DairyPalooza 2012

On Saturday, April 28, six months’ worth of planning and worrying and stressing came to fruition.

That’s right – the 2012 DairyPalooza!

This was the second year of the event, which brought over 250 participants, parents, and volunteers to the Wayne County Fairgrounds for the all-day learning experience.

I served on the planning committee again this year, as the publication design chair. I put together brochures, flyers, logos, and information packets for the event. It was a lot of hours of work, but I gained a lot of experience using publication design programs.

But that’s beside the point – this post is about DairyPalooza.

Mom and I arrived at the fairgrounds at a little after 8am on Saturday. We had moved tables and chairs the day before, but it was time to actually get set up. We unburdened the van from its load of t-shirts, resource packets, and supplies, and you could almost see it sigh in relief. The tables, however, were soon groaning under the weight we transferred to them.

I left the registration tables in the capable hands of mom and some of our wonderful volunteers so that I could help vendors set up in the career expo. We had 10 organizations and businesses represented, and each exhibitor brought goodies to hand out to the kids. Highlights included cowbells and cookies from PNC bank, cheese samples from Guggisberg, and lots of handouts from Farm Credit Services. The vendors were barely set up before the first round of kids came to visit their booths.

But the arrival of the kids also meant that I needed to have skillathon stations set up. As a practice session for the kids, some common skillathon stations were available to work through. I was running the eartagging and tattooing station, which was an absolute blast. Kids that came through received a paper “ear”, which I helped them to tattoo (up to 5 digits with no repeat letters, excluding F and N, which were inexplicably gone when I opened up the packet) and eartag (four designs, with the option to write something on them).

While I was sitting at my station from 9am to 3pm (with a pizza lunch break provided by ADA and Land O’Lakes, of course), there were many other sessions going on around the fairgrounds. From nutrition to washing to fitting and showmanship, each kid had at least four sessions to choose from during each of the four session blocks.

At the end of the day, a beautiful cake with the DairyPalooza logo was served, along with ice cream sandwiches. As kids chowed down on their snacks, tickets were drawn announcing the winners of our many door prizes, ranging from clippers to leather show halters to an actual show box.

The whole day was an incredible success, and it’s going to be even bigger and better next year. This morning, I got a Facebook message from a dad whose son attended DairyPalooza, thanking me for donating my time and effort into planning the event. He said his son had a blast, and that’s what makes it all worth it.

If you’re interested in learning more about DairyPalooza, feel free to contact me and I’ll provide you with any information I can. Farm and Dairy posted pictures of the event on their Facebook page, so follow this link (http://dft.ba.com/-DairyPaloozaPictures) to check those out. 

*Note: This was not a paid sponsorship of DairyPalooza. I just really think it's awesome and want you all to know about it!*