Mom Being Da Bomb at the Utah State Fair

Several weeks ago this slacker of a blogger met up with her family at the Utah State Fair. This family included my parents, my brother Kyle, and his wife Rachel. My beloved Clayton couldn’t join us because he was at a choir rehearsal. He sings in the BYU Concert Choir, and he sings in an acapella old school Barbershop Club. I sing in the church congregation.

I don’t know too much about the State Fair, other than it happens every year, you can check out a bunch of cows, people try to sell you things you don’t need, and there is divine Dippin’ Dots ice cream. But this year, there were two very special things about the fair.

The Haunted House

Mom totally won an award for this creation of hers at the State Fair. My mom has a passion for Halloween, and she’s always wanted to make a haunted house dollhouse. “Dollhouse” seems too girly to be in a phrase with “haunted house,” but really, that’s what this project started out as—a white, pink and girly Fisher dollhouse. Over the years Mom had collected tiny Halloweeny things from the D.I. and other places. But then, on one inspirational and probably sunny morning when the birds were singing, the time came to become the master builder on a tiny and creepy scale. Mom painted every inch of the girlyness away. She added flooring of various kinds, wallpaper, and her own little electrical system. She added chandeliers, framed pictures, furniture, and then the monsters, each with their own room and theme.

The funnest part for me through all this was getting to touch everything. I’ve touched literally everything in that little house, and I actually mean literally in the way it’s supposed to be used. Every time she added something new, I zeroed in on it and had to touch it.

Occupants: Dracula, a Witch, the Mummy, Werewolf, Creature from the Black Lagoon, Frankenstein and his monster, and a bunch of ghouls, ghosts, spiders, rats, bats, skeletons, the Grim Reaper...it's a monster mash.

Oh, there was a point to all this awesomeness. Mom entered her artwork into the State Fair. It was a hit! Children and adults everywhere (especially the children) were mesmerized by this haunted creation. She won the People’s Choice award, which is a big deal, because there are like a zillion categories for every artwork, so everyone had an award of some kind. But not the People’s Choice! Go Mom! It’s more than just the award too that’s uber cool. We were about as interested in the people who goggled at her Haunted House as they were in the house. It was happy and fascinating to see the delight that her masterpiece brought to their faces.

Behold the artist and her creation

 

Behold the admirers of her creation

The artwork that probably would have been the People’s Choice if Mom’s house hadn’t been there is this big guy, made completely out of car parts:

There was also this one creation, a board covered with more toys than you can imagine and coated in silver paint. The goal was to find Waldo, who apparently has some color and can be seen if you look at the board from a certain side. Naturally, this produced some funny reactions in people. Adults and children of all ages lined up by this strange thing, squinting their eyes and tilting their heads, and murmuring “Alright, where is he?” It’s so funny what art brings out in people.

The Lemurs

Thanks to my friend Sarah Lay, I found out that for 5 dollars, I could hold a lemur! I love animals, especially furry ones. I got to hold two babies! They were clinging to each other in a way that they could roll up into one big ball. They’re pretty little creatures, with really big yellow eyes.

This is what my family did while I got to hold the little guys:

Dad still had his boot to support his recovering ankle, and had been on his feet for a big chunk of the day. The boot was at last taking its toll on his heel, but he was a trooper to the very end.