Fair fanatics: Flowers are a labor of love for couple

or Mark and Karen Green, preparation for the Carbon County Fair starts months ahead of time.

In May, the admitted fair fanatics begin planting all the flowers that beautify the fairgrounds.

Karen starts by planting 18 flower pots and 20 flats of flowers at the fairgrounds.

First they sifted all the dirt for the beds.

Then they planted marigolds, petunias, celosia, purple salvia, vinca, sunflowers, spikes and more.

While there are gardens located all over the fairgrounds, Karen’s favorite is the tribute to veterans located across from the Palmerton Lions stand.

That has red, white and blue petunias.

“It’s hard to find a true blue color,” Karen said. This year she arranged the flowers to resemble a flag waving.

But you can’t plant them and forget them.

Now the daily process of trekking water to the fairgrounds begins.

Mark hooks a 275-gallon gas-operated water tank to his truck to water the flowers.

“We used to do it with sprinkling cans,” Karen says.

Even so, “It takes two to three hours to water.”

The process began when the greenhouses were no longer able to provide flowers. That’s when the Greens took over.

“We just do it to spruce up the fairgrounds,” Mark said.

Karen spends time daily on the upkeep, pinching the dead flowers to keep them blooming.

The Greens have been involved in the fair since the beginning, and have served as directors for several years.

Woodcraft

Every year Mark handcrafts a wooden piece of furniture to donate for a raffle to be drawn on the last day of the fair.

This year the item is a love seat wooden glider, made with three types of his wood from trees on his Kunkletown property. Red oak, ash and red cedar were used this year.

It is one of the prizes in the raffle to benefit the fair queen Maria Burits, to help fund her trip to the Pennsylvania Fair Queen State Competition.

The glider took more than 20 hours of work, with drying time for the four coats of nonyellowing varnish.

Green started donating wooden chairs eight years ago.

“I just like working with wood,” he said.

Mark has made animal benches, rockers and a chair with sunflowers.

Plus, he and Karen make all the cutouts for the fair. He cuts the wood and Karen paints them.

“I start planning in January after the theme for the fair is announced,” Green said.

He doesn’t sell his creations, so the only way to get one is to win it at the fair.

They were also the originators of the Farmer for a Day exhibit at both the Carbon and West End fairs. Complete with life-size cows with working udders, the displays show both children and adults where our food comes from.

“Some children have never seen a cow,” Karen said. They ran the exhibit for several years and now have turned it over to the respective fairs.

In the early years day care classes would tour the exhibits. The Greens gave them mementos to take home.

Mark also started the dime stand at the fair.

Throughout the year, they help with Lions events and American Cancer Society fundraisers.

All about the fair

As if donating flowers and cutouts is not enough, Karen makes two big bowls of cucumber salad for the Jerusalem Lutheran Church stand every day and bakes cakes wherever they are needed. She has also volunteered to cut up onions. They consider fair week to be their vacation from the farm where Mark helps his son Jason with chopped hay and straw bedding.

“We have just always loved fairs,” Karen said. They’ve been to 55 fairs in Pennsylvania. In the early years, Karen said they’d go to three or four fairs in one day. “We’d travel 500 miles a day.”

One year they were honored as Friends of the Fair.

“We’re not here for the awards. We’re here to spruce up the fair,” Mark said. “When people say it looks nice, that’s all we need.”