Part of crew one cooking over 600 pork chops for family fun night on July 13^th. L to R: Don Mulderink, Pat McDonald, Dan Tewes, Steve Warrick Sr. and Steve Ashby.

Amelia Soucie makes her tic-tac-toe during the water game and added to her bag of winnings. Others wait to try the game with over 62 kids participating in games this year, and about 352 people attending different parts of the evening.

Far left, Rick Portillo and Paul Malito discuss the prizes they were handing out to the kids. 4-H members who helped with handing out pop, ice cream, ran popcorn machine and basketball shoot and the ball drop games. They are in green shirts while the winners fill the prize table selecting their winnings as all kids had huge winnings this year!

4-H helped with Popcorn...

and the basketball game...

Andy Koenig arranged for several of the Thepary Dog owners to bring their dogs to Family Fun Night and were a huge hit with the kids as they take a break with this picture.

The Band Full Circle in the background is setting up while the early crowd enjoys their meal before music, magic and games begin on July 13^th at Weitendorf Ag Education Facility JJC.

All ages were watching the magic show intently during Family Fun Night.

Mr. D. has Maggie Nugent floating in air during this magic trick before the band started at the JJC Ag Education Facility. The audience of about 300 watches on in amazement.

Amy Brandau and LuAnn Matejcak serve up pork chops during Family Fun Night while Kris Mulderink, Jeanne Tewes, Pam Robbins, Kathy Bernhard, Loretta Sartore, Sereda Perosa and Anita Schneidewind serve the rest of the meal.

Young Farmers Pedal Pull registration. Corey Brandau explains the process while Kandice Kestel and Courtney Sowa register the kids for the pull where prizes were sponsored by Heritage FS.

Debbie and Bobby Foster serve as master face painters during Family Fun Night for over 54 items they painted on faces, arms and necks. Here Kendall Grace Kestel smiles for the camera.

Free Child IDs were offered by The Will County Sheriff's Department

Young Farmers put together the golf bags after their meeting in July.  Workers l to r: Kevin Ardaugh, Austin Brown, Kyle Johnston, Adam Maves, Scott Brummel, Kandice Kestel, Courtney Sowa, Jarrad Mulderink, Ryan Nugent and Corey Brandau.

Winners of the first pedal pull heat during Threshermen’s Show on Saturday July 22^nd after 5 full pulls in the first round and 2 more full pulls in the pull off l to r: Second Place with a 3^rd pull of 45 foot 11 inches is Vincent Martin of Joliet, Third Place with a second pull 49 foot 1 inch Blake Olha of Manteno, and First Place with a 3^rd pull after 2 full pulls was Colton Bisping of Manhattan with a 47 foot 11 inch final pull.

The second heat of the pedal pull during the Threshermen’s show had 22 participants and when the smoke cleared these were the top 3 pullers l to r: Also, the first-place winner selected the second-place prize. Third Place with a pull of 42 foot even was Clayton Walker of Custer Park, Kase Quigley of Frankfort took home second place with a pull of 42 foot 2 inches and First Place went to Phillip Werner of Peotone with a full pull.

The final heat of the pedal pulls during the Threshermen’s Show was as follows, Ben Floyd of Wilmington with a pull of 43 foot 2 inches, First Place went to Joey Oliver of Monee with a full pull and Second Place went to Jett Quigley of Frankfort with a pull of 46 foot 10 inches.

Young Farmers work crew for the Threshermen’s pedal pull with 50 kids participating l to r: Kevin and Lauren Ardaugh, Ryan Nugent, Jarrad Mulderink, Joe Davis, Austin Brown, Courtney Sowa, Ashley Davis, Kyle and Lindsay Johnston, Adam Maves, Corey, Clyde & Amy Brandau and Anita Schneidewind.

Some of the crowd that attended the legislative barn meeting held at Dave Kestel’s Farm July 25^th. It turned out to be a nice evening with weather and friends!

L to r: Rick Johnson asked one of the 9 questions discussed during the meeting at the Kestel Farm and Senator Linda Holmes answered the question on local control with wind and solar projects and chief of staff from Representative Janet Yang Rohr’s office, Donna Wandke, also provided answers as did Senator Rachel Ventura.

Senator Rachel Ventura discusses the airport legislation and why she opposed another attempt to build the airport which it was estimated over 50 years this project has been being discussed by the group for Will County area.

Donna Wandke, chief of staff for Representative Janet Yang Rohr, discusses the water access bill that they had sponsored and they want to work with Farm Bureau to have their opposition removed as Senator Ventura and Senator Holmes listen on and then provide comments.

Registration and auction workers sign the 130 golfers in on July 28^th

L to R: Amy Brandau, Cheryl Tordai, Debbie Werner, Sharon Zolner, Karen Warrick while chairman of the 10^th golf outing Ryan Nugent checks in.

Registration was an extremely busy place! Here the crew who makes things happen works on goodie bags, to registration, to selling different raffle tickets for popular items including a 1\2 beef donated by 5K Farms and Mulderink Farms. Middle: Anita Schneidewind hands out goodie bags to the 130 golfers.

