Our county fair is an important event to everyone here at The Arc of Delaware County. In fact, for many people in the county this event takes center stage especially for the residents of Walton, N.Y. where the fair takes place. You might say that fair week is part of the way of life!
Excitement abounds and preparations begin weeks, if not months in advance of visiting the fair. People set goals of saving money for the fair, deciding what favorite foods will be enjoyed, and what favorite items to spend money on. Dates are made with friends days in advance to share lunch or a spin around the midway together. Animals are cleaned and prepared for judging, finishing touches to handcrafted items are made readying them for judging. Itemes are produced for sale at vendor booths and last but certainly not least, tractors of all sizes are readied to pull and demolition derby cars receive their finishing touches. They jump on the track to get everyone’s blood pumped for the smashing and crashing into each other and produce an excitement like no other!
For the first time, our agency had it’s own booth in the new commercial tent! Good things come to those who wait. We were on a list in hopes of space opening up, and it did with the addition of a new commercial tent. The rain didn’t stop us from having a great time! Many community members stopped by our booth to say hi, ask us some really great questions about The Arc, color a poster or become a member. We had a great time with a daily blanket draw and sold ticketts to our beautiful quilt raffle. Be sure to scroll through and see some of the great pictures we took while attending the booth. We are an amazing team here at The Arc of Delaware County and true to form, the dedication of our team members made for a fantastic experience!
A HUGE shout out and special thank you to all who assited in manning the booth. You were all amazing!
What an exciting time for us as we represented in just about every catagory at the fair! Smiles were a mile wide, dreams came true and hearts burst with pride to be a part of the county fair.
Studio 190 introduced their Unity Blooms to the public for retail sale and were the featured artists in the Art building on Friday. Their exibit as featured artist was spectacular! Check out the pictures below. They also out did themselves with our featured “garden spots” at the entry of the Art building. The wire art cow and large wooden Unity Bloom sculptures were mentioned by many.
A moment we won’t soon forget was when Sammie Conklin got to make a dream come true and drive in the demolition derby!
Sammie has been an avid derby fan for many years. He can recite specific heat winners in certain derby years and often knows who took the hardest hit. The Delaware County Fair writes, “Usually Sammie does the countdown for the first heat each year, but this year, thanks to his friends Katie and Zack Backus, mom Beth and the entire Fair community, Sammie not only ran his own car, but he won the first-place trophy!” We’re not sure what was more moving, watching Sam realize a life dream or watching the outpouring of love from the community he lives in.
Sam also showed sheep and pigs and one of his pigs took a blue ribbon!
Kristiana Volpe was not only a big help to us while setting up our exibit booth but she also entered some of her craftmanship for judging.
Warren Stelter got in on the fun, demonstrating excellence and dedication in the garden tractor pull. It was hard to imagine a happier face as Warren pulled with that tractor for all it was worth, eventually popping a wheeling to get as far as it could possibly go! The high fives were soaring as high as the smiles were wide!
Many of our friends showed dedication and excellence through their crafts, talents and entries.
Jamie entered cookies. Joseph has been busy making paracord bracelet’s proudly entered for judging. Michael entered a blanket and a hat set. Doris, who has been producing lovely jewelry for quite some time, entered a necklace and bracelet. Missy created two beautiful tablerunners for judging and Edson entered tomatoes he grew. Terressa V., Shannon, Jenna and Andy entered their artwork as well.
We hope you take another moment to scroll through the pictures below and enjoy the fair as much as we did.
We would love to hear from you! Reach out anytime to learn more about us and get to know us! Our community means the world to all of us!
