We turned in our pitchforks for ice cream cones that summer. Apparently, fannie packs were in style then. We are in the midst of the annual Custer Street Fair, where in past years we sold chocolate chip cookies and lemonade from the confines of our back yard which bordered the city property where fair goers passed by on the weekend of said occasion. We did this for 18 years.

Initially we began this practice when our kids wanted to purchase things in the Fair and our answer to where the money was going to come from lied in this endeavor of selling goods. It was a huge success by most standards and at the time anyway, a good way to teach a number of good practices. The kids all learned how to make the cookies and we would alternate the baking of up to 2500 cookies out of our kitchen stove. For 18 years we did this.

Did I mention that the chosen week for this annual event was Father’s Day in June. The children’s park that was adjacent to our building made for a steady stream of families with children, all dying to have a cookie and lemonade on an often hot, sultry, and sunny day.

As years passed by the Fair brought folks back to the neighborhood where they had once lived, former church members alike came back for the Fair so it made for a reunion like atmosphere. We literally saw children grow from infancy to young adulthood.