A Weeks Worth of 'Catch Up' ..

they say the 'best laid plans of mice and men often go awry' .. my intentions were to keep you totally updated on the comings and goings of this past Canton .. get you down in the trenches with me .. let you meet some of the awesome people who make up the incredible vendors at what is considered by many to be the largest flea market in the country .. spreading out over 100 acres ..

yes, those were my plans ..

well to start off .. prior to leaving for the two and a half hour drive to get to Canton .. I thought I would show off some of the things we had worked on for the show and would post about them once we got to Canton ..
setting a table up outside i draped it with the wonderful new tablecloth i had made from an vintage tablecloth .. pottery barn inspired .. (oh grab something to drink, this is a weeks worth of catch-up and we are only at the beginning ..) so rod helped me set the dining table up outside and we draped it with the tablecloth .. it looked lovely, draping to the brown green grass, i grabbed the camera and adjusted the focus .. and boom .. gale force winds enveloped us .. well, poo ..

i thought i could grab a quick pic between the gusts ..


no such luck .. i made this by adding ruffled bands of gauze to an existing luncheon tablecloth .. i thought it turned out real cute ..

so fast forward 3 hours .. our two and half hour drive took longer because we had to make a stop half way there to get some bottled water .. 20 minutes into the store .. we discover they had no individual bottles of water .. it's 4th of July weekend and someone forgot to order enough .. but we are assured they will have a truckload that evening .. so back on the road ..

we finally get to Canton and everything is looking good .. our display fixtures have arrived and as requested the 'wall people' have not put our wall up so we can enjoy the wonderful summer air and maybe catch a breeze and surely get some sunlight ..

ready to start the day unloading and setting up the booth .. we like setting the display up first ..

display partially set .. ready to unload the trailer & van ..

so we spent the rest of the night .. until midnight .. setting the booth up and unpacking ..

another chest of drawers .. or as we say down here .. chester drawers .. this one accented with vintage 1940s green print wallpaper ..

little glider vignette with crisp white office chair and vintage table ..

a better look at the tablecloth and of course the slipcovers ..

the next morning the sun was shining bright .. and even though we were exhausted, we were ready for the day .. i loved the way the sun was shining into the back of the booth, which greeted the rising sun with open arms .. it really lit up the booth ..

the sun just lit the booth up with such intensity, it made everything seem crisp and new ..

isn't that tablecloth the coolest ..? ...

a daylight view of the glider vignette ..

we spent the better part of Thursday greeting customers and putting the finishing touches on the booth .. it was so hot, but i was able to make a blog post ..

the Arbors pretty much shut down at 5 o' clock .. a lot of the vendors head off to the surrounding restaurants or settle in for the night .. Rod and I chose to grab a quick sandwich and hit the sack .. it had been a long day and we were totally spent .. we don't have a travel trailer, but we have our old van which we use for sleeping .. we use a blow up mattress and have a small air conditioner we install in the passenger window .. and there are showers on the grounds, which we make use of .. so by 7 that evening we were sawing logs like nobody's business .. when i was awakened by the soft tinkling sound of rain hitting the roof of the van .. i nudged Rod and said .. "it's raining .. did we close up the booth?" ( we always say 'we' when we don't want to appear blaming of the other or suggesting that the other should have been responsible) .. to which he replied .. " uh huh".. i raised my head enough to see the back of our booth and that indeed our canvas drops cloths were closed tight and secured with clips .. i also noticed our neighbors were in their booth beginning to secure it .. then i kind of felt like the rain was getting harder .. not such a soft rain any longer .. i felt the van kind of sway ..i nudged Rod again and said .. "i think this is getting serious .." .."it'll be alright" he said .. and then the rain slowed .. then there was a sudden burst of a downpour .. i grabbed for my shoes, but realized i had changed into my flip flops in the booth and left my shoes there .. i told Rod " we need to get up " at the same time the wind picked up and our backdrop began flapping in the breeze and slapping items in our booth as they were being tossed around and around .. i glanced over and saw our neighbors scrambling .. i heard hail hitting the roof of the van .. i saw hail hitting the ground .. i saw our booth being devoured by the wind and rain .. i felt sick ..
throwing the sliding door of the van open .. i ran .. Rod close behind me .. flip flops flipping and flopping in the rain and wind and hail .. where there was a drive not 2 hours ago, there was now a raging river .. i made an attempt at a jump and lost a flip flop and my phone .. i looked up and all i could see was our booth being tossed .. through the wind and rain i began grabbing at things that were wet in a plan to get them into a dry area .. luckily that afternoon i had opted not to remove all our pillows from their plastic coverings .. or it could have been much worse for us ..the sound of shattering glass and wet fabric flapping in the wind echoed through the caverns of the Arbors .. it was pure chaos ..

now i know it seems odd to stop and take pictures of all this .. but i didn't think of taking pictures of it until it had stopped raining .. the winds had died down .. i realized i was sopping wet .. rod and i looked at one another and began to laugh ..all we could repeat was 'unbelievable' .. he said i kept saying the 'f' word over and over, but that is sooo unlike me, i don't believe him .. you know .. what do you do .. you pick yourself up and keep going .. it was an adventure .. we had a lot of things get wet .. we dried them as best we could and i have been washing things this week .. we lost 3 teacups with saucers, 4 cloches and the cup and saucer of a dish set on the table .. everything else was either paper, wood or fabric .. it all got wet ..

the front of our booth .. the ladder once assisted in closing off our booth and was the point where two fabric lengths met to close our booth from prying eyes..cause if you don't block your booth, people will come into it when you aren't there..

the back of the booth, tossed .. the wood signs tossed like paper ..

one of the chests we had, tossed over and crushing hat boxes ..

so we are close to midnight by the time we get things picked up and sorted and on the way to drying .. when i feel myself limping .. and i look down and see this and immediately get sick to my stomach ..



at some point in the evening, i guess when i made that ill-fated jump over the raging creek/river, i twisted/broke/mangled my ankle .. and that has kept me out of commission for the last week .. a neighbor brought me a boot to wear .. Rod got me an Ace bandage, but it had latex in it, and i am allergic to latex ..(do yourself a favor and don't do a google image search for ankle rash)..

the next morning, the booths behind us in the open field looked like this ..


this is the booth of the guy that rents the little scooters as you come into the main entrance of Canton .. off hiway 19 ..

this is the booth of a plant vendor behind us ..

unable to walk i could not get pics of the damage other than what was around me .. by Friday morning, in most places it looked as if nothing had happened .. there were vendors who suffered a lot more damage than we did .. i feel for them .. and don't let anyone tell you otherwise, there was bad damage in the buildings also .. i heard of people who lost a lot of merchandise over in Pav 2 .. it was a sudden storm that caught everyone off guard ..

here's a story about the storm ..

so it took us all weekend to recover .. i was able to make some posts to facebook by my phone once it dried out, which was amazing .. but it took me til Saturday to locate our notebook .. and by then i just wanted to get home and get my foot up ..

the dr said my ankle was just a bad sprain .. but to stay off of it for about a week and keep it elevated .. uh huh, sure .. she gave me a scrip for an anti-inflammatory and said it should be better in about a week or so ..

now .. wasn't that entertaining and maybe a little bit better than being there ?? lol!

hope you all have a wonderful week .. i will be making a post in the next few days to show you before and afters of the little glider ..

love ya'
Troy