White, Red, and Blue, Blue, Blue!

Once again, the Solano County Fair has come and gone. It's rather like a rite of mid-summer: the Fair opens, almost nobody shows up except those loonies (like me) that love county fairs, the Fair closes, and I go pick up my entries and a sheaf of ribbons.

This year, I didn't enter any jams, jellies, or pickles in the Preserved Foods competition. Preserved Foods is a bit tricky to do in the Bay Area: most of the county fairs happen just as the major canning season starts, and things have to be put up within 1 year of the opening day of the fair. This means you either spend most of the summer putting up things that won't be judged for nearly a year, or you scramble at the last minute to come up with award-winning entries. I've done both, and won both Best of Show and Reserve Best of Show in both 2004 and 2006. However, I didn't do any canning last summer because it was much too hot, and then we went on vacation for 3 weeks. I tried to do a little canning right before the deadline, but my heart really in it this year, and I wasn't satisfied with the results, so I just passed on entering anything.
I made up for the lack of Preserved Foods by entering a bunch of different things in different Textile and Baked Goods classes. Even though I was hampered by a bad can of baking powder--Clabber Girl, the baking powder I've used for the past 40 years seems to have been reformulated to remove any trans-fats (in baking powder?!?) and doesn't act the same as the old baking powder--I still had 9 of 10 entries finish "in the money," and 5 of the 9 had blue ribbons tacked up next to them. I did nearly as well in the fiber arts: 6 of 7 entries finished in the money, and 3 won blue ribbons.

But wait! There's more!

I came home Friday evening, and there was a telephone message from someone at the Solano County Fair, telling me I had won a "special award," and that I and two guests were being "comped" admission to the Fair on Saturday, so I could be present at the awards ceremony at 6:00 p.m. As we were already going to the Fair with a bunch of friends, and had a fistful of comped admission tickets already, I didn't worry about retrieving the comp tickets. We went off to the Fair, spent an hour buying different snack-like foods (corn dogs; garlic fries) that went well with beer, and made our way over to the MacCormack Building for the big awards ceremony. We got there early, snagged perches on a couple benches, and waited. And waited. AND WAITED. Nearly an hour after the ceremony was supposed to start, it finally did...with the announcements of the winners of the different 4H awards. Now, I don't have a problem with 4H, and it was sort of cute (for the first 10 minutes) to see these little kids go up to receive little trophies and cash prizes for growing 28-lb. cabbages, making the best jam, or stuffing and mounting a buffalo head. However, it was hot (the MacCormack Building doesn't have air conditioning), everybody was tired, and we missed several hours of the fair.

However, the Fair officials finally got the end of all the kids' awards, and announced that Meyer Cookware Co. had donated two of their 5-piece bakeware sets for a Cookie Bake-Off, so all the cookie entries had been entered. A little girl who won for her baking won the Junior Division Cookie Bake-Off, then the official doing the emceeing said, "During the entry check-in, a woman came in with all these entries, and when I said she must be hoping to win at least one blue ribbon, she said, 'I don't do this for the blue ribbons...I'm going for the Best of Show, Reserve Best of Show, and the Sweepstakes.' Well, she didn't win those, but her cookie entry was loved by every one of the judges. The winner of the Senior Division Meyer Cookie Bake-Off is Dawn Jacobson!" The Lizzies, made from a recipe from my grandmother's cousin Mary, had won what turned out to be this year's top prize. I was both very pleased (it's a great recipe) and very embarrassed (Did I really sound that arrogant?) as I went up, posed for a "grab it and grin" photo, and got my set of bakeware, to the cheers and applause of my friends and the rest of the crowd.

So, the results:

Blue (1st Place) Ribbons:
--Banana Bread (my grandmother's recipe wins for the second year in a row)
--Streusel Coffee Cake
--Carrot-Pineapple Muffins
--Lizzies
--Lemon-Poppyseed Bread
--Handspun Yarn, 2-ply, Other Than Wool (SoySilk)
--Handspun, Handknitted Item (Monmouth Cap)
--Handknitted Item, Other (Child's Vest)

Red (2nd Place) Ribbons:
--Currant Scones
--Handspun Yarn, 2-ply, Wool (Corriedale)
--Handknitted Item, Socks

White (3rd Place) Ribbons:
--Hot Milk Cake
--Chile-Cheese Cornbread
--Nut Brown Bread
--Handspun Yarn, Singles, Wool (Suffolk)