The Greatest Show on Earth

A couple weekends ago, we went to the Ringling Brothers and Barnum & Bailey Circus at the Prudential Center in Newark. This was a Christmas present to us from Brian's father and step-mom. Brian and I talked up the circus to Julianna for a good month before we went and she was so excited to talk about the Elephants and the tigers! She was eager to go, even though I don't think she truly understood what it was we were going to see. Have you been to the circus recently/ I think I went as a kid but don't recall when. We went to Cirque-de-soleil 2 times before Julianna was born - but it was nothing like this!

Once we were there, as much as I thought she would love the animals, she really only liked the dancing dogs. To my surprise, she hardly paid attention to the elephants or the tigers. She did however love the acrobats, the trampoline performers, the high wire act and the human canon. Sometimes you just don't know what your child will like, even though you totally think you know!

Julianna was a good girl and stayed in her seat the entire time or stood up in front of it - there was no one in front of us, so it was perfect. We had good seats too, we were in row 8 right in front of everything going on.

I decided to take my camera, even though I wasn't sure what kind of shots I would get due to the dark lighting there. I think, considering the light, smoke and changing colors - I did ok. At least you can tell what's going on even if it's kind of grainy. And uh, it seems as though I sized some of these wrong. That's what I get for doing this with one eye open before bed.

Prudential Center - Newark

Elephants before the show. 

Expensive snacks & souvenirs. $8 popcorn, $7 snow-cone and $25 wirley light-up thing.

Gotta love free enterprise. 

Light-up thing that we wisely purchased from the street vendor before we came in for only $10. 

I loved the Elephants! 

Lot's of stuff going on at once! Hard to keep up with it all - Julianna's head & eyes were going side to side. 

I loved the dancing horsies too! 

Amazing strength on these acrobats! 

Tigers. Oh my. 

(I couldn't help but think of the end of "Water for Elephants" - and was happy to see the cage up! haha!) 

Julianna loved these guys! 

Human canon. And you thought your job was hard? 

Dancing doggy! 

Love these guys. How do they get them to do this? I'll never know. 

Dancing doggies in a row. 

Elephant finale! 

I love the finale with all the lights and confetti - So cool! Julianna loved it too! 

I got down on my knees to get a picture of us, and she sat down with her beloved Light-up thingy. Oh well.