment are sending us to the Ringling Brothers Barnum and Bailey "Zing Zang Zoom" Show in June. The show incorporates magic and illusion with traditional circus arts, which should make for a very entertaining event. I cannot wait to hear Little Man squeal when they make an elephant disappear! Actually, the real feat would be making the elephant poo disappear!

Here are the show dates, it will be held at US Airways Center:
Wednesday June 24: 7:00pm
Thursday June 25: 11:00am, 7:00pm
Friday June 26: 11:00am, 7:00pm
Saturday June 27: 11:00am, 3:00pm, 7:00pm
Sunday June 28: 1:00pm, 5:00pm

You can purchase a 4-pack of tickets for only $44 by logging on to http://ticketmaster.com/ and entering the coupon code: MOM. You can get additional tickets for just $11 each.

And be sure to check back in the coming days, I am working on procurring some tickets to give away on the blog!