More Photos!

More amazing photographs of the market, taken by Kelly:

Jenny had spotted a "saw flower" like this on Pinterest.  Brian had all these saws and put
them up -- perfect for the side of the Tool Shed!  

Maybe someone else wants some hens and chicks?  

This delivery truck was a great addition to the market!  Thanks to the people at
Rose Acres for letting us display it!

And this pink tractor is so special -- painted and owned by the Hoeveners, who lost their daughter, Lisa, to breast cancer.  

A wonderful group who came out to spend the day with us!

Another great group!

Love our shoppers!  (We helped them carry this after the photo, lol!)

We loved seeing this area fill up! 

Our friend, Heather, from Jubilee in Seymour, did a demonstration each day.  Friday, she filled the copper washtub with flowering kale and other fall foliage, and on Saturday, she decorated a bird cage and did the succulent milk crate below:

Heather from Beautiful Chaos also did a demo both days, showing the versatility and
ease of painting with Annie Sloan chalk paint! 

We are lucky to have such fine musicians as our friends.  Jordan Richart was great
(and funny!  This was "the first and only stop on his world tour"!)

Everyone enjoyed Mark Friend's set!  

This sweet boy is an inspiration for one of our additions next year -- a kids' area!

Look at all those door prize tickets!  It was a good day ....

What a Time! A Barn Market Photo Wrap Up!

We could not have even imagined the wonderful response to our first market -- there was lots of love those two days!  I find it hard to put in to words, so I'll just post some of my favorite photos, taken by our dear friend and official Hen and Chicks Barn Market photographer, Kelly Stephens!

Two of my favorites -- musician Mike Gerth entertaining Sloane!

How pretty is this?  

Oh, how I love vintage!

Our homemade hand washing station -- one of those things you have to think about when you're inviting a thousand people over for the afternoon....

My little camper, which became our "stash it" spot.  I think I could have sold her many times over, but she's too special to part with!

The Welcome corn crib -- it's hard to miss this sign, and sums up the attitude at Jenny and Brian's farm! 

More photos of day 2 and our vendors tomorrow!  Thanks, thanks, thanks!

Georgie

Wow!

I haven't posted forever, I know.  But let me just say that all the work that went toward our first Hen and Chicks Barn Market was worth it.  We had such a good time.  Really!  It was just so much fun, and we're thinking ahead to our next market, because so many are asking for another!  So, I plan to post some pictures soon, and then we'll have an update about our 2016 plans.

If you came out to the market, thank you.
If you were a vendor at the market, thank you.
If you helped at the market, thank you.

Thank you, thank you, thank you.

A New Look for an Old Barn

The part I like best about the whole vintage/shabby chic "movement" is taking something old and giving it a beautiful new life.  My grandma was a furniture painter before it was cool, and I carried a purse to high school that my mom and I made out of an old pair of my dad's overalls.  (I'm still on the hunt for more old overalls, by the way!)

We've been giving new life to the barns at Jenny and Brian's farm -- a new roof on the chicken house, new floors, cleaning, repairing and painting -- making it all pretty for you when you come for the Barn Market!


Here is a picture of the dairy barn as it looked last week:

Fine, but concrete block just isn't very exciting, is it?

When Jenny and I traveled to NYC this spring, we made a visit to Pennsylvania to visit her sweet cousins, and we loved looking at the old historic barns with stone foundations that dotted the hills around Allentown.  I saw a lot of the same type barns on our vacation -- Iowa and Minnesota are both blessed with beautiful old barns.  So I thought, "Could we paint the block to look like stone?"  Turns out, we could!

 First, we power washed, then, we primed.  Just as an FYI, concrete block sucks up A LOT of primer!

Sherwin-Williams was having a 30% off sale last week, so I bought 4 quarts of latex paint, choosing colors by matching them to some photographs of barns and stone silos; I picked the bottom 4 colors from a color card, and started painting.

I really liked what was going on, but we wanted to pull some of the red from the barn roof, so back to SW for a quart of deep red, and we were all happy with the results.  

We also "whitewashed" the door with some Annie Sloane Chalk Paint mixed with water -- still "barny", but much cleaner-looking.  The mortar lines are also AS, mixed with a little brown.  

Of course, this is the short side of the barn -- we're making good progress on the LONG side, which faces the road.  Hoping to have it done this week!  

