Last weekend was the Troy Strawberry Festival. To me, it signifies the beginning of festival season (with Oktoberfest in Minster signalling the end). Since the Adams Street bridge is out (they started construction right after last year’s festival), they couldn’t really hold the festival on the levy like usual, so they held it in downtown Troy.

It was nice, although a bit smaller than usual. My favorite vendors were there, however. I got my strawberry lemon shake-up from the usual lot, and lunch wound up being, for the third year running, a pork chop sandwich (bone-in). Damn good pork chops. I also sampled a strawberry pizza (not a good one, alas), strawberry empanada (tasty and not too sweet), strawberry smoothie (yummy), and strawberries on cheesecake (very nice).

Yesterday was the start of the Lost Creek Garden & Antique Show and mom wanted to get there early to have a good selection of flowers to choose from. Went to her favorite vendor first and she picked out 4 things (which the deer will probably eat, alas!) At another vendor, I bought a hypertufa filled with hardy succulents, which I shall endeavor to not kill. We also had supper there (chicken salad sammich, doritos, cookie, water) and sat on logs to eat.

Today’s Grand Adventure (TM) was visiting the Yellow Springs Street Fair. Usually when we attend it, we can park in Yellow Springs. This year, I think just under 4 billion people were there, and they brought their 3 billion cars with them. Thankfully, there was a shuttle service from Young’s Dairy, so, after going through town & back again, we parked at the shuttle lot & took a blue school bus to the Street Fair.

Despite the crowd, we were able to see most of the booths at the festival. We wound up having lunch from Jeet India‘s booth at the festival. Jeet is where I get my Indian Fud when I go to Fairborn for my Doctor Who Magazines at the Bookery Fantasy. Mom and I had saag paneer, dad had chicken tikka masala, and we all had vegetable samosas and naan with our meals. Very yummy. Once again, we sat on (or near) the ground. (We did this at the Strawberry Festival too – we’re getting good at getting up off of the ground.)

After we returned home, mom and I spent some time at the pool. (We were also there yesterday, before we went to the Garden show.) I used my snorkel and snorkel goggles – woo! I bought them as a birthday gift for me this year, but today was my first time to use ’em. It took awhile of breathing through the mouthpiece to get over my initial panic, but I spent several minutes swimming underwater – twice! I shall have fun practicing this over the summer.

Tomorrow’s Grand Adventure (TM) is the Poultry Days Festival in Versailles (pronounced ver-sales). So I suspect we’ll be having fun and food again tomorrow. Oh, and maybe tomorrow I’ll post about my new bicycle!

Happy October everyone! I was checking on last year’s posts for something and noticed that I only posted twice last October. I hope I’m not so lax this year!

The original plan for the weekend was Oktoberfest on Saturday after mom got off from work. So I decided that Sunday would be cook chilli and bake bread day. Dad came over Saturday morning for breakfast with me at the local UCC that has an all-you-can-eat pancake breakfast on the first Saturday of the month. We had a nice breakfast of pancakes, sausage, and eggs, chatted with lots of folks, then walked back, stopping in to talk to Jack at the bike shop.

Dad returned home, and I did some odds & ends at home, waiting for mom to get off work. But she called later and said it was too cold and rainy, we should go Sunday. I agreed, but later realized that sort of screwed up my chilli and bread plans. And laundry. So I decided to get onto that as early as I could Sunday.

So today, I got up at a sort of reasonable hour (but not as early as I should have). I started laundry, made myself a nice poached egg on toast breakfast (using my flaxseed bread for toast), and headed off to Troy for a few things. First I needed to pick up my new glasses. Got there half an hour early, but needed some stuff so I shopped a bit (my eye doc is at Walmart – heh).

Next to Lowe’s for an air filter for my central air, then Meijer for fruit and chilli supplies. Then back home for cooking, laundry, and baking. The goal was to be done with it all by 3, but it wound up being 4 before I was done. The bread didn’t rise as nice as last week’s – dunno if it’s because of the recipe or because it was cooler in my kitchen this weekend. Smells good – will get to eat some tomorrow.

The folks picked me up at 4 and we headed off to Minster for Oktoberfest. We’re usually there for lunch, and on Saturday. So Sunday afternoon was a bit more crowded than we were used to. Mom zipped us through the crafts pretty swiftly. None of us saw anything we had to have, so then it was on to the food booths.

