The junior fair coordinator, Debi Heiks, made sure that I felt welcome at the Ottawa County Fair. She gave me a cool t-shirt that has the fair name on the front and the quote, "My animals eat better than I do" on the back. Her daughter, Demi, was the Ottawa County Junior Fair Queen last year. I had the pleasure of meeting Demi at the OFMA queens pageant in January. It was HOT, HOT, HOT at the fair. The temperature was in the upper 90s. The queen and king, Molly and Zach, showed me around the fair. I saw the unique
camping facility that the fair has. It was a nice setting on the fairgrounds with lots of trees, which is unusual for a camping site at the fair. We also visited the "baby animal barn" where they had baby kittens, puppies, turkeys, goats, calves, and many more! Molly and Zach took me to Mike's Cheese Shack where we tried a basket of fried cheese curds. I love cheese, and it was amazing! While we were eating and discussing different activities of the fair, the rest of the fair royalty met up with us. The king 1st attendant, Alex, and the queen 1st and 2nd attendants, Kayla and 
Shannon, joined us. They told me that the fair has a "buyer's club" where people donate money to a fund to help low bids match average bids during the livestock sale. For example, if most of the hogs sell for $X a pound, then one exhibitor's hog only sells for $Y a pound, the fund will give an amount to help the low bid match the majority of the bids. I received my first "fair pin" for my sash from Demi. It is popular in northern Ohio for royalty to make pins with their fair name and pass them on to royalty from other counties. I even was introduced during the sale by OFMA past-president Jon Overmyer, who was also auctioning.
