In the short and sweet event, the pairs walked around the covered show ring with the bleating sheep before introducing themselves and their animals to everyone watching.
Each of the children participating through Reliable Enterprises got a chance to introduce themselves and receive a blue ribbon from an event organizer and local 4-H leader Peggy Erven.
Reliable Enterprises is a Centralia-based nonprofit with more than 10 programs, many of which are dedicated to helping local residents with disabilities.
After making a few laps around the show ring and receiving their ribbons, the youths headed out to the field behind the blue barn for a photo opportunity where parents and families took the chance to snap pictures.
As the participants waited for family and friends to finish up, they chatted among themselves. Volunteers and participants talked about their animals or showed their partners tricks to handling the sheep. By the end, every kid was smiling and one sheep was wearing a cowboy hat.
This was the first year of the small event that was coordinated between Erven and Lewis County Parent to Parent Coordinator Shawna Haller, who works with Reliable Enterprises. The two said they hope that they can make it a regular occurrence. They plan on doing it again at the Spring Youth Fair in May 2026 and at next year's Southwest Washington Fair.
Haller said the idea originally came from a video of another fair doing a similar style event. While it took some organizing on Haller's part to let parents know about the opportunity, Erven said arranging for the young exhibitors in her group was quite easy. She said when she asked for volunteers, she had many more come forward than they could even end up using.
One of the young volunteers who said she had been showing since she was 3 years old said she volunteered looking to help kids who hadn't been able to do these activities already.
She said she can't wait to do it again.
After the event, Erven said her hope for the event was to show local families that their children are welcome and wanted at the fair and in local 4-H groups.
“Every group has members with different abilities, and some are more profound than others,” Erven said. “We wanted to do an outreach to parents in that community to make sure they knew that 4-H and the fair have always been inclusive.”
During the event, one parent, Cassandra Whitaker, walked with her son and his partner and a sheep. After the event, she said she signed her son up hoping to expose him to the fair and share with him something that she had grown up with.
“I wanted to give him an inclusive experience at the fair,” Whitaker said. “My dad showed pigs. I did sewing and cooking in 4-H growing up. It was important to give him an experience that normally we wouldn't be able to do. I’m hoping that he can get comfortable around animals, and in the future he might want to do it again.”
The Southwest Washington Fair continues through Sunday.
Learn more and plan your visit at https://southwestwashingtonfair.org.
