On Sunday our family had a booth at the Mushroom Festival at the Mount Pisgah Arboretum. Last year we saw that they identified mushrooms at the festival, so we brought some with us in a box to be identified. Every year the same mushrooms sprout up from the same log in our front yard. Jeff said the mushrooms were definitely not edible and thought they might be poisonous, but we didn’t know what kind they were. They were identified as Sulfur Tufts, and they are indeed poisonous. It was good to know what they were called, but the most exciting part for us (and our claim to fame for the day) was the fact that we got to put our clump of mushrooms in the exhibit at the festival. Bracken proudly told our friends to look for the “largest mushroom in the whole place. The yellow one. That one is ours!” It was far from the biggest mushroom at the festival (we saw some huge ones), but clearly we were proud of it.

Our friends had a booth next to ours this year, which made the festival especially fun. (I loved their beeswax candles shaped like morel mushrooms. Bracken collected the lichen for their display.) Other friends had a booth across the way, and we ran into friends and neighbors while we were there, making it feel like such a small world. Going on the hayride was a must on our list this year. It wasn’t as eventful as last year’s hayride, but I thought it was even better because friends joined us. Bracken recognized the horses as the same ones from last year and said they must be really old by now, which made me chuckle. There were mushrooms on display that we didn’t notice last year and we learn something new every year. My favorite mushroom name this year was Goat’s Beard. And I think the Artist’s Conks are really neat!