I grew up in the country — back roads, starry skies, well water, woods to explore. But I did not grow up on a farm. I know very little about livestock and I can’t even identify basic farm equipment.

(“Tractor” is as specific as I get. Well, maybe “green tractor” or “red tractor.”)

However, the fact that I’m a non-farm girl who’s become fairly suburbified (and yes, I just made up that word) does not prevent me from enjoying the county agricultural fair.

So Chad and I took the boys to the fair last night.

After some quick calculations in my head, I realized it had been nearly 20 years since I’d been to a real, actual county fair — complete with 4-H exhibits, animal barns, and assorted competitions that might perplex your average city-dweller.

Clearly, it had been too long. But I was looking forward to embracing my rural (if not quite farm-y) roots and exposing the kids to some new experiences.

It quickly became apparent that my kids are also not farm-kids — well, one of them, at least.

As soon as we arrived, we visited several barns, encountering cows, goats, and chickens. L.(4) was caught up in all-things-animal, and when we walked past a family who had brought their Boston Terrier along, L. pointed at the poor dog and shouted, “Cat!!!”

Forget livestock — obviously, we’re still working on basic pet identification. The sad thing is, we had a cat for many years, so you’d think he could tell the difference. But I guess L. hasn’t had much experience with Boston Terriers, so the poor thing was labeled a cat last night. He (the dog, of course) must have been mortified.

Putting the dog/cat incident behind us, we checked out more animals (the rabbits were especially cute), picked up some hot dogs, and headed for the Hay Hauling Competition.

To be completely honest with you, I didn’t know what a hay hauling competition was. I mean, I could see that there was a big pile of 30 or so hay bales in the middle of the arena. And I gathered — from the title of the competition — that said hay was going to be hauled.

But that’s all I knew.

I didn’t know if it was going to be hauled by people or animals, or whether machines or equipment would be used. I didn’t know where it would be hauled to or how someone would win.

But it sounded interesting. And besides, it was hot and muggy out, so sitting down and watching an event sounded more inviting than hiking through over-heated livestock barns.

In case you — like me — have never been to a hay hauling competition, I’ll give you the basic idea. Teams of 3 compete against each other to load 30-some bales of hay in a pickup truck, drive around an obstacle course (hoping the hay stays stacked) and unload the bales back to their original formation on the ground. Fastest time wins. There are other rules about how many layers of bales they need to have in their truck, but I didn’t absorb all those details.

At first glance, the idea of watching people stack & unstack hay and drive around in a circle does not sound too exciting. But we were fascinated.

Those hay-hauling boys were fast and strong. And the tension in the arena — as the pickups went over the bumps in the obstacle course, testing the integrity of their stacks — was palpable. I found myself holding my breath, hoping that the hay wouldn’t topple after all their hard work.

One of the best parts for me was that an old-timer was sitting directly behind me, offering commentary to his friend throughout the competition. He was full of opinions, and if he didn’t approve of a hay-stacking job, he let it be known: “That there is the Leaning Tower of Piece-a, that’s what that is.” Sure enough, that hay formation didn’t survive the first bump in the course.

After we left the hay hauling event, we got the boys some milkshakes and headed over to watch the Horse Pulls. I have to be honest: the horse pulls were a little boring. Well, the actual 5 seconds or so when the horses were pulling a tremendous amount of weight behind them was pretty incredible. But it took so long to set up each pull that we got a little restless. L., especially, was not pleased, and repeatedly attempted to leave us, wandering as far as he dared along the bleachers.

We wandered around the fair for a little while longer, and stopped in the pig barn to check out the week-old piglets (adorable). After walking through rows and rows of pigs, C.(11) declared that I would have a hard time getting him to eat ham-related products ever again. I’m not sure I believe him, but we’ll see. (I happen to know he has a weakness for bacon.)

Finally, it became clear that L. was nearing his bedtime and his county fair limit. It was time to leave. Our trip to the fair was a fun-filled adventure, and we were all glad we went. Now we’re wondering if we should stop back some other evening to check out the monster truck show or the school bus demolition. I’ll make country boys out of my kids yet.