blue and red ribbons

This year I decided that it was about time for me to suck it up and enter some of my photographs in the Davis County Fair. It sounds silly I guess because it is just Davis County, but I was worried I would get my socks knocked off by the incredible talent around here. Well, Taylor and Allie both have taken some fantastic pictures this year and I thought that more than anything I wanted them to have the experience of competing (and I thought they would rock!) So, I couldn't very well make them enter w/o entering myself so off to the printer for some foam mounting I went. I was a little discouraged when I looked up the rules and regs because it said that if you sell any of your photographs for money then you had to enter the Professional division - sigh. I was hoping to enter the adult amature division because I thought my chances would be a little better. I ended up entering two different classes, my awesome sunset picture went to landscapes and my cute picture of the twins went to portaiture. Allie entered in the youth division, flower catagory and Taylor entered the youth division for landscapes with an incredible sunset pic he took on Easter while fiddling with the camera trying to get a good pic of Laurel Anne. I thought my picture of the sunset would do well but I wasn't too hopeful about the portait, mostly because most professional photographers take portaits for a living and so I thought that of all the classes, pro portaiture would be swimming with entries, and I was right, tons of really incredible work. We missed the awards breakfast because our Saturday was crazy as usual so we had to wait until we picked our pictures up to find out if they had won anything. To our delight,
Allie won FIRST PLACE in her class,

and Taylor won SECOND PLACE for his class!

As for me? Well, my sunset picture didn't even place! I was kind of bummed until....I saw a BLUE RIBBON on my portait of the twins! HOLY CRAP! I won first place in the pro portaiture class! I seriously can't believe it, and like I said at the beginning, it is just Davis County, it's not like I was invited to do a gallery in New York or anything, but I have to say, it does feel very nice. A little pat on the back and some bragging rights that I really needed. Funny how those things always come when you need them most, huh? So, now we're thinking that since they're already mounted and ready, why not enter them into the state fair? I'll let you know.... Here's to taking great photographs! :)