The Country Living Fall Fair 2010

This is the first thing I head to when we arrive at the fair. If you look closely, the pumpkins and gourds are placed on stacked hay bails and there is a corn stalk coming out of the middle. A thing of beauty.


The fair is held just outside of Columbus, Ohio at the fairgrounds called Ohio City.


The place is filled with historic buildings and is really beautiful.


We bought the early bird tickets so we could get in at 8:30 am. It did not work out that way as you will see later in the post.


We left at 4:00 am to make sure we would be the first in line.


The fair seemed to be twice as big this year.


I don't know the history of these buildings because each year we are so busy shopping we really don't pay too much attention to the buildings.



What a perfect setting for this fair.


The unfortunate thing this year was that we went on Friday which had a high temp of 90 degrees.


The next day the temps were in the 60's.


That did not stop people though.


It quickly became very crowded.


This place even has it's own garden.


After my gourd/pumpkin stop, this is always the next place I head to. There is nothing quite like a good broom and I bought three. Aren't these beauties?


This is Jim Rantala, the broom maker. If anyone wants a broom, you can contact him at: jrantala@alldial.net This is his email. He does not have a website. Not only are his brooms wonderful, they are also very reasonably priced. I have about 8 of these now and love each one of them.


Plus, look at this guy! How cuet is he? The jolly broom builder!!!


Shabby chic seemed to be the main theme of the fair this year.


Click for a closer look.


I loved this idea. These pumpkins are decorated with black sequins. They look like Cinderella's coach.



Many of the booths had architectural salvage for sale.


And there were many Halloween booths.


I loved the way these ladies used vintage conservatory windows to form a tiny shop.


There was some very nice furniture for sale.


Rustic Fall wreaths.


I loved these cats and rats.


And why didn't I buy this for Christmas? Now I am going to have to make one for myself.


Nice chest.


And while we are on the subject, what is up with this?


This was tempting but big.


The I found this booth.


And did not buy this witch! Why? And her black cat! Why? I get so into taking the pictures that I forget to shop. Damn! Then I come home and look at the pics and ask....WHY??? I really like that witch and cat. Oh well.


But I did buy this.


But I did not buy the JOL. Why? I am blaming a lot of this on the heat.


Cute doll house and figures.


Rustic dolls hung on the fence...ouch!


And then I spotted David Smith the redware maker.


And I got so excited about adding to my redware collection that I forgot to take pics of his work. Tomorrow I will show you what I bought.



I liked the name of this booth.


There was a lot of burlap and wire which is a hot look right now.


Copper pots and Fall flowers.


What a pretty display.


WAIT....who's the guy in the Longaberger basket? I'm buying this one. It's the Blog Tech!!! Good sport you are BT!!! We noticed that he was the absolutely only guy of his age at the entire fair.


The fair seemed to have lots of 'green' items this year.


'Green' ghosts.


This is just one of the things that makes this fair so wonderful and inspirational. All of the signs and planters were decked out with pumpkins and gourds.


Cement witches.


Festive dried gourds.


What a cool way to decorate a Fall table.


Alternative way to display pumpkins.


These ladies were making tansey wreaths. It seemed like every other person we saw was carrying one.


A closeup of one of the sign holders.


Longaberger pumpkins in a Longaberger basket.



A lot of this was being sold.


These lemonade stands were all over the fair.


There was all sorts of fair food to be had.


Very quickly the crowds were unbearable. There were lines to get into the booths. The Blog Tech and I were there for only 45 minutes when we decided enough was enough.


The only thing that would have made me more miserable than the crowds and the heat would be to be her. Sit down, shut up!!!


This serious swinger caused me to rush to the car.



This is what caused us to be late to the fair. It totally closed the main highway down in both directions. A tractor trailer hit a petrol truck. Never a good thing.


We stared at this for the next two hours and arrived at the fair at 10:00 am entirely blowing the early bird concept and the avoiding the heat and crowds concept as well.


After going to the Columbus Market we headed back to the highway six hours later to find this.



