Fairest of Them All

Every once in awhile, you just need a break, from work, from friends, from life, from everything, and this past weekend, I took one. I put together all my frequent flyer miles (thank you Marni USA), and booked a round-trip flight to the land of tobacco and cows, North Carolina. Ahhhh home sweet home. For the first time in 5 months, I could hear the wind rustling the leaves on trees, and I could smell the aroma of freshly cut grass. Away from the polluted city air, my mind and body was revitalized!

Let me tell you, did I pick a good weekend or what? Not only was it the perfect weather the entire time, but it was also the very last weekend of the North Carolina State Fair, AND the Carolina BalloonFest. And just for shits and giggles, I also threw in a trip to Carrigan Farms to go pumpkin picking.

Somehow, during all 20 of my years living in North Carolina, my parents never took me to the state fair. After a little begging and the jockeying of haircut appointments, I finally got my parents to agree to going with me. We spent the day eating our weight in deep-fried, fair foods, and spent all our cash on games. We seriously had a blast, and obviouslyyyyy, I have the pics to prove it.

Let's dive right in and start with the good stuff, THE FOOD!!!

CORN DOG

You guys, corn dogs are seriously one of my favorite things to ever exist. One time I ate 3 corn dogs in 5 minutes. It was one of my proudest moments. This one was super yummy. I eat mine with ketchup AND mustard.

DEEP FRIED SNICKERS

Honestly, I'm not even going to lie, it was nasty AF. I highly suggest that you NEVER try one.

ICE CREAM

...with rainbow sprinkles. I mean, *come on*. It's a classic. I couldn't pass it up. My favorite ice cream flavor is chocolate *of course*.

Not pictured: Fried Oreos. Why? Because I ate them too fast to snap a pic. Oops.

After our food settled, we hit the game stations. My dad won two huge stuffed animals, and gave them away because my mom wouldn't let him take them home. I won nothing...BUT I got veryyyy close to winning the free throw game/challenge (whatever you would call it). See the pics below for proof!

After all our money was lost on games, I made my mom head into the mirrored fun house with me, and down the twirled slide (she had a really hard time fitting).

A state fair checklist isn't complete until you get to pet at least one animal, so we walked through the barns, watched toddlers ride on ponies, and pet a few award winning bunnies. Obviously, this was one of the greatest moments of the fair for me since I love bunnies SO much. It was pretty much like I died and went to bunny heaven. They were FREAKING ADORABLE. Sorry I don't have any pics of them. I was too busy wiping away my tears of happiness (not really, but I was soaking up the moment).

And before we made our way back to the car, we hopped onto the Ferris Wheel and went for a little ride. They're actually not my favorite things because I'm slightly (not chronically) scared of heights. But, nothing beat the view from the top. Plus, the lighting was poppin, so naturally, I had a little photo shoot.