The school house never looked so festive. We had so much fun planning the party and so much fun at the party! We loved meeting all the delightful ladies who attended. And the “early birds chicks” came in plenty of time, to register for the FREE Room Re-Design giveaway! Congratulations to our winner Cheryl! We are so excited to “shop” her house and get started!

Back to the party…we had props in the attic for our gals to dress up in and snap photos on their phone. I have seen a few of these pictures floating around on Facebook but none have yet shown up on The Prairie Chick page. Do you hear that girls…none have yet been posted to The Prairie Chick page! We are dying to see more. Feel free to share them  – if you dare!

We also had several displays of ways to use vintage pieces for weddings, refreshments, showers, garden parties etc. scattered throughout the main floor. (I apologize for the blurry pictures. It was crazy-busy and I snapped pictures in between chatting and writing up sales)

Vintage Spring Party Refreshment Table

We served sweet miniature cupcakes made by the lovely, Mara Olson. (I ate way too many of those…) She also makes the most beautiful sugar cutout cookies you have ever seen in your life! I am not kidding! (Thank you to Dawn from Storehouse Antiques for this clear picture of the cupcakes.)

Paper cones and cups filled with popcorn, fruity spice drops, and malted milk balls. (Thank you again to Dawn for this picture)

Pink lemonade served in mason jars with sweet paper straws. (Picture courtesy of Dawn…)

And of course crackers and cheese. (Sadly there is no close up picture of those courtesy of Dawn!)
Then there was our cute little garden Fairy sign in table as you came in the door. Well, actually we used the top of a cute yellow dresser – but who’s keeping track…

But back to the garden Fairy sign-in dresser/table. Are we confused yet? Just humor me people. There was a cute fairy garden, moss trees on painted candlestick holders and a cute bird perched there, as well as a vintage pot to put all the registration slips in for the Room Re-Design we were giving away. Sweet little Andrea from Simple Expressions by Andrea came up with this idea.

Here is a close up of that Fairy garden and one of the trees. See the little chair and the little bird house in the Fairy garden? This is a fun way to dress up your potted plants and to use a vintage piece of glassware.

As our guests arrived they were greeted by Andrea who handed them slips of paper to register for the Free Room Re-design giveaway and also they were asked to mail us chicks a letter. We asked them to let us know their favorite color, their favorite things at the Market etc. We then asked them to “post” them in our mailbox. It was fun reading their responses!

Then we had some fun ideas from Dawn at Storehouse. Here is a neat centerpiece idea using three bottles tied with twine on a silver platter with
single stem flowers in each bottle. Love it!

Dawn also painted a silver platter with black paint and added a clip. This could be used to clip a reception menu, a wedding invitation,
or as shown here, a photo of the bride and groom.

 Next we have some shower decorating ideas. This one happens to be for a wedding shower but could be adapted to fit a baby shower theme as well. What better way to  let people know they are at a shower  than to use a vintage umbrella!

Here we have made a sweet banner using scrap-book paper. It says “Best Wishes Maddi”.  Then we have propped up the umbrella in the corner. This would also look adorable hanging over the table if you have a way to do it. Then we made flower magnets to hang on the front of the tablecloth and used vintage silver pieces for the bouquet and the refreshments. A chalkboard is propped in the back. You can use it for the menu, to write the name of the person you are giving the shower for, the date of the wedding or the due date/birth date of the baby if using it for a baby shower,
whatever the case may be. It all adds to the charm and vintage feel of the decor.

 On the landing to the attic we also had vintage metal and wicker picnic baskets with wool plaid blankets and old thermos filled with flowers to show how to throw a vintage themed picnic. Unfortunately I didn’t take a picture. Sigh… Susan from the Blue Owl  (check out her ETSY store) made cute serving dishes combining vintage glassware and plates, and also a stunning picture frame backed with chicken wire with tags attached that wedding wishes could be written on. The ideas were amazing and inspiring.

 We will definitely hold another Vintage Spring Party next year. Who knows what we will come up with for decorations. And of course we will give away another Room Re-design. We look forward to sharing Cheryl’s room when we get it done., so stay tuned!

