Cooks and Crafters Enter Their Goods in Fair Contests

Yolan Lipscher couldn’t bring herself to throw away her husband’s neckties after he died last year.

So one day the 81-year-old retired dressmaker started ripping apart the seams on the ties and ironing flat the patterned, brightly colored fabrics.

Then, laying one tie horizontally above another, she sewed a snazzy, multicolored jacket so offbeat that it could have come from a trendy Melrose Avenue boutique.

“Whoever I showed it to said, ‘You’ve got to do something with this. You’ve got to show it at the fair,’ ” she said.

On Friday, Lipscher was one of hundreds of county residents who went to the Ventura County Fairgrounds to enter hand-sewn clothing, crocheted afghans and other goods in contests scheduled for the fair.

Although the fair doesn’t begin until Aug. 18, judging for many of the contests will be held next week.

Men, women and children vying for the blue ribbons began lining up early outside the fair’s massive yellow buildings that will house the exhibits for home arts, youth, professional arts and other contest categories.

“It’s been unreal,” Professional Arts Superintendent Marcia Callahan said shortly before noon. “At a quarter to nine this morning they were here.”

Many residents such as Lipscher said they had never before entered anything in a county fair.

Kim Malone, 42, said she comes to the fair every year, but this year her daughter suggested that she compete. So Malone entered a huge crocheted bedspread and smaller afghan in a home-arts contest.

A Casitas Springs resident, Malone said she began crocheting eight years ago when back problems forced her to go on disability.

She spent five months working on the white, yellow, blue and pink bedspread, and two months on the blue and red afghan, she said.

Although entries for most exhibits will be accepted at least through Sunday, some will be accepted even after the fair opens.

But Malone said she was concerned there would be too many entries in her category. “I didn’t want to get left out,” she said.

Unlike Lipscher and Malone, Carolyn Parrish, 61, of Ventura is a veteran fair contestant, who said she has entered cooking competitions at the fair during at least the last seven years.

She won the sweepstakes award last year in the preserved-foods contest.

Although she suffers from severe diabetes that caused her to go blind in her left eye about a year ago, Parrish said she still cooks.

And in this year’s competition, she entered more than 50 jars of preserves, from luscious-looking whole strawberries in thick red syrup to yellow, dried apples.

Parrish’s diabetic condition forces her to avoid sugar, which stops her from sampling many of her own goodies.

That’s no problem, she said. “You follow a recipe and if it looks right, it usually is.”

And for safekeeping, her husband, Mason Parrish, a shop teacher at Buena High School who accompanied his wife to the fairgrounds Friday, said he occasionally performs the taste-test on his wife’s jams and other preserves.

Despite the obstacles presented by her poor health, Carolyn Parrish said she hopes she’ll always be able to continue entering her goods in the fair contests. “It’s fun to compete, to do the best you can.”

Seated at the other end of the long registration table from Parrish was the woman who hopes to be this year’s sweepstakes winner in the preserved-foods contest: Inara Jankovskis.

Like Parrish, the 50-year-old Jankovskis has had health problems.

After she had open heart surgery last year, her doctors wouldn’t even let her move her arms to stir food, which cut down on how much she could cook for the 1992 fair, she said.

But on Friday, Jankovskis came to the fairgrounds with about 150 jars of carrots, yams, peaches, asparagus and an assortment of other vegetables.

“This year I went hog-wild,” the Camarillo resident said cheerily. “I love the fair. That’s what I look forward to all year long.”

FYI

To make registration more convenient for east Ventura County residents, fair volunteers will be at the Borchard Park Community Center on Reino Road in Newbury Park today from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. to accept entries in four categories: photography, gems and minerals, youth contests, and all home-arts competitions except for baked goods. For more information, call 648-3376.