Georgie

Sign, Sign, Everywhere A Sign

These:

have been in my garage for years.  My women's group has participated in our town's Oktoberfest from the very beginning (sometime in the 70's -- maybe 74?) and many times, our cute booth won an award:  one of these lovely signs, plus a monetary gift for the next year's application fee.

When we closed our thrift shop (which we had operated for over 40 years in 3 different locations), these signs (and several more), plus years of scrapbooks, treasurer books, secretary notes and other memorabilia, ended up in my garage.  I've finally culled it down to the scrapbooks and a few other pieces, but just didn't know what to do with the signs -- no one wanted them in their garages, either!

Light bulb moment!  I flipped them over, painted them and used my handy Cricut and some Annie Sloane paint to make signs for our barns:

Check one more task off for June!  

And, because my work area was already a mess, and because I had an extra sign I had already painted black, I made a special one for Jenny's garden/potting bin: 

So true.

Georgie

Re-cycling Quilts

 Jenny and I are both quilters, so quilts, quilt squares and quilt designs are going to be a big part of our decorations for the barn market.

We've picked up some well-worn, well-loved quilts at flea markets and antique stores, and a few weeks ago, we purchased 6 shabby quilts at an auction.

Jenny has great plans for these quilts -- primarily, to use them to cover bales of straw for seating for our guests in the food and entertainment area.  Since Jenny is working hard on the barns, I agreed to take the quilts home and get busy.

But despite their holes, stains and general raggedy-ness, I had a hard time making the first cut into those quilts.

I have never thought to record all the hours it takes to make a quilt (from choosing patterns and fabric to finishing those last stitches on the binding and label), but I know it's a lot of hours.  A LOT.  But that's not what quilting is about.

You love someone, so you make them something they will love and that will keep them warm.  That's it.

50, 60, 70 years ago, a woman (or group of women) sat down to create these quilts to keep her family warm, just like we do now.  It just breaks my heart to cut into all that loving work.

Then Jenny gave me a "snap out of it" talk!  These quilts will probably never again cover a bed -- they're just too far gone.  If we don't use them and display them in a different way, they'll probably just continue to rot away until someone throws them in a dumpster.  Cutting the quilts into straw bale covers, chair covers and buntings is, in a way, continuing to honor the women who made them.

Before I show you my first project, I thought I would document these quilts.  They're still beauties, in my book!

Monkey Wrench 

 6" blocks set on point 

 Scrappy
Colorful 2" squares

LeMoyne Star  

6"

Texas Star

18" blocks in bright colors!  

Tree of Life

10" blocks.  Look at all those little pieces!

Here is my first quilt-cutting project -- a bunting for the music wagon.  Dresden Plate, originally set in long rectangles:  

It was in terrible shape -- rust spots, worn fabric and I think it might have even been burned on a stove -- there are some suspicious coil-shaped scorches.  But doesn't it look pretty now, displayed with some reproduction fabric strips on clothesline?  I might just hang this in my living room after the sale.

This is what vintage/antique lovers know:

There is value in things that have outlived their original usefulness.  

There is honor in remembering the ones who created and used those things.  

There is beauty in finding a purpose for them again.  

Georgie

Using Old Stuff - Graduation Party

Jenny's son, Luke, graduated from Trinity High School in May, and his graduation party was last weekend.  Many of the things we've pulled out of the barns became decorations at the party!

Luke's cousin, Kourtney, had found this old truck stock gate; with a little cleaning and a few nails (and a little help from my grandson, Paul), it became the menu board:

Old doors became the backdrop for Luke's and Kourtney's memory tables:

Sorry the pictures are a little blurry, but I had to hurry with my phone before the crowd arrived!  And what a crowd there was!

We'll be using the doors again, as they will be the backdrop on a flat bed wagon for our music and workshops during the market.  Their card holders were old suitcases, and Jenny used an old bread box for chips and washtubs for holding the drinks.  Plus, both kids had amazing t-shirt quilts displayed at the cake tables.  These two have already accomplished so much in school, sports, 4-H and church activities.  

You'll probably see those buntings again, too!  The one on Luke's table was made from a roll of burlap "ribbon", cut into rectangles and sewn onto clothesline -- so quick and easy.  Kourtney's was from scraps of red fabric and some vintage lace I had in my stash.  Sewing buntings is great fun -- just stack up all your pieces of fabric, fold them over the clothesline and sew away -- it's a cute way to add personality to a display.

Georgie