After looking at all the options, I settled on my usual. Fries and lemon shake-up from one vendor (shared with the folks), and brat mit kraut from another. And the mini-donuts for dessert. Mom picked the elephant ear for dessert. So we shared desserts too. Yum!

It turned out we were only there for little over an hour. But it was a fun time. And I bought Yet Another Oktoberfest Mug to go with the others I’ve collected. Each year, Minster sells a glass mug with a new Oktoberfest logo. The price for the longest time was $8, but it was $9 this year. (Might have raised last year, but I didn’t note it in last year’s entry. Alas.)

Next weekend is more stuff – Fall Fair and the Lost Creek antique show. And this week is supposed to have great weather. Here’s hoping I take advantage of it and get lots of walks in.

This past week, I had a major disagreement with a sinus infection or cold and spent most of my evenings sleeping on Nyquil. But after a horrendous headache on Thursday, I seem to have come out the other end relatively unscathed. Go me!

So today, the folks and I did more Festivalling. In fact, we hit 3 in one day, two of them new for me. We started out at the New Bremen Pumpkin Festival, a first for all of us. New Bremen is a small town not far from mom & dad’s lake cottage. (judiang and I went to New Bremen this summer to visit the Bicycle Museum of America and she took videos with her iPod and recently made YouTube videos of it.)

So anyhoo, the purpose of that festival, apparently, is for pumpkin growers to bring their MONSTER PUMPKINS out for competition. OMG, these things were bigger than kids! I took some pix with my phone and hope to post them later. We didn’t want to wait around for them to weigh the suckers, but they had quite a gizmo up to do the deed. (Before you see the pix, I’ll just quantify this a bit to say they had to use a fork lift to move these pumpkins!)

The only thing I ate at the pumpkin festival was a Belgian Waffle on a stick. Not one of the better festival foods – it was a bit too cakey. Still, we had plans for lunch at Fort Loramie, so that’s where we went next.

The German Heritage Festival is basically an excuse to eat German food and listen to polka. Only no one was there playing polka, so we ate German food and listened to the DJ play stuff like “Hang on Sloopy” (in honor of the OSU Buckeyes). I had jaeger schnitzel on a pretzel bun and Reuben bites with 1000 Island dipping sauce. The tenderloin was very tender and I really liked the Reuben bites. No crafts at this Festival, so mom decided we should go south to the Mum festival next.

We took a short break at the cabin, then another short stop at Sears (so I could get a filter for my air purifier), but eventually got to Tipp City for the Mum Festival. I used to teach at Tipp, but never did get to their Mum festival. So today I rectified that oversight.

Compared to the other two festivals we went to today, the Mum festival is HUGE. Loads of crafts and food. However, no mum-based foodstuffs… So completely unlike Troy’s Strawberry Festival… 😉

Since we’d had lunch in Fort Loramie, my main goal here was dessert. Mom and I were pleased to discover someone selling kettle corn, so we each bought a large bag for later (though we snacked on mine a bit while we walked around). After we were nearly all the way through, I decided to try a deep fried Snickers bar. Since I’d had deep fried Oreos and Twinkies, I felt it best to try candy bars. And OMG – very rich and very tasty. Definitely a surprise.

Dad took us home and then I headed off to my own home, with a stop at the grocery for fresh fruit & veg. My goal is to be productive tomorrow and get my house cleaned & some vegetable soup made. And, if I’m really productive, bake a loaf of bread. May try flaxseed bread. Anyhoo, wish me luck on being productive!

Still a couple of days until we’re really into Autumn, but with out recent cool & pleasant days along with the autumn festivals, it feels like we’re into my favorite season already. Yay!

Last weekend didn’t have much in the way of festivals, but the folks joined me on Sunday for BBQ chicken from the local fire house (their bi-annual fundraiser) and a Netflix stream of Tangled. We enjoyed the food and the movie.

Also last weekend was my first attempt at beer bread that wasn’t from a kit. Turns out beer bread is a pretty simple recipe. Since I had 3 cans of Guinness left from my Guinness brownies, I found a Guinness beer bread recipe and tried it. Pretty tasty, albeit a bit bitter. Really good lightly toasted with butter on.

