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Family shares fun needle art as fair tradition

For the last five years, Brianna Walker has entered her needle art into fair competitions. She and her husband have a scavenger hunt to find it on opening day.

HOUSTON COUNTY, Ga. — The Walker family in Houston County loves to go to the Georgia National Fair to eat donuts and see the animals.

However, a major part of their fair traditions have to do with the art.

"I normally start with crocheting the round," Brianna Walker said as she began to form a pattern.

Each of these beginnings turns into amazing 3D art. 

"I wanted to try and play around with making food look as realistic as possible," she said.

Brianna has perfected her craft of making yarn chicken tender trays for 10 years, and she's entered this work into fair competitions for the last five.

"I try to go for that wow factor," she said.

It was all inspired by a family tradition.

"When I was a little girl, my great grandfather would enter his woodworking into the fair so I remember seeing all of his really awesome ribbons when I was a kid," she said.

She says it makes her feel connected to her great-grandfather. 

"I like knowing that I'm carrying on that tradition. Knowing that I can make him happy. I've been told that I have some of the same qualities that he had when it comes to working with my hands," she added.

Now she collects her own ribbons. She has nearly 20. 

The fair competitions are also a way for her to show off her talent. 

"I like to tell people it's like my Super Bowl, because there's not a lot of places that I can display fiber art," Brianna said.

It's a great reward for the long process.

"I literally started for this year's fair last year, so it takes me that long to get things going," she said.

However, she doesn't have to brave the long process alone. Her husband Samuel supports her through it. 

"Going through and trying to figure out how to make it really come to life with the trays and things like that," Samuel said. 

 They say crafting together is a great time, but they get really excited on opening day. 

"As soon as I'm able to leave work, we get in the car and we drive on down to the fairgrounds and we go through and we start looking for everything and it's kind of like a little scavenger hunt," Brianna said.

Brianna loves seeing how her work is placed and Samuel likes the logistics side.

"What can we improve on next year? What kind of things are the judges looking for?" Samuel questions.

As they munch on fair food, they listen for reviews.

"It's cool seeing people appreciate that and hearing them 'ooh's and aah's' over some of the stuff she does," he said.

This year folks can find 34 pieces of her work throughout the park.

"It's just something I see myself doing for as long as my hands will let me do them," Brianna said.

Brianna shares this tradition with her art students as well. She says they enter their work for scoring too, and she even convinced her best friend to enter some work.

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