Sunday, August 26-Anna W.

I've been at The Great Minnesota Get-Together since 1 pm Tuesday and it's been totally crazy but really amazing. My ride down here was definitely interesting with 5 4-H State Ambassador Girls riding down in one 7-passenger van. It took us an hour to load all of our luggage onto the luggage rack and the very back of the van once we got to Alexandria, then we still had to pick up another girl in Sauk Centre. Once I got here I was able to pick a bottom bed right next to a fan, which feels really nice, especially on the hotter nights. Wednesday my little brothers arrived with our rabbits and the rest of the livestock kids from Douglas county. Unloading the livestock trailer took quite a while, especially since there were 23 swine coming to the state fair just from my county, which took up an entire row in the swine barn.

Thursday I got to correct tests taken by the beef kids which are the deciding factor of who gets called back for interviews that same morning. It was actually quite fun because the people I was working with were really interesting and fun to talk to while we were just sitting there all morning. I had to leave from the beef area early to get over to the rabbit skill-a-thon/quiz in the Coliseum. Later Thursday I checked the call-back list which consists of the top 20% of exhibitors in 3 age groups, and my name was on there along with 3 other rabbit kids from my county. Also that day was my first day working at the front door and informational booth in the 4-H building. That is definitely one of the most interesting state ambassador jobs there is, especially since there's always something to keep you busy. So many people now are interested in urban 4-H programs and/or don't know what 4-H is at all and it's fun to teach them. Last night we said the 4-H pledge to 2 different groups of people while I was working at the info booth and later a guy from one of those groups came up to me and recited what the 4 H's are. There's even a printout we've been handing to interested people with contact info for the extension office of their specific county; that seems to help a lot.

Saturday morning I woke up early for the rabbit show, which started at 8 am. I thought that I'd have time to run over to get a barn breakfast, but the line ended up taking forever to get through. My youngest brother had to come find me and tell me that my class, Jersey Wooly rabbits, would be up on the show table really really soon. I practically ran back to the sheep/poultry barn, which also contains the rabbits during livestock weekend, took my rabbit out of it's cage and lined up behind the barn to get ready for the show. Luckily the judge was taking a while so I wasn't really late or anything. I ended up with a blue on my Jersey Wooly Jr doe rabbit, an Interview Finalist polo, and a call-back for showmanship which resulted in a blue ribbon for that also. All of the rabbit kids in my county did really well, with half of us earning interview call-backs.

Last night was the livestock dance, something I've looked forward to every year since my 2nd year taking livestock down to the state fair. My first year, 2002, I didn't really know anybody so I played spoons with some other kids in the dairy barn. This year though, the dance would be different as I had to dance with nearly everybody there and my job was to make sure everyone else was having fun, it wasn't really about me. I did get a sore throat, really dead and sore feet, and needed lots of water breaks, but it was still really fun. This morning I got up to eat breakfast in the 4-H building and then went down to the barns to take care of my rabbit and sometime today I plan on taking a much needed nap, most likely after dinner. Another performance of State Arts-In is just ending and pretty soon I'll be going up to dinner, where I'll probably mingle with some artsies and livestock encampment kids. *Anna Wagner*