1) Favorite thing about Church Fairs

So far, the favorite thing about the church fairs (and other fair-like events) at St. Stoic is that I get to see what other people, who have been doing this for years, do best. The Chicken BBQ, the juried Art Fair, and the Silent Auction (happening this Sunday) are all lay-led events. What's not to like about people using their talents?

2) Best Item Ever at a Church Fair

Last year at the Art Fair, which was 7 weeks after I started at St. Stoic, I got a beautiful ceramic relief of the front of the church building. It was the first thing I used to decorate my church office when it was finished a month or so later, and I think it will be the first thing I use to decorate every office I have from now on.

3) Opinion of cotton dishcloths, that staple of Church Fairs everywhere

Although not a staple of either the Art Fair or the Auction, there is a drawer full of them at St. Stoic that get pressed into service at the Chicken BBQ. They are incredibly ugly.

4) Major Lunch Offering at your fair or the last fair you attended

At the Art Fair, there is a booth that is run by St. Stoic where we sell the best smoked brisket you ever tasted. The beef is raised, butchered, trimmed, and smoked by one of the members of the search committee that brought me here. No hum-drum burgers or hotdogs for this crowd! Sunday's offering will be chili.

5) Worst Item Ever at a Church Fair

This year there will be a nativity set on the Auction that has caused some hurt feelings, I'm afraid. Someone donated it to church last year and demanded that it be displayed. We have no decent place to display it, and it is so very tiny for the sanctuary space as to be un-useful. The person got very hurt by that, took it back last week and put it on the church Auction block. But I think the resentment lingers, unfortunately. To complicate matters, it is by an artist that I do not know about, was very expensive, and I was not as impressed by the $$$ value of the "gift" as I was supposed to be. Oy!