The Greatest Show on Earth!

When I was little, I remember my parents taking me and my sisters to the circus. I don't remember much about the show, but I remember it was so much fun and I loved the family outing that we all enjoyed together. I thought it would be fun to take the girls this summer. I was so fortunate to find discounted ticket prices online, so we bought 6 and were all set to go with Ian's parents. An hour before the circus started, they had an event on the stage floor with a bounce house, activities, dancing, meeting the elephant and getting to meet and take pictures with the clowns. It was so crowded, everyone was shoulder to shoulder so it was kind of hard to maneuver. We chose to take photos with the clowns thinking we would be able to see the elephants once the show started.

 The girls had little "The Greatest Show on Earth" tattoos on their hands. Zoey tried to start peeling hers off right away while Kira wants to keep hers on her hand forever. 

There were so many people, we put the girls on our shoulders so they could see what was going on in the crowd and so we wouldn't lose them.  

The circus was so much fun. The first half before intermission didn't impress me tooo much. I was wondering when I would be amazed... and for something new I'd never seen before. The funnest thing about the first half was the lion/lioness/tiger performance. There were 3 tigers, 3 lionesses and 1 lion. So fierce!! I was kind of happy we were really up high and safe! There was one lioness, Molly who kept hissing at the trainer. She was acting up and the audience was reacting worringly to her threats. She actually had the trainer leaned up against the cage wall for a minute before he convinced her to go sit back down. I guess those lions really think they are the boss. The tigers and lions were fun though. The trainer got the tigers to all roll over and lay down and sit. Just like dogs. And Ian noticed that the trainer didn't set a hand on any of the animals except the biggest one, the male lion! He was the sweetest one! The trainer was able to pet him and give him kisses, very carefully though. He would approach him slowly and make sure the lion was okay with it. What a scary job! That part was really entertaining. When the second half started, they had an adorable little dog show. There was this little tiny dog that was doing tons of back flips in a row and he even jumped from a high point and someone caught him. There was a very impressive poodle who could jump so high and for a very large distance. Each dog had a little unique trick he could do. It was so cute to watch. The poodle even played jump rope and balanced on a rope in mid-air on his 2 hind-legs. There was an acrobat show too. I love all the swinging they do where they catch each other and do flips in the air. And another part of that group did a floor show where they were literally catapulting people off of a teeter-totter onto someone else. At the climax, there were actually 5 people stacked up on top of each other in a straight line. It was so impressive when they would fly up and land in different positions or do a flip in the air on the way up. One lady did a flip and landed in a handstand on top of someone else, joining hands with him. It was sooooooo impressive and entertaining! I couldn't believe how many stunts they did. It was by far my favorite part. They had a motorcycle scene where they started at 1, but ended up with 8 motorcycles all stuffed inside a huge ball. I couldn't figure out how they could all possibly fit in that big ball. They would start their engines and begin driving around sideways and upside down in the ball because of how fast they were going. It was AMAZING. I loved how the audience would ooh and ahh. It felt like we were all experiencing something amazing together. The girls LOVED the part with the elephants! We even saw a baby elephant among them. They were so cute how they would walk out in a line holding onto each others tails with their trunks. They just seem like such sweet animals. The clowns were entertaining too. They were trying to figure out a way to save Rapunzel from her tower at one point and couldn't figure out an intelligent way to do it. Finally, a little midget ran up the side of the tower and rescued her. The audience was laughing at how simple and ironic it was. I am so glad we got to experience the circus. The girls loved it so much and have been talking about it ever since. Zoey managed to fall asleep right at the end when it was really loud and during the finale. I couldn't believe it. She was so tired. They are such sweet girls. I am so glad I get to do things like this with them and give them these fun childhood memories like I had.