As you know, I had anguished quite a bit over my choice of hat. A week before Derby I had settled on the fourth hat I had bought, but I knew it needed to be jazzed up. I happened to go into Dee's Crafts in Louisville and found myself in hat-making heaven. Dee's has a full staff of designers on hand to give assistance ranging from selection of materials to actually assembling the finished product. I selected my hat decorations and took them home to assemble myself, but I have glue gun anxiety, and it took me a full week to get up the nerve to start sticking stuff to the hat.
I wished that little birdies would come help me out like they did for Jennie in the Ezra Jack Keats book Jennie's Hat:
Alas, no birdies came to help. AND as it turned out, my flower was impervious to glue, so I wound up stitching that sucker on at the last minute. All in all though, I think it came out well (the green feather was a perfect match for my shoes):
We arrived at Churchill Downs in time for the first race of the day (the Derby is actually the tenth race). We were worried about the weather, which had been threatening rain, but it turned out to be perfect. In fact, without the cloud cover, we would probably have all fried to a crisp!
Here is our happy group in front of our box:
We spent a pleasant day, munching on our box lunches from Heavenly Ham, watching the hats, and betting on the ponies. Fred figures we won about $40, which sounds great until you factor in the $60 we wagered.
Derby, for me, was all about the hats, and I had a great time watching some of the brilliant creations people had put together:
If there was one Derby disappointment, it would have to be that I found mint juleps to be one of the most vile concoctions ever created. I wanted to like them--they're so attractive and have such a pretty name--but it was not to be. I did, however, pose with one, which Fred gamely drank for me:
It was a stirring moment when the crowd stood (on their chairs!) and sang "My Old Kentucky Home." Churchill Downs was kind enough to provide lyrics for us out-of-staters:
Derby Day was long and leisurely, but the Derby itself flashed by in the blink of an eye. Before I knew it, it was time to go collect our car from the lawn of some enterprising folks who lived near the track and head off to make our 7:30 dinner reservations at the Napa River Grill. I had the Thai curry scallops on a bed of rice noodles, and Fred had rack of lamb in some sort of marinade that featured Maker's Mark, his all-time favorite bourbon. The food was amazing and was the perfect end to a perfect day!
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