Fair Time!

During the home-stretch of my first semester of graduate school, I got to have weekend of Newport Fair activities.  This was my second time visiting the fair, so I was really excited to visit again!  The Newport Fair is Virginia's oldest agricultural fair, so how appropriate it was that I helped with the livestock show.

I arrived at the barns to see lambs and a few goats and chickens.  The kids were decked out in their colorful plaid shirts and blingin' belts, something that us dairy show kids, who were required to wear all white, never had the pleasure of wearing.  My biggest contribution to the show was getting the prize money ready and being a copying machine for the classes with my old Giles FFA friends Alisha and Katheryn.  It was great to catch up with them while watching the wee-ones show the critters.

We did run into a snag when it came to judging the chickens.  Although I have some poultry judging in my past, judging rooster-hen pairs was not a part of any contest I did.  It just so happens that the only class I had more than one contestant in was the pairs.  The two pairs were different breeds as well.  The judge for the show was more specialized in livestock, not poultry, so the job of placing them landed on me and Jeannie.  After some creative brainstorming, Jeannie decided to place them into "small breed pairs" and "large breed pairs" so that way, all were winners and no one got to blame the intern...more than necessary.

Toward the end of the show I got to announce the participants in the "costume contest" portion of the show.  It was extra cute because of Jeannie's son, Layton participating along with the goats!  Following the overload of cuteness, we had a nice potluck behind the barn for the participants and their families.  It was a tasty way to wrap up the show and avoid overpriced fair-food.  Even though I missed the horse-pull due to clean-up, I enjoyed the rest of my evening by hanging out with a few friends.

Layton and his lamb, Wesley
(photo by Jeannie)

Bright an early on Sunday, we came back to clean up the grounds.  Never in my life have I more appreciated janitors and grounds-keepers.  People are disgusting.  But we got the grounds cleaned and raised some money for 4-H in the process!

It's been years since I've attended any fair, so being a part of Newport brought me back to my youth.  I loved seeing the 4-H er's hard work paying off.  At the same time, they made friends and saw old ones.  I had expressed my excitement for the Newport Fair for a while, and many Giles County friends wondered why.  "It's really small," they would say.  The Newport Fair celebrates heritage,community, and agriculture things that I love to see anywhere, especially rural southwest Virginia.  This event gave me a fun and relaxing way to appreciate the simplier yet important things in life.