I love seeing other people’s dogs and so does my son, so I am almost always up for an event tailored to dogs. The Pet Expo had the added benefit of being tailored to all pets, and I thought it would have more things tailored to my cat-loving self. I encouraged another family to join us. My friend asked me if it was just going to be browsing pet products – “I don’t think so”, I said. While browsing booths is always part of events like these, I told her I was going for the pet shows, kid’s zone and free stuff.
I was wrong; it was almost all browsing booths. While it was at the Convention Center, it was not all the large. We were there for the talent contest, sadly the entries were sparse and the tricks were few. Not much they could do about it since the entries came people who were there at the time. The stage was small and people stood all around, most of the dogs were afraid of the crowd. We were also there during a rescue dog parade – which was just calling dogs up on the stage, it was also not the best “show”.
I was embarrassed about the kid’s zone. My friend has a son that is older than mine. He wanted to do something “fun” and I told him about the kids zone that we would end with. I hadn’t been to the kid’s zone when I was telling him about it, but when we made our way to that “area”, it wasn’t an area with kids activities or anything free for them to do. One booth was set up and they did spray tattoos. They were more expensive than we wanted to spend.
The free stuff was not all the abundant either; in fact it was the least amount of samples I have gotten at any pet tailored event I have been to, bigger or smaller. Stone Mountain had some sample bags of food (and some for cats); we got some probiotics, and poop bags. A few booths had wheels the kids could spin – or plinko style games. We got a couple pieces of candy and an unblow-up balloon. We did buy some pet treats that were cute.
They did have lizards, parrots, and cats that you could look at too. While I sound down on the event, it was fine place to kill some time, I just wouldn’t have invited others with me if I knew what it was like. For people not trying to entertain dog loving toddlers or if you didn’t have a dog you wanted to enter in the contest, it probably isn’t the most fun. The Convention Center did have a craft bar, we stopped there to entertain our husbands. The kids ran around the vacant couch areas playing with their balloons.
On the way home I convinced my husband to take a “short detour” to Chalkfest. I knew he would like it, and he did. The area was very small; we walked the whole section and went to the bathroom in 30 minutes. We came at the end of the first day, not many designs were complete yet, which is too bad because it stormed the next day. It was fun to see the talent of the artists. I would recommend going next year if you are in the area. It was an interesting stop.
Keep Entertained 