Yesterday, after work, I joined the folks for an outing to the Lake Festival. At Lake Loramie (where my folks cottage is) they have an annual Antique Power Show and Lake Festival. There’s a group there that sells HUGE pots of mums for $5, so mum gets her mums from there. I decided to buy a pot this year too, so I’ll have some lovely white mums on my porch if I don’t kill the plant first!

We ate brats with kraut for supper there, shared a corn dog, had corn on the cob (still sweet!), and then I decided to try the deep fried Twinkie one group was offering. Wow, who knew that deep frying even makes Twinkies taste good?!

I spent the night with the folks, and this morning (late this morning) we did the Farmer’s Market runs as usual. I bought a red pepper at one (should have gotten my sweet onion from there too) and some Houtz cheese (a hard goat cheese) from the other. I put the cheese in the cooler we brought along just in case they had the cheese this time, and then we went to Taste of Troy.

Several restaurants and businesses had tents at Taste of Troy this year. Rather than being spread out throughout the square, they just had it at Proudy Plaza (where the concerts were held this summer) in order for traffic to still go through the square. I managed to spend $20 worth of tickets on lots of different food things. All pretty tasty. Even have a caramel apple and a piece of peach pie for later.

After we returned, I helped mom move her “new” chair to her bonus room above the garage. Then I headed off to my “shopping chores” before home. In an hour and a half or so, I’m off to Aunt Becky’s for a night of card playing. Don’t need supper, will likely just eat snacks at Becky’s. (I bought Munchies, cuz I’m evil.)

Tomorrow is Rest Up and Do Laundry Day. At work, I’d just like to know what it feels like to be “caught up” again. 🙂 But the weekends are great for having time to enjoy myself. Especially with our wonderful autumn weather!

I spent the weekend at mom & dad’s place. Saturday was a day to swim in the pool and to have grilled burgers. (Earlier in the day, though, we had lunch at Taco Bell.) Sunday was our trip to the Troy Strawberry Festival.

We arrived shortly after it opened at 10am and walked to the levy from the high school parking lot. We started down one side of the levy checking out the crafts and deciding what we’d eat later when we’d gotten hungry. My first purchase, as usual, was a strawberry lemon shake-up. It’s tasty and gives me something to savor while perusing the festival.

An hour or so later, we had gotten to the far end and decided anything we saw at that point that we wanted, we should buy (so we wouldn’t have to go all the way back again). My second purchase was a strawberry empanada (basically a fried strawberry pie). We all agreed it was pretty tasty.

We saw folks we knew at some of the booths, and while the folks were talking to some of their friends at one booth, I bought a strawberry cupcake. Small and tasty with a nice icing (and a slice of strawberry on top).

I was hoping one of the vendors was doing the 1/2 bbq chicken that our firehouse does each Memorial Day Sunday. But since I always have my friends around, I never get to have it anymore. (Silly judiang and elsaf don’t care much for it. No accounting for taste! 😉 Heh.) Alas, none of the booths seemed to be selling it this year, so I went with the winner from last year – the grilled pork chop sandwich. I also bought another container of their rub since I’m running out of the one from last year. The booth was also selling strawberry smoothies, so I got one (the shake-up long since gone).

Mom and I ate our sandwiches (she’d ordered the same) and drank our smoothies while father waited in line for his bourbon street chicken, beans, and rice. When it did arrive, it turned out to be worth the wait. Next year, it’s going to be a harder decision if both the pork chops and the bourbon street chicken are back again. Our final strawberry treat of the festival was a strawberry pizza from Fox’s Pizza Den. A nice and tasty combo of cinnamon’ed pizza crust, fruit dip, and strawberries.

Having spent two hours at the festival, we waddled back to the car (actually, none of us actually felt stuffed, just full, so that was good) and returned to their home. Mom and I returned to the pool and I vegged there for awhile (reading my BeBook or swimming) before finally returning home.

My intention was to do laundry, but I was sleepy, so I had supper and then took a nap. When I later got up, I at least got my sheets and undies cleaned before bedtime. Heh.

If you ask me, this was a good (and tasty) start to my summer vacation. 🙂