AntiqueWeekend: It's Fall, Ya'll!

Sunday, November 3, 2013

It's Fall, Ya'll!

Repurposed from my daughter's wedding
this chalkboard gets lots of use

Morning TV tells me that parts of the country will have a hard freeze tonight. The seasons are changing in Texas, too. But here it’s a little different. In our part of central Texas we have two seasons: "really hot" and "wow it’s cold!" Monday’s 86 degrees is Saturday’s overnight low of 43. Suddenly I am scrambling for warmer blankets and a sweater. Even still, the sky is a crisp blue, the sun is shining bright and my rain-happy roses are blooming like mad. I have to remind myself it’s Fall!

Plaid flannel pumpkin and chili peppers
say Fall in Texas!

It’s November and somehow Halloween décor just looks a little garish once the trick-or-treating is over and the candy is gone. Visiting blogs and websites, I have been inspired by all the pumpkin creativity. Pumpkins are painted, stenciled, covered with lace and created from Mason jar rings (cannot wait to try that one!!). My own faux light up jack o’ lanterns have seen better years. Taking inspiration from others, I decided to cover mine with fabric to take them through Thanksgiving. My idea was flannel, a true fall staple. At the Goodwill (our substitute garage sale location if it's raining) I spotted a wonderful child’s orange and brown plaid flannel shirt and a yummy brown fisherman knit sweater. They were perfect for “slip covering” my old pumpkins. Since the pumpkins were shot, I carefully pried the plastic base holding the light bulb off the bottom. This allowed me to slide the buttoned shirt over the pumpkin (sleeves pulled inside-out) and tuck the shirt tails and extra length up inside the pumpkin. A little light tack spray I use for stenciling held the fabric securely to the pumpkin. I wrapped the collar with twine to create a “stem” and voila! Now I have Fall pumpkins, without even damaging the shirts. For additional color I grabbed some potted chili peppers (this is Texas!) and gerbera daisies and filled a favorite twig basket. A hand-woven throw over the rocker and a few gourds finish it off. Happy Fall, Ya’ll!

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Our Story

In 2000, with his temporary job in California coming to an end, David asked me where I wanted to live next.
I said Fayetteville (Texas), a charming town of 266 people in central Texas. And so we came. We moved into a loft above a commercial building on the square in Fayetteville. It was there that AntiqueWeekend.com was born. My husband had visited Fayetteville many times over the years, visiting his parents and grandparents. He told me wonderful tales of the antique shows held twice a year. It was hard to imagine that the fields of grazing cattle could be filled with tents and booths full of treasures. (They do move the cattle!) We love garage sales, prowling through antique stores, flea markets and thrift stores. In California we attended some legendary flea markets including the Rose Bowl and Long Beach. We spent our Saturday mornings driving through the greater Claremont area finding some wonderful treasures at garage sales.
With time on our hands and treasure hunting in our souls, we decided to utilize David’s computer skills and develop a website that would serve as a resource with information about the semi-annual Warrenton and Round Top Antique Weekend and a directory for the ever-increasing number of show sites and vendors. It was a different world 13 years ago. Few show sites and even fewer vendors had websites. And social media was unheard of. With smart phones and tablets the world has changed and we can see it in the visits to our website. And we have changed, too. The website now has a clean new look. We are on facebook and twitter, have thousands of photos on twitter and instagram, send a periodic newsletter and have recently launched an AntiqueWeekend blog.
We have changed, too.
We bought our own old farmhouse, planned weddings and have wonderful granddaughters who love to visit Mimi and PopPop at the farm.
We bake cookies and do crafts and many of the pictures you see on the blog are projects we have done together.
When you are making your plans to visit Antique Weekend we want you to have all the info you need and great photos of what you can expect to see. Between shows we want to inspire you. We’ll share ideas, memories and information about events that happen here “the rest of the time” so you can plan to come back more than just twice a year.