Texas State Fair

On Friday, I went to the Texas State Fair with friends... or perhaps people I thought were friends, given the amount of fried food they allowed me to ingest in a six-hour period!

Here they are, contemplating our next fried adventure.

Here we are near Big Tex, the annual dual mascot and welcome wagon. You can always find yourself at the fair by examining your relationship to Big Tex... literally and metaphorically.

The fair is out in the State Fair grounds, permanent structures that remind me of NYC's Rockefeller Plaza: art deco and monumental...

with lots of exaggerated, symbolic maidens...

and hard-working blue-collar guys...

We saw butter sculpture: this year's entry was a complete Old West Saloon scene, with butter bar, butter bartender, butter saloon girl...

butter dog and walls...

and butter fireplace, table, and stools (the "brick" thing on the left was the fireplace, complete with faux fabric flames).

Forgive the flash lights: it is all behind glass, and I took terrible pictures!

We also looked at the women's handwork: quilts, clothing, and so forth, with handsewing, crochet, knitting, embroidery, needlepoint, crewelwork, and any other kind of handwork you can imagine. Gorgeous stuff, that reminded me very much of the work my grandmothers, aunts, great-aunts, and mom taught me.

 

This is three quilts, hanging 'way above our heads. I'll include more of them in a later post, because they are simply spectacular and should get the attention they deserve. The colors, the quality of the quilting and applique, all of it was incredible.

We also saw the work of the Master Pumpkin Carver on two massive pumpkins. Here's the less scary one.

We also ate our weight--or perhaps cholesterol count--in fried foods, but that too is another day's tale. I'll simply leave you with this: fried pickles, fried green tomatoes, fried butter, fried Oreos, fried potato laces, fire-and-ice (fried pineapple), and fried bacon. That's right: deep-fat-fried bacon.

Mmmm, good.

Pearl