See you on the Prairie,

Shelly

Remember this is just a peek. At the time I snapped these photos the attic was not set up yet, and if any of you have been in the attic you know how big it is! So keep in mind that there are more antiques, collectibles, primitives, jewelry, purses, scarves, pillows, dish towels, silver, dishes, crocks, – oh and clocks! Huge awesome clocks made from wooden spools and metal. They are awesome!  Enjoy!

Okay, okay…so even though we weren’t finished staging the fireplace/clock wall, I had to add this picture for you. I so badly want to keep the one on the mantel, but I will refrain myself and let one of you have first crack at it!

Very cool, huh? These are made by Brandee and her husband. A very cute couple. I am so excited to have them as new vendors. And of course we have our usual suspects bringing out all their lovely things. Dawn from Storehouse Antiques, Karla from The Other Chick Designs, Andrea from Simple Expressions by Andrea, Susan from Blue Owl Boutique, Rachel form Ginko-Lily Antiques, and Rodney, Sharon, Dave, Ana and Tami. Whew! did I forget anybody? Any how…Be sure to check out our 2013 Spring Market album on our Facebook page for more pictures. We update it every so often when we get the chance as we are setting up and as these wonderful people bring their things in.

Despite our wild Minnesota weather, I hope some of you will be able to take a drive out in the country to our sweet little Market. We would love to visit with all of you.

See you on the prairie,

Shelly
The Prairie Chick

In fact I am so positive that spring is coming that we are throwing a VINTAGE SPRING PARTY on Friday evening of the Prairie Chick Market from 6 to 8 p.m. There will be refreshments, pink lemonade, and plenty of “vintage” party ideas!
AND…all attendees will have a chance to win a FREE Room Re-Design by the Prairie Chick herself (that’s me)! And listen up all of you “early birds” (yes, I’m talking to all of you chicks that are always on time if not fifteen minutes early to an event – maybe we should call you “early chicks“…) the first 25 of you who come to the party will get your name in the hat TWICE! But, be warned – the doors to the schoolhouse will not open until 6 p.m. sharp! (The break between 4 and 6 p.m. on Friday is so myself and my fellow prairie chicks can get the party decorations and food set up, as well as put our feet up for a minute or two, before we greet all of you and party down!)

All of us here at the Market are so excited! We hope many of you can come and that you will bring your family or friends along to join in the fun!

See you on the Prairie!

Shelly – The P-Chick

But I had an idea! (Imagine a picture of a light bulb here.)
In my fabric stash I had the perfect piece to cover the chair with. I had used it before and recently made pillows with it. For some reason this fabric makes me happy. Maybe it’s the color combination and the fat birdies. At any rate…I love it!

When getting ready for The Prairie Chick Market I often coordinate a few pieces of furniture and accessories. As you can see, lately I am into black, gold, and purple. A very rich and warm combination. I am still adding purple into the shop here and there. It’s fun to get away from all the white and blue that you see all over blog-land lately. Not that I don’t like white and blue, because I do! It’s just fun to try out different colors.

Back to the chair.
First I pulled all the staples out of the chair and took the shiny gold fabric off. Then I sanded the wood, and painted the frame black using Benjamin Moore paint, waxed it with MinWax and buffed the wood. Then I recovered the chair (using many staples…), and hot glued black braid around the bottom,

And here it is! A Boho Prairie, bird chair!

Side Note: The container the Hydrangeas are in, is a vintage ice cream container, from the Schwen Ice Cream factory in my home town of Blue Earth, MN. There is a fun story about Walter Schwen, the owner of the factory, and his application to patent the process of dipping small squares of ice cream, inserted with piano wire, into chocolate. Walter called his creation “The Chocolate Dream”. Surprisingly two other men also applied for a similar patent at the same time. A lawsuit ensued. The three men had to travel to Chicago for litigation. Soon Walter tired of traveling back and forth to Chicago and sold out his interest to the other two men. One of the men was Russel Stover ( from the famed Russel Stover candy company) and the other went on to create the “Eskimo Pie”!
*Sadly, the Schwen company is no longer in business, but those of us who grew up in Blue Earth remember their ice cream and the factory!

Wow. All this talk about ice cream is making hungry! I think I will go sit in the bird chair and have an Ice Cream Bar – maybe even one with toffee bits!

See you on the Prairie. (Hopefully on May 2, 3, & 4th for our Spring Prairie Chick Market!)

Shelly -
The Prairie Chick

Take this mid-century coffee table. It is