Adrenaline Rush

The Ault Fall Festival is this week end. Standard small town stuff: a parade consisting of tractors, politicians, horses, and cheerleaders; old (antique) farm machinery display; games in the park for the children; lawn mower races; Sunday pancake breakfast at the fire house; and an arts/crafts fair in the old gym at the high school. So I gathered up a few flowers and vegetables and my lady bug quilt to enter them in the small town competition. Entering such a competition is always a bit of an adrenaline rush. I have no illusions for there are amazing quilters and gardeners who submit their best work every year. Now I am not quilter. My daughter who is an amazing seamstress decided that I should make a quilt some years back. I finally got the quilt top quilted this spring. When I told Jen that I was taking flowers over to the gym, she said that I should enter the quilt, so I did. I had seen one in Cold Water Creek Catalog and deciding that it was far too expensive to buy, I designed my own quilt and with help of my daughter got it pieced together.

There really isn't much in the garden. The cucumbers are producing like crazy, the egg plants seem to be doing well, but the bell peppers are struggling, the tomatoes are quite slow this year, but here are my entries. Last year the egg plant took reserve champion. An egg plant of all things.

Gardening in Colorado has been challenging this year.We had no moisture all winter, then all of our normal rain fall for the year came in May (7 inches), making getting the garden started hard.
We didn't get a lot of things planted that I normally plant and everything else seems to be coming on later.

It's late in the summer now, so some of the flowers are on the down side of blooming. Grasshoppers have invaded, and it has been hot and dry. But there are a few beauties left to choose from: the stargazer lily, new to the garden this year. I planted three that I ordered for White Flower Farms last fall. This one is the first to bloom. I was so excited to see it opening up yesterday. Cosmos: dad always called them weeds, but I love their simple little blooms. So do the bees and butterflies. The sunflower certainly is nothing to brag about because it is one the wild ones that come up every year on their own. Last year mine came in second. I happened to run into the judge who said it was a tough decision between the sunflower and the grand champ. I don't remember what won the grand champion, but it was a deserving award. I'd have been embarrassed for my wild sunflower to win. Finally, a day lily. I don't even know if day lilies hold up once they have been cut. This one was a new bloomer this year too.  It has been in the garden for awhile. My husband ordered it from Oakes Day Lilies catalog and we had sorta forgotten it about. The color does not really show up in the photo. It is a creamy yellow with a blush of pink around the edges.

So later today I will wander over to the gym--we are just a short walk away-- to see the show's results. If nothing else, having my name on a few entries at the little fair lets people I never see any more know that I as still around.