Shaker is over….

Hi everyone!  Well, Shaker Woods is finished for this year. We were so fortunate that the weather was excellent all three weekends. The weather, and the much improved local economy  (a local car plant received very good news and is booming) resulted in large , happy crowds. Many of our customers came for at least two of the weekends—some came all three!  This weekend seemed like old home week—it seemed every time we turned around, we had a visit from a vendor friend or a neighbor from home.  All in all, the show was one of the most pleasant we have ever had there. We are very lucky that virtually every vendor in our immediate area at Shaker is very friendly and we all part with hugs. Some we will see again at fall shows, some we won’t see until next year at Shaker. It is very easy to get close to your neighbors at a show. Today we finished cleaning out our booth, loaded up the display, and spent a good deal of time restringing the roll up tarp covering the entrance. The roping which controls the tarp as it rolls up finally wore through and had to be replaced. It was complicated, but we got it done , and it works!!

 

My camera, which has been giving me fits lately, behaved over the weekend. So….here are a few new pics of the show….

Robert Griffing is a nationally known artist that paints the Eastern Indian tribes…just STUNNING artwork…wish I  had one tenth the talent he has!!

 

Tom’s booth décor….he creates beautiful custom knives….he uses a lot of antlers…

Tom at work….

My neighbor’s beautiful quilts…

handwoven baskets…

peeled rustic furniture…

Jack Robinson…gorgeous reproduction furniture..he’s retiring this year… I’ve admired his work long before I started doing this show..

A new neighbor in our area…his chairs are exquisite….and very expensive, but he had a good show…

Here is the artist at work…see all the shavings on the floor? He worked hard the entire show carving a chair and scooping out the seat…just amazing work…

My poor pitiful booth at the end of the show…and we took additional vanloads each weekend!!

Since Al thought I had bought enough goodies, ( ) I traded a piece of folk art for my pumpkin man! I Had trouble deciding between him and a really cute witch. The dollmaker was so friendly! His mouth is wire that was stitched on..I believe this is a Bittersweetfolkart pattern…if I’m wrong, please let me know and I will correct…

I had two vendors visit us that read my blog..still can’t get over how strange that seems!  Sandy Hoerig came over to meet us after she saw I mentioned her and her wonderful prim dolls in my last posting. Just the nicest person!  Like I said, we had so many visitors, the show was even more fun than usual. I really have to say, the promoters of this show work so hard to get this show up and running every year. Every time we went over to get our booth ready, they were cleaning up leaves, spreading gravel, planting flowers, and spraying for bugs so it would be comfortable for their guests…and that was during that incredible heat we had. This year was the 30th anniversary for the show. I wish I had snapped a pic of the two cutest little girls that stopped to show me the shaker boxes they had painted in the Shaker schoolhouse. Things like that make it such a wholesome family event.

Last week we received a call that we got a space in the number one traditional show in the country. We hadn’t committed to any show in November hoping that we would get in. We have another show around the same time that we could have picked up but it is a longggggg  trip to it.  This show is much closer…and the long trips are getting harder to do. We really need to get busy! Actually, we get back to work tomorrow. We have several big orders to get out and then need to build up stock again. Thank you all so much for taking time to read my little blog..and welcome to all my new followers—I truly appreciate every one of you. I hope you all enjoy your Labor Day weekend—we are planning on taking a picnic down to Brian’s new apartment as he is uncomfortable with driving the distance to our place. It will be so good to see him and Stryker—wish Craig could be there too. We’ll all be together again at Christmas but that still seems a long way away!!   Have a nice week!—Jan