New Year's Eve in Arkansas

So we headed down to the beautiful square in the center of Fayetteville for First Night. We came upon the structure for the Hog Drop:



(Ella is doing her self-created Razorbacks sign.) Unfortunately, the machinery didn't work, as we found out later...but it worked out for the best.

Anyway, we then went in and chatted with Trout Fishing in America:



They're terrifically nice guys about to mark thirty years of making music together. Assuming the recording worked right, we'll probably play the interview a week from Saturday. They put on a great show:



It was cold outside (low 30s), so I think they got more people inside than they might have otherwise. Kids (including ours and the cousins) were dancing and having fun, and cousin Ty (and my brother and sister-in-law) picked up some merchandise, which they got autographed.

We then went outside for a bit to watch the puppet parade, which was hard to photograph but really neat:



We also saw a fun magic show and a very entertaining juggling act.

As the evening progressed, I decided we couldn't make it all the way to midnight - as mentioned, it was cold and we were all getting tired. But once we got home to the grandparents, we decided we should have a celebration there, so we had one at midnight, albeit midnight eastern time. We even had a hog drop:



Our hog drop worked, unlike the one at the town square.

And hats and noisemakers:



(In addition to Ella, that's official Spare the Rock Uncle Mike and Cousin Ty.)

Happy New Year, everyone!