Best of Show

Ahem. Exciting news 'round these parts. SOMEbody's painting won Best of Show at the Utah State Fair!

And maybe SOMEbody kind of, sort of, freaked out when she saw the ribbons. And maybe started screaming and jumping up and down. And maybe pointed out to everyone she could that John was the artist. (And maybe also bragged about it to random strangers at a convention she had to go to for work last week when she overhead them saying they were going to the Fair.) Gosh, who would do such a thing? So embarrassing...

On top of Best of Show, Johnny's painting also won the Shirley Venus Memorial Art Fund Excellence in Art ribbon AND the People's Choice Award. It was quite fun to see people's reactions as they looked at it. They would get super close to it for closer examination and then say things like, "No way!" "That has to be a photograph...how is that a painting?" "I don't get it." One couple was even convinced that it was computer-generated. Ha. (I watched him paint it, people. I can verify that it is, indeed, a painting.) We talked to the lady in charge and when she found out John's was "the car painting," her eyes lit up. She told us the judges went CRAZY over it and were thisclose to bumping him up to the Professional category (John entered it in Amateur, figuring he would have a better shot at getting a ribbon. Umm, pretty sure he would have done just fine in the Professional category...just sayin'.) She also asked if it was for sale. To which we replied, if the price is right. Holy moly. We're movin' on up in the world!

Other fun things we did at the Fair?

-Ate greasy, deep-fried, kind-of-gross, kind-of-delicious food.

-Danced like fools with the nephews during one of the musical acts.

-Had light saber battles.

-Enjoyed the royal butter sculpture.

-Booked it over to see the little piggies before the Fair closed up for the night, whereupon I discovered that they perhaps smell the worst of all the farm animals. But those piglets are maybe the cutest things in all the livelong world.

All in all, we had a grand time. Email me if you would like John's autograph. I don't know if you've heard, but he's kind of a big deal these days. :)