Full Table

I entered 30 classes at the Cupar Show, split about 50/50 between crafts and baking. On the whole I am really pleased with how I did for a first attempt – I know people say “It’s all about taking part” and to some extent they are right, but if you have gone to a lot of trouble doing something, it is nice to think that other people liked what you did and thought it was of high quality.

Anyway, most (but not all) of the things I put in won some sort of prize, even though there were not many entries in some classes, so I think I had at least one “third out of three”.  One observation which actually makes sense is that I did better in bakery than in crafts (I got three firsts in baking while the best I did in crafts was second) – I have been baking for 50 years and only seriously doing craft things for the last two or three.

Another observation is that (like the heart of God) it is hard to know the mind of judges; some of the things I thought were really good did nothing, whilst others that I thought were frankly crap did very well.

My very best thing that I ever made, “Lurk the Eden Crocodile” got second (hand on heart I must admit that I thought he was better than the first prize winner), and my flower pillow stuffed with lavender won nothing at all.  On the other hand what I thought was a rather indifferent chocolate tray bake one first prize and a loaf of bread from the bread maker that took five minutes to make got a second.

I put everything back on the table at home to make a bit of a show of my own.

These were my winnings – £27.50 – which sounds like a good rate of return considering the show only cost £5 to enter.  However, this is before you factor in the cost of all the crafting materials and ingredients.