This blog could be so long I almost don’t know where to start. That being the case I think I will sum the last week and a half up in a shortened version.
Thursday before last my mother and I flew to the north east to go to a flea market in Brimfield, Massachusetts. Touted as the largest in the country, it was definitely smaller than Round Top here in Texas. However, the show is 3 times a year and apparently the summer show is the smallest of the 3. Either was it took my mom and I 2.5 full days to see everything and honestly I’m sure we didn’t see EVERYTHING. The flea market was set up much like Roundtop where there were outdoor fields along a small road full of vendors. You just kind of slowly meandered your way down to the end of the road. I scored oodles of treasures like an old 1960’s swimsuit, vintage wrapping paper and cards for Crafty Collage Curio Packs, check out all the watches I found for Tardy bracelets and more. Luckily my mom and I had each packed an empty suitcase to fill up with our loot.
There were a few vendors that I wanted to tell you about that you can check out online for awesomeness…
While wandering the hot and dusty fields I found myself in a tent full of super cuteness by Emily of Crazy Cakes Designs. Check out her blog roundup of Brimfield and her Etsy store. Buttons, chenille cupcakes, baby blankets and more her stuff was really adorable.
I spent quite some time in the booth of Andrew pf Accessories of Old. I loaded up on vintage jewelry and mom stocked up on his selection of vintage buttons, ribbon and trim.
Another interesting phenomenon I saw is that lots of people seem to be making new Bakelite jewelry. They are using vintage Bakelite pieces but they are carving, gluing and molding it into new pieces. Bakelite Couture was my favorite with some amazing pieces. Check them out on My Space too. Bakelite Bracelets also had some new/old pieces of Bakelite.
In other interesting news for those of you that sew you might know who Wrights is. Well there outlet store was in a neighboring town so my mom and I also spent quite a bit of time there so she could get goodies for her Barkcloth purses.
On Sunday we headed for Providence, Rhode Island to do a little bead shopping. Thanks everyone for your suggestions we hit 3 different places in the course of two days and let’s just say I have 8 boxes of vintage beads, baubles and charms being shipped to me as we speak. I looked like I had been making out with a dusty box at the end of each day and my allergies are still killing me after digging for it, but it was worth it. I can’t wait to play with everything and make new and exciting jewelry, but alas I must be strong all the projects for my book are due on the 31st of this month. I might not even open the boxes when they get here to resist the temptation. Oh who am I kidding?
In one of the stores I ran into a fellow Etsy dealer who I chatted up as we waited to have our beads counted. Be sure and check out Tracy over at Epoch Beads for some really cool vintage jewelry supplies. Her friend Atomic Veggie also has some awesome things.
Wednesday mom and I flew back to Dallas. I could have gone onto Austin, but my friend Erin was having her birthday celebration in Dallas that Friday so I decided to stay in town for a few days. Hope drove up to McKinney on Wednesday too so it was a regular family reunion for a few days. On Friday Cory, Erin, Karly and Sarah all drove down from Austin and Hope and I met up with them for our big night out on the town. We had 2 rooms booked at the W Hotel which is quite fancy pants. We swam in the Infinity pool which had an amazing view, sipped cocktails in the bar and enjoyed the terry cloth robes. For dinner we went to a restaurant called Amuse which was wonderful. Here we met up with Erin and I’s friends Stevie, Becky and Kim from high school. It was so good to see everyone. After dinner we headed down to Exposition where we went to a place called The Monkey Bar and met up with another high school friend Eric and his boyfriend. This place had a slight tiki theme that I enjoyed. After awhile we made our way over to another place called The Fallout where we all danced around to 80’s songs until the lights came up. Fun was had by all and I think Erin had quite the birthday. 
Saturday it took Hope and I almost 6 hours to get back to Austin due to the rain and traffic. Once we did I was home for maybe 2 hours before it was time for me to leave again and go out. My friends Tim and Katherine’s salon Method was celebrating their 1 year anniversary and all the art adorning the walls where pieces by Hope. Needless to say I was a little “under the weather” from the night before so I left a little early.
So now here I am sitting at my computer and blogging for the first time in over a week. I need to spend the day unpacking, sorting mail and catching up on things. First however, Chris and I off to have Migas. All the Italian food I had on the East Coast was wonderful, but nothing beats Tex Mex and I need my fix.
Hello!
I was a Brimfield this last show as well, scored some great items that I posed about in my blog (www.atomsatwork.com/words). It’s amazing to see someone talk about Brimfield, and the Wrights outlet, I grew up in Ware, Ma (yes is sounds like where, were,weir) and grew up going to these outlets and events.
Much Love,
Stephanie
i used to love the wrights outlet! they used to mark stuff down super duper cheap, then if it didn’t sell they would give it away for free on the first of the month! (needless to say the first was always a madhouse!) the last time i went back there a couple of years ago sadly it was all changed, the markdown section was about 1/4 the size and they don’t mark stuff down as cheaply as they used too