FORTVILLE — Handmade noodles in the freezer? Check.
Prizes for the token redemption table? Check.
The oldest member of the parish willing to make her traditional pie? Check.
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Organizers of the annual St. Thomas Festival know a great community gathering requires the right ingredients. And over the 35 years St. Thomas the Apostle Catholic Church has presented the festival, there’s been time to develop a tried and true recipe.
“It’s the same traditional festival we’ve done for a long time,” said Stephanie Garst. “We’re pretty proud of it.”
This year’s festival kicks off Friday, Aug. 3, with a 21-and-older Monte Carlo Night.
The festival continues Aug. 4 with the family-friendly Ol’ Time Country Fun summer festival featuring carnival games and prizes.
Kathi Dickerson, who coordinates the games and stocks the prize table, said young festivalgoers seem to especially enjoy games in which they can compete against each other. A favorite is Kerplunk, in which players each try to pull a stick out of a cage of balls without making the balls fall.
There’s also a dunk tank. Garst said one young adult in the parish who volunteers there is known for sitting his shift in costume and dishing out some good-natured banter to those trying to hit the target and send him down into the water.
In addition to the games, the festivities on Aug. 4 also include a chicken noodle dinner, burgers, walking tacos, bingo, a silent auction, and a farmers market. Live music runs throughout in the festival tent; parish children’s and adult choirs perform, and the Silver Creek Band is a perennial favorite in the lineup.
Festivalgoers can also step inside for one of three guided tours of the church building, which was built in 1916.
The festival’s history is not as long; it started in 1983 when Garst’s father and a church friend felt the parish should try such an event. Garst herself remembers running a game booth, pregnant with her first child, during that first festival.
There were some children’s games that first year, plus some entertainment and food. In the years that have followed, the festival has grown and traditions have emerged.
The chicken and noodles recipe is one of them; it’s been handed down through the years. Some members gathered recently to roll the dough, cut the noodles and stock the freezer for this year’s festival food line.
Another menu regular is certain desserts that festivalgoers look for each year to enjoy, Garst said. One member makes a good sugar cream pie, for example.
Also, Mary Weir, at 109 the oldest member of the St. Thomas parish, makes a pineapple coconut pie that’s well known in the parish from spring Lenten dinners and the summer festival. There have even been a few years that the entire pie has disappeared — bought whole by a festival customer, said Paige Hunt, Weir’s granddaughter.
These days, Paige and her mother, Peggy Hunt, also participate in the pie-baking. Weir recites the ingredients from memory and looks forward to stopping by the festival, Paige Hunt said: “She looks forward to going there and taking her pie and seeing some friends.”
Garst said the festival always builds bonds among parishioners. They pitch in for two-hour shifts and work together around the goal of presenting the church’s biggest fundraiser of the year, from which 10 percent of the proceeds will go into the church’s charity fund.
Garst said the event is also a welcome opportunity to spend time with the community at large.
“It’s just a great time for us as parishioners to get together,” she said, “and a great opportunity to put ourselves out to the community.”
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The 36th annual St. Thomas Festival weekend is set for 7 to 11 p.m. Friday and 11 a.m. to 10 p.m. Aug. 4. The church is located at 523 S. Merrill St., Fortville.
Monte Carlo Night (for people 21 and older) is on Friday. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. Cost is $20 per person or $30 per couple. Admission includes food, soft drinks, beer and wine coolers. Games include blackjack, Texas poker, roulette, chuck-a-luck, reverse raffle, tip boards, left-right-center, Pai Gow poker and Texas hold ’em.
Ol’ Time Country Fun summer festival is set for Aug. 4 with activities for all ages.
There will be a homemade chicken noodle dinner, homemade dessert corner, ice cream, children’s games, live music, bingo, blood drive, silent auction, raffles, walking tacos, elephant ears, lemon shake-ups, farmers market and church tours.
The games include Kerplunk, Plinko, darts, a duck pond, a sucker tree, a ring toss, the race-to-inflate-the-balloon “Pop Your Top,” and a fishing wall where festival volunteers behind the wall attach prizes to the fishing lines youngsters cast.
Competitors earn tokens at most games that they can cash in for various levels of prizes at the Redemption Center, which will include some large stuffed animals.
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