County Fair Time

The county fair was this past weekend.  Last year, I entered a few quilts/quilty things in the Home Arts department and walked away with one honorable mention.  The judges were helpful and left constructive criticism on the back of each of my tags which basically boiled down to:  LEARN TO BIND CORRECTLY!  The good news is, I have learned to bind correctly thanks to a kind neighbor.  And, this year, I reaped the benefit with two second places and two third places.  Not too shabby!

However, the big surprise was I entered a few jams and pickles in the canning division and the outcome was much better than I anticipated!

 

So apparently I make pretty delicious strawberry and blackberry jam.  Bea peeled the skins from all the tomatoes I canned, so that blue ribbon for canned tomatoes is hers, too.  She was pretty thrilled at the prospect of winning first!  The only downside is that since everything is tasted and left in the building for 4 days, you have to be willing to part with an ENTIRE JAR OF PICKLES if you want to enter them. 

Here’s a snapshot of my canning pantry in the dining room after my efforts this summer:

And here are two gratuitous photos of my kitchen helpers:
Esther making her world famous fruit salad and Veronica helping fill the dishwasher.