Ah, the start of the autumn season of festivals. Labor Day weekend was the Piqua Heritage Festival. This weekend was the Lake Festival at Lake Loramie. Next week, the town of Fort Loramie has a German Heritage Festival. And of course the first weekend in October will be Minster’s Oktoberfest.

The folks and I headed to the Lake Festival and Antique Power Show today. They have antique & vintage tractors and other farm implements, including a working steam-driven thresher which we saw in action. Some amazing technology, even though it’s now rather obsolete. Mom bought a couple of nice BIG pots of mums at the first vendor we stopped at. Only $5 a pot and, as I said, BIG. She got the dark red ones – I liked those best. We didn’t buy much in the little vendor booths, though I did find a neat wind ornament to replace the one I had bought years ago at the Arts & Eats festival in Plymouth, MI that I attended with elsaf and judiang. (The major difference being the ornament I bought today was $10, the one from that festival was at least $50, IIRC. Heh. Alas, it’s almost rusted away to nothing, hence the need for a replacement.)

Food was next on our agenda. No festival visit is complete without munching on the goodies. The Lake Festival doesn’t have quite as much selection as the ones in Piqua or Minster, but we all found something to eat. I had a brat (the world’s smallest one, I think – dad’s was much bigger!) with kraut, onions & mustard on it. In preparation for Oktoberfest. Mom got us all an ear of roasted corn – it was very yummy. Then I followed the meal with a funnel cake. As we were leaving the festival, I saw the Old Fashioned Ice Cream booth (powered by one of the antique power machines) and decided to get a scoop of homemade chocolate ice cream. Yummy – although the stuff I make is better. Heh heh.

After the festival, we returned to the cottage where I read some of my school work (college) and then fell asleep. Darn that Lake Effect Sleep. When I woke later, mom dragged me into a game of gin rummy. We broke for supper at a nearby Mexican restaurant we’d not tried before (dad and I agreed that it was OK, but it won’t make our top pick for Mexican joints). There’s also a new toy store near it which we checked out. It was quite a cute place – lots of neat stuff.

We finished the game when we got back (mom won) and by then it was going home time. So I packed up my college stuff and drove on home. Tomorrow, there’s a family reunion, and then I must work in earnest on my college stuff.