Saturday, October 19, 2013

Small Town Living

The first full week in October always means one thing to Manheim, Pennsylvania - Farm Show.  It is the last in the farm show series.  And to some this might seem weird, but all the small towns in the surrounding area have farm shows and fairs.  Living in rural Pennsylvania lends itself to 4-H and FFA and other organizations that will encourage the historical roots of agriculture and farming in this area. 

This year Bella's friend told her that she was going to run for Farm Show Princess again, she had run the year before.  Bella asked her about it as we were not as familiar with this side of Farm Show.  Bella then asked me if she could run.  I looked into it and decided it wouldn't hurt to commit to the criteria listed.  It was basically like a pageant, but for Farm Show.  In the end because of her age she was in the Junior Queen Category where she made the court and eventually proved to be first runner up or "Junior Queen Alternate".  She and I were thrilled. 

To get this far she had to do an interviewing process with a panel of judges, prepare a 3 minute speech, memorize and present it and fill out forms about her involvement in the community.  As the alternate she got to help judge certain events and hand out awards and ribbons later throughout the week, she always had to wear her sash while at the farm show and she got to be on the royalty float.  Because of such emphasis on these things and my ended term as Women's Club of Manheim President, where I no longer had to oversee a food both, Farm Show seemed really different to me this year.

Sadly in the end, a hurricane blew up the coast causing horrible weather to cancel the Farm Show the last day and a half.  Our town flooded once again, but as always we are resilient and back at it.  But I still have a trove of pictures to remember some of our favorites of farm show week.





1 comment:

RETA said...

Lovely BlogSpot! Nice going, Bella! I LOVE your pictures!