You would think with all the “stuff” we have around our house and farm that I wouldn’t need to go spend a half day “Junking”!! But that is what Dan and I did this past weekend near Omaha, Nebraska. We spent time with my only sister, Julie, and my youngest brother, Kent, and his wife, Sue at an event called “Junkstock”. It is an annual event that spreads out over quite a large, rural grassy area including buildings, tents, and loosely set up areas for vendors of every kind imaginable.
We had never been there, but my sister had invited me in years previous. We saw how serious some of these shoppers are when we entered the “fields” to park. After yet another hard rain on Friday evening, parking was hard to find that didn’t cause you to walk through mud or standing water. Common attire was boots of all colors and heights, jeans, flannel shirts or sweatshirts. Hearty shoppers even pulled wagons for their finds! People paid an entrance fee, while the sign said that dogs were free! And there were many of them…mostly big! (Maybe the smaller variety would have gotten lost or stuck in the mud!)
It was a step back in time at many of the “shops”. We were humored and amazed to see what people made out of things we grew up with, and would probably consider “used up” or “finished”. Beautiful tables, islands, and bars made out of large slabs of wood, sanded and finished, but their bases were old pieces of pickups, farm machinery, or tools. As we poked and peeked around in various bins and containers we came upon kitchen items used long ago, tools that Dan had forgotten about from his childhood, and items re purposed to serve in a new way. One we especially laughed about was an old manure cart that used to be used in someone’s barn to clean out the gutters, and then taken outside to empty only to return to the barn and start again. The owner had cleaned it up, put pretty wooden doors and handles on it, and someone probably has it in their home now for storage. Hope it doesn’t have a hidden or lingering smell!
Metal, burlap, wood, old cloth feed sacks, etc, were found everywhere sporting some “new” use to tempt us to hand over the money and take it home. My favorite find was an old metal garden sign that says “ Garden of Weeden”. It will fit perfectly in my landscaping sprouting tufts of grass here and there. My sister found an old step stool in great shape, and some wooden arrows that she plans to create a family sign with at her home. When we thought we had seen it all, we walked further to catch a glimpse of yet another unique idea that someone came up with.
Of course these kinds of events always tempt your taste buds. We did enjoy some homemade root beer with our lunch. They had all kinds of bottles, both plastic and glass. You purchased your favorite kind and size, and they would fill it, cork it, and off you went. And you could refill it any time for half price. So I had my “fix” for the day! We both love honey, and we came home with some smoked honey, that they said would be good on salmon. Looking forward to trying that. We actually did try it on our grilled chicken at my brother’s that evening, and it was tasty.
These kinds of events are great places to meet new people and have fun watching all who are there. One of my favorite past times; people watching! The little boy stomping through the mud puddles while his mom shopped was one of my favorites. Another was a “pumpkin” man leaning over the engine of a very old pickup, his pumpkin head dangling inside the wires and parts. Speaking of that, of course the place was FILLED with pumpkins and gourds every shape and color, plus huge, beautiful mums just popping with color. They even had a pumpkin house, made of open shelving shaped like a real house. It was filled to the brim, and you could win prizes by guessing how many the “house” held. The colors and patterns were so pretty.
Dan is a pretty conservative shopper, and he even found something he could use! In one of the little tents he spotted a wooden, saw handle. When he asked what it cost, the owner of the stuff said, “Where did you get that?” Too funny, they don’t even know how much “junk” they have! He got it for a dollar to replace the half broken one he has on an old hand saw. Now he just has to find the old saw so he can fix it!!
We finished our few days of going back in time last night when we went to The Everly Set concert in Windom, as part of the local Concert Series. In my younger years I loved going to the Roof Garden in Okoboji and got to see and hear the brothers, Phil and Don Everly, perform many times. Even though these songs are six decades old, we sure enjoyed stepping back in time and hearing them again. We don’t get to all the concerts, but the ones we do are almost always enjoyable.
Enjoy this October time, and keep praying for some drier, harvest weather. It has been quite the year for rain, and as we saw in Iowa, with Interstate 29 still closed in spots, it covers a large area.
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