Swine Showmanship 101

We just had our big livestock show last week. It's always a crazy week, but this year I actually enjoyed it without any stress. My kids are at great ages. They actually did all the work themselves this year, without any help from me...even ironing their show clothes! They all did a great job in showmanship. All four of them got a call-back, and were in the Championship round for their age division. They also did really well in the Livestock Judging contest. Kindra got 1st place in the Junior division, and Brenlon got 2nd place in the Intermediate division and 2nd place overall!



They have a fun competition called the "Older than Dirt" Showmanship. The kids can sign their parents or 4-H leaders up to show their animals. Well, my boys thought it would be really funny to sign me up to show a pig. I think they thought it would teach me a lesson on how hard it is to get in the show ring and make your pig behave, smile, etc. I finally agreed to do it...much to the kids' suprise! I chose to show Jayden's pig, Frederic, because he was the best behaved pig of the four. Much to our suprise, I did a pretty good job (and Frederic was very well behaved), and I was called back for the final round! There were 5 of us "old people" in the final round. I figured I was doing a great job, and actually had a shot at the Champion ribbon. The judge asked us all a really difficult question, and I was the only one to get the answer right. Then the judge took our show sticks away, and made us come and get them at the other end of the ring along the fence. We could only grab our stick if we still had one hand on our pig. The other four got their pigs over there in a wild stampede. It reminded me of when WalMart opens it's doors for the after-Thanksgiving sales. Frederic, being the calm well mannered pig that he was, wanted nothing to do with the mad dash. I couldn't get him near there for the life of me. Finally, someone felt sorry for me, and handed me my stick. At that point, I figured my chances of winning were gone, but I didn't really care....I was just trying to keep smiling while breathing hard and trying not to fall over with fatigue!! They handed out the Reserved Champion ribbon to some guy, and then handed out the Champion ribbon to....(can you believe it!) ME!!! It was really fun. The boys were excited for me, yet groaned a little that their plan backfired. Now people were telling them how I had shown them up! They also didn't appreciate me telling them that now they HAD to listen to me when I told them how to show, as I was a Champion Showman!! HEE HEE! That part was really fun! Of course, we have no pictures of the whole thing. I asked the kids if they went and got the camera and took any pictures. They said, "No, that's your job, Mom." Oh well. Maybe next year.