 The bouncy ball race was the first race of many at Gregory Park. The Great Pumpkin Festival has been put on the last 11 years by Tony Saylor, who said the key to a successful event is keeping it simple. We're looking just for old-fashioned games, kind of games that we had when I was growing up and from judging from the reaction of the kids and stuff here, old-fashioned is still good stuff. One of the fan favorites has to be the pumpkin roll, where lots of kids in the youngest age category 7 and under got the pumpkin rolling. I always like the littlest kids, they just try so hard. For some of the older age groups though, it's all about trying to stay on your feet. Just the giggles that you can get out of them, they're just having a blast and then you watch their parents or grandparents, they're having so much fun, kind of maybe reliving stuff they did when they were kids. There were four different age categories for the three-legged race, where the top two finishers walked away with a pumpkin. The wheelbarrow and three-legged race also included a parent-child category. It was super good, we did good, we just do it for fun. This brings joy to my heart, this is my favorite event of the year to run. The pie-eating and pie-throwing contest gave adults a turn to participate and the children a chance to cheer on their parents. It's a family-fun atmosphere that could potentially be expanding for next year. We're going to come up with some new games maybe and we might even look at possibly some different vendors, maybe some more arts and crafts, things that if you don't want to be in a race there's something else that you could do that you could take home with you. Reporting in Brainerd, Sarah Winckelman, Lakeland News.