The Fair results

I went over yesterday and picked up the crafts I entered in the county fair. I'm happy with the results - 4 blue ribbons, 2 red (they judge on the Iowa system or something like that - no single 1st or 2nd place, they give out multiple blue and red ribbons). And, nice bonuses - there's prize money! Not enough to get rich, just $2 per blue and $1.50 per red, but the photos got enough to pay for the processing. And apparently people were "raving" about the cross-stitch; apparently the fact that I did all that wording impressed them. :)

So, here's what I entered:

A. The cross-stitch project, Web of Life from a JanLynn kit, got a blue.

Not the best picture of it, but I can't find the better one. The design is 11 x 17 total, plus the margins, so it's pretty big.

B. The Burrito's hat got a blue, but lost five points for "general appearance." I think it's because he wore it a bit, and a few of the ends came un-tucked.



C. My red and gold Gryffindor scarf got a blue. No picture of it. It's a red and gold striped scarf, done in acrylic yarn that took forever to find in the right colors.

D. Photos (Full-size versions are on my website, just click on these.)

This moon shot that I threw in as a backup, did the best. It got a blue, although the comment was that if the moon was off-center, it would look better. I like it as is, but I may play with cropping it to see how it looks.

The yellow flowers got a red; it lost 10 points for clarity, 10 for subject matter, 20 for composition (!), and 1 for matting. Apparently there was "too much light" (I think the auto-fix in Paint Shop overexposed it a little) and apparently it's hard to tell where the focal point is.

And now that I look at the comments, this one was supposed to get a white ribbon instead of red. Looks like the judge changed the results, but someone misread things.


The lilies also got a red. It lost 5 points for subject matter, 10 for composition, and 1 for matting. Maybe the judge isn't a fan of lilies. Apparently it could be cropped better (I don't see it, myself) and there was tape visible on the matting. I think the tape in question is where I taped a second piece of whole cardstock to the back of the cardstock mat.