{"id":654278,"date":"2026-08-24T18:39:22","date_gmt":"2026-08-24T18:39:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/654278\/"},"modified":"2026-08-24T18:39:22","modified_gmt":"2026-08-24T18:39:22","slug":"mt-morris-strawfest-celebrates-sculptures-straw-bale-race-winners-shaw-local","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/654278\/","title":{"rendered":"Mt. Morris StrawFest celebrates sculptures, straw bale race winners \u2013 Shaw Local"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mother Nature smiled on the final days of the 11th annual StrawFest Sculpting Contest in Mt. Morris<\/a> on Aug. 22-23 and even gave a wisp of help to the hearty souls who lined up for the annual \u201cStraw Bale Races.\u201d<\/p>\n

Five teams of two squared off on Wesley Avenue, in the heart of the downtown, to see who could push their straw bale down the street the fastest.<\/p>\n

Jake Nicholson and Sam Helmich demonstrate their winning technique in the Straw Bale Race during StrawFest in Mt. Morris on Saturday, Aug. 22, 2026. (Earleen Hinton)<\/p>\n

Just as the competition began, a bit of a southerly breeze was detected by race officials Jeff Bold and Larry Ubben.<\/p>\n

\u201cOoh, there\u2019s a breeze. That should help,\u201d said Ubben, who announced the event.<\/p>\n

Four teams advanced to the semis, but only one, powered by Jake Nicholson and Sam Helmich, brought home the $50 cash prize.<\/p>\n

The race was one of several activities on Saturday, which also included a 5K, live music, kids\u2019 games, and the announcement of which straw creation won this year\u2019s contest.<\/p>\n

Five straw sculptures were entered in this year\u2019s competition, with visitors and artists casting votes for their favorite.<\/p>\n

This year\u2019s winners were:<\/p>\n

\u2022 1st Place People\u2019s Choice, 1st Place Artists\u2019 Choice: \u201cMt. Cheddarest\u201d (In the Swiss Alps) by Danica and Mark Rogers of Rochelle<\/a><\/p>\n

\"“Mt.<\/p>\n

\u201cMt. Cheddarest\u201d (In the Swiss Alps) by Danica and Mark Rogers of Rochelle (Earleen Hinton)<\/p>\n

\u2022 2nd Place Artists\u2019 Choice, 2nd Place People\u2019s Choice: \u201cThe Tree of Life\u201d by Bobbi Hanna, Fran Volz, Kelsey, Gadsden, Oren, Ronan of Oregon<\/a><\/p>\n

\"“The<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Tree of Life\u201d by Bobbi Hanna, Fran Volz, Kelsey, Godsden, Oren, Ronan of Oregon (Earleen Hinton)<\/p>\n

\u2022 3rd Place People\u2019s Choice: \u201cHay-land Coo\u201d by Doreen Hartman of Mt. Morris<\/p>\n

\u2022 3rd Place Artists\u2019 Choice: \u201cWellers Woods Gnome\u201d by Chris and Cecilia Mann of Rockford<\/p>\n

\u201cMother Earth\u201d by Steve Lentz of Montello, Wisconsin, was also one of the entries.<\/p>\n

The U.S. National Straw Sculpting Competition started in Rochelle in 2016, after artist Fran Volz visited the small village of H\u00f6chenschwand, Germany, which hosts an annual straw-sculpting competition that draws thousands of visitors. The event moved to Mt. Morris in 2017, where it is hosted by Encore! Mt. Morris.<\/p>\n

According to competition rules, sculptures must be a minimum of 6.5 feet in height, length, or width and at least 90% straw on the surface.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mother Nature smiled on the final days of the 11th annual StrawFest Sculpting Contest in Mt. Morris on…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":654279,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[267],"tags":[365,362,363,364,366,18,117,27934,19,17,266384,266385,8244,276571],"class_list":["post-654278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-arts-and-design","tag-arts","tag-arts-and-design","tag-artsanddesign","tag-artsdesign","tag-design","tag-eire","tag-entertainment","tag-festival","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-mt-morris","tag-ogle-county","tag-oregon","tag-rochelle"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/117151949083184665","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=654278"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/654278\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/654279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=654278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=654278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=654278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}