Happ-ily Ever : flea market

There's something a tad bit depressing about passing an exit you turned on to everyday
for 3 years. Its not that I long to go back to my college days at Illinois State..
I love where I am in life and wouldn't trade it for anything, but reminiscing
about days gone by, mourning time lost, is not a fun process.
Maybe its just me getting older. No matter, every time we head south
on I-39 I feel the same way.

My brother-in-law and I made a trip down to Bloomington for the first monthly

antiques/flea market of the year. I ended up coming home with some vintage

prints for the kitchen that I intend on framing and a gorgeous polka dotted scarf. I love

vintage baby shoes, especially if they are saddle shoes and these babies were so cute!

As I've mentioned before, we've been having a bit of a dry spell in our area.

We need rain so badly and there hasn't been much in the forecast as of late.

The other day, we had 40+ mile per hour winds whip through our neck of the

woods and the "dust storms" that resulted were pretty crappy. This photo is what it

looked like pulling out of my driveway that afternoon. My bro-in-law & I hopped in

the truck and went exploring because hoeing corn that Chris mis-planted in all that dust

and heat was getting pretty old. If thatday wasn't the poster child for why

more farmers should be implementing conservation methods of tillage, I don't

know what is. I could see dust flying off of certain fields all

day long, while the fields next to these ones weren't losing much at all. It pays to

leave crop residue on top of the soil surface on dry years like this. Top soil is

just too precious. Plus the left over residue keeps moisture in the ground longer.

More of that dust.

We went to the wedding of my sister-in-law's life long best friend on Saturday. Everything
was so perfect and beautiful :) The entire Happ clan was there and you'd better
believe that we took full advantage of the amazingly fun photo booth that
was provided. The left photo strip is Chris & myself, along with my

mother-in-law, Karen. The center is of us and our great friends, Katie & Devin.

The strip on the right is my sis-in-law, my bro-in-law and myself, hamming it up,

of course. Photo booths never get old.. I get so excited when we walk into

a reception that has one :)

Queso fundito on Memorial Day. We had lunch at our favorite Mexican restaurant that we

have been missing out on a lot lately. It was as fantastic as I remembered.

We finished up our Memorial Day festivities by grilling out steaks & chops with Chris's

sister, Emily, and her boyfriend from Fort Worth, TX, Billy. She brought over a bottle

of rhubarb wine for me, as she knows my obsession with anything rhubarb. Isn't that

label easy on the eyes? I love it.

I hope that everyone enjoyed their long weekend. Besides the high temps & winds,

ours was pretty great, if I do say so myself.

On Sunday, Chris & I hopped in the truck and headed north to pick up my dad & his girlfriend, Crystal.

We were all on our way to the bi-annual antique flea market in Elkhorn, Wisconsin. There are a few things in life that make me feel completely happy from head-to-toe, and flea markets are one of them.. I just love how I never know what I'm going to find or discover strewn about tables, booths, and buildings. I love the feeling of rediscovering something that once brought someone else joy hanging from their living room wall, or sitting pretty on a cabinet shelf. I don't believe that there is any such thing as "junk".. I like to think that, somewhere out there, there's somebody who's heart would sing at the sight of that old telephone, or that green little glass shoe. I never approach a flea market or antique mall with an item in mind, I just meander through and if something really speaks to me or makes me want to do a cartwheel right there in the isle, I buy it... if its reasonably priced :) Anyway, we headed north on I-39 to Rockford where we ate way too much at the Machine Shed (a really, really awesome restaurant that has a country-inspired menu as well as some fabulous country/farm "artifacts" decorating its walls. As we neared Elkhorn, the rain started..

then stopped.. then started again.. and again.. and again.. Pretty much the story of the day.. Because the flea market was held at a fairgrounds, and a lot of booths were outdoors, evvvrybody shoved and crammed their way into the narrow-isled buildings. This was no problem for us.. We actually like to take our time browsing through booths but it honestly seemed like we were the only ones in that boat. I heard a middle-aged woman grumble, "If one more person gets in my way I'm going to knock them the f*ck down," under her breath as she pushed past a man in a wheelchair. Really, lady? I mean, you are at a flipping antique flea market..

and , yes, it is raining.. you can't change that..people are going to be in your way all day. This attitude was one that we encountered all day, unfortunately. Life is just too short to grumble, and shove, and curse at total strangers because they happened to linger ahead of you a moment longer, looking at something they are obviously interested in. Geeeesh!

I won't let them ruin my blog post, so that is all on them :)

Treasures I stumbled upon included an awesome Crisco sponsored cookbook/pamphlet from 1951. There's a picture below and I LOVE that little girl on the cover. Soo cute. I also found a complete set of farm animal cookie cutters IN THE BOX! Its rare enough that I found an actual complete set, but to have it in the original box was really the cherry or 10 on top. I'd been scouring bins of cookie cutters at antique stores for years trying to find the basic farm animals and now I finally had it. Did you know that a swan was actually considered a farm animal in the 50's? I sure didn't.

Dad bought a little purple Schwinn bicycle. He said he learned to ride a bike on one just like it, except it was candy apple red. He says its for "future" grandchildren. Crystal bought a perfect little '50's chrome-lined, laminate-topped, teal table with teal and chrome chairs. Adorable..And she also found some metal wash bins. They were pretty lovely, too. So we drove the truck into the fairgrounds to pick up their finds and I ended up spotting the wrought iron bed of my dreams.. for $100..

I couldn't have been happier :) With a little sandblasting work done by me to remove the corrosion and light blue paint, and a little straightening out of some bars by my dad, with his infinite wisdom of metal work, it should be good as new. After, of course, a shiny new coat of off-white paint :)

Hope you all had a wonderful, dry, weekend.