SEQUIM — This train keeps a-rollin’ through the week, the month and the Sequim post office.
And it’s an edible, fondant-frosted train, replete with a beribboned conductor and a passenger who’s waving and grinning like the sweet man he is.
This locomotive has a solid gingerbread body, embellished with candy and frosting and on display in the post office lobby at 240 S. Sunnyside Ave., in downtown Sequim.
It is the symbol of the 115th annual Irrigation Festival, which just wrapped up over the weekend with the Grand Parade, Logging Show and surrounding events.
Postal clerk Cheri Barnett spent about 32 hours constructing this cookie; she’s done similar projects and a couple of weeks ago, she thought she’d highlight the fact that her employer, the U.S. Postal Service, offers a commemorative cancellation here in irrigation town.
Commemorative stamp
The cancellation, available by request at the counter, bears an image of a steam train and reads “115th Irrigation Festival Station / 115 Years of Pioneers,” in honor of Sequim’s annual community party, which is the longest-running festival in Washington state.
Collectors, and anybody who wants to send a letter with the special cancellation can purchase an envelope stamped with it for $5, Barnett said.
She’s known as the designer and builder of historical gingerbread structures especially for the post office.
They’ve included a fully frosted White House for display during the week of Jan. 20, 2009, when President Barack Obama was inaugurated, and a 2-foot-tall, snow-white Washington Monument cookie erected in the post office lobby for the Fourth of July last year.
The Irrigation Festival train will stay on display through this week, Barnett said, while the commemorative cancellation will be available all month.
Pink ribbon
It’s worth peeking in at the conductor, she added. He’s wearing a pink ribbon, to symbolize breast cancer awareness.
Barnett was diagnosed with the illness late last year and has since begun chemotherapy.
“I’m doing OK,” she said, adding that from now on, she’ll put pink ribbons on each of her gingerbread creations.
The train, after it comes out of the post office, will go south this summer.
Barnett is looking forward to taking the immense baked good to Ocean Shores and sharing it at a family reunion.
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Sequim-Dungeness Valley Reporter Diane Urbani de la Paz can be reached at 360-681-2391 or at diane.urbani@peninsuladailynews.com.