See that no turn sign. It had my name all over it. I love to spit in the face of authority. That traffic ate my dust and we took off into the countryside. It was the best detour we ever took and I will show you where we ended up tomorrow.

We had a blast!

Comments

I'm so envious of the fabulous craft fairs and sales you get to go to! I might try one of those black sequined pumpkins myself -- they're gorgeous! And they wouldn't be that hard to do, I think.
So much to look at! Great fair I wish I could find one near me that is like that! Loved all the decorated pumpkins! The Blog Tech is cute as can be!
brandi said…
~besides the traffic jam...so lucky were you to visit such a fair...beautiful crafted creations and those pumpkins i may have to try too! absolutely gorgeous...and the brooms...i have collected brooms from various thrift stores but all mine are of child size...thank you for sharing the "jolly" broom makers link...i am off to go for a visit! sometimes i too get so distracted taking pictures and have those moments i wished i was paying a wee bit more attention...maybe you could get a witch stencil and make one yourself!?! she was quite cute...warm wishes and brightest blessings~
Suzanne said…
You may adopt me any day now!

Kiss Teddy for me (and Bella)
Wow, wow, wow! What a Fair!!! Lucky you, even though it was hot. :-)

Gentle hugs...
Robin Larkspur said…
longaberger punkins, how neat! Too bad about the crowds and the heat..i hate that.
Sharon Day said…
Why can't all of America be this quaint??? I liked seeing people at this country autumnal looking event all in tees and shorts. Made me feel better in the AZ desert. I don't know how you didn't leave just dragging all the vendors behind you to your home. I would want everything!
brokenteepee said…
That is one thing about Montana; there are very few traffic jams. With less than a million people in a heck of a lot of space traffic is just not an issue.

They think they have traffic but they have no idea what traffic really is....
I guess You already know what I´m going to write :-) I wish we had something like that over here :-) :-)


There´s so much to comment today that it would take more space than I can get, so I´ll just concentrate on some things :-)

The town is really beautiful, but then again You have only shown really beautiful towns in Your blog :-)

Those Cinderella coach pumpkins gave me flashbacks to that movie as soon as I saw them :-) :-)

But I have to say that the christmas star is a bit too much for me :-) :-) People here in the village would think I was even stranger than they already think I am if I had something like that here :-) :-) :-)

I saw some really fine furniture I would like to have here and those rustic dolls hanging on the fence is fantastic!!! To have one of those hanging on my door would probably scare my neighbors so much that they would avoid me for all times :-) :-) :-)

I also liked that bird cage behind those cement witches.

Thanks for showing all these great photos!
Have a great day now!
Christer.
Leanne said…
Go girl with your detour!

You can make your own witch & cat - it looks similar to this one. I am going to get ds to make it for a woodwork project.
http://www.marthastewart.com/how-to/witch-and-cat-lawn-ornaments
Guillaume said…
So many nice things there...
AlphaBetsy said…
I was at the fair on Saturday and I am laughing at how many things you took pictures of that I had loved as well. :) I'm sorry it was stressful for you getting there, but I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did.
I'm SO jealous... I've always wanted to go to this! Everything looks amazing!!!♥
Laura said…
I've always wanted to go to these country living fairs. Maybe someday I'll get to go! I have two cats like the one that you showed and a witch but she looks different. My granddaddy made them almost 40 years ago. He used to set up displays for the holidays in his yard and somehow I ended up with the witch and cats. hee hee

blessings
~*~
Teresa said…
I am so incredibly jealous of your adventures! It looks like a lot of fun things.
this looks amazing! i love all the halloween things :) Thank you for sharing your pics!
Rue said…
Thanks so much for the tour. I almost take back my wish to attend though - I could never have handled the crowds. I would have opted for the early bird ticket too - it's just a shame you weren't able to actually get there early.

Can't wait to see where your rule-breaking took you - giggle!
Unknown said…
I love the Longaberger pumpkins. They are so cute. The fair looks like it was tons of fun.
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