Getting raffles ready to go!

 L to R: Luke Baskerville, Sam Tewes, Ashley Davis and Katie Sharkey.

See how the day went in the next edition of Directions!

Want to enjoy the Prime Timers' events?

If you are 55 and older and a Will County Farm Bureau member, you can!

Questions? Call Tracey 815-727-4811

The Young Farmers Committee meeting was called to order by Corey Brandau at 7 pm on Thursday July 20^th with the following members present, Corey Brandau, Jarrad Mulderink, Adam Maves, Kyle Johnston, Ryan Nugent, Scott Brummel Dist. 5 Representative, Kevin Ardaugh, Kandice Kestel, Courtney Sowa, Austin Brown, and Mark Schneidewind

Corey started with pedal pull events and Kandice and Courtney reported on Family Fun Night pull, they added to their workers for the Threshermen’s show this weekend, developed work schedules for the Will County Fair, Symerton Home Coming, Chasing Cans for Cancer pedal pulls and will do a work schedule for the Christmas in the Village pull at their November meeting. They have secured prizes for all of the pedal pulls but will need to get some for the December Christmas in the Village pull.

Focus on Youth Awards they are providing 4 awards this year and they have started in the Farmers Weekly Review and in Directions Electronic Newsletter. Corey asked Kyle to read the thank you from one of the winners Dale Hauser and the group really appreciated the note. They will work with CD and Me on an event after the first of the year and they will cook and serve pork chops for the Prime Timers picnic which will be on Wednesday August 2^nd and develop a work schedule. The committee will have a large loss this year as going off in November will be Ryan and Lauren Nugent, Luke Baskerville and Corey and Amy Brandau. A retirement event is planned for September before harvest begins and the details were discussed, and plans were finalized as they would like to have the last 15 years of young farmers invited as Ryan was on the committee for 17 years. 

They then spent 30 minutes on finalizing the golf outing set for Friday July 28^th at Green Garden Country Club with registration 10 am and shot gun start 11 am. Ryan reported they are sitting at 33 full foursomes and a half of a foursome just how things worked out currently we have at least 3-hole sponsors per hole, and we will order the signs for the golf course tomorrow morning at 730 am. They reviewed the 4 live auction items and decided to maybe add one more the day of tourney. The raffles look good, and they added 2 more Chinese raffle items tonight. Set up is 9 am so please arrive by then so we can get signs up and banners up. Luke is hauling the wheel game for Mark. Ryan finalized the prizes for the cannon game, and we still have 9 golfers yet to pay but will have 134 golfers with 25 volunteers working and have 12 people just joining us for dinner so close to 170 total people to support ag education. They reviewed beverage holes and beverage carts, hole in one holes which there are 4 one for $40,000 towards purchase of a vehicle from Dralle, 4 other games only 1 being additional pay game and will have 17 Chinese raffle items, 4-5 live auction items and 2 straight raffles. They will deliver golf hole signs and the hole in one signs Thursday July 27^th and they will have 8 to 9 carts for the workers set aside. They will still need to stuff items after tonight into the bags which is the program with prize holes and activities and lunch halfway tickets.

Austin reported on the Ag Olympics held July 8^th and all went well. They have the animals secured for the fair and will set up after 5 pm on August 22^nd with animals but some will help at 10 am with the tent set up. They developed a work schedule but need more help for Sunday. Corey said get your tickets for SWCD awards program August 4^th cost is $25 per person but great food and great time deadline next week. The legislator barn meetings are set for July 25^th Kestel Farm with 5 legislators attending and August 3^rd Warrick Farm with currently 3 legislators attending. All start at 6 pm with a meal and then program to follow at 630 pm.

Young farmers trap shoot August 12^th starts at 4 pm and Scott said he will see if they can bring over a carload. Harvest Dinner is September 8^th at the Kevin and Molly Gorman Farm invites out to teachers and health professionals and will be sent as a reminder in 2 more weeks. The County of Will has a used tire collection also for farm tires set for Saturday September 16^th at the fairgrounds from 8 am to 3 pm with limit of 100 tires per address. Corey reminded the group we need to get straw and hay for animals and feed. The next meeting was set for November 20^th at 7 pm at Austins Machine Shed and Austin has refreshment duty, and it will be the election of officers for the 2024 fiscal year and Corey, Ryan, and Luke’s last meeting.

Come to Mark's Country Store for unique gifts,

seasonal items, and so much more!

(We accept cash, check, Visa, Mastercard, Discover)

The world’s largest gathering of strip-tillage farmers and experts is coming to the Bloomington-Normal Marriott Hotel & Conference Center from August 2-4, and Will County farmers can receive a $50.00 registration discount with you register online and use the code WILL.

The 10th anniversary National Strip-Tillage Conference will feature more than two dozen sessions covering myriad topics for profitable results in strip-till farming, including equipment set-ups, cover crops, intercropping, economic analyses, soil testing/analysis, fertilizing methods and more.

Learn about everything the National Strip-Tillage Conference offers and register today.

https://www.striptillfarmer.com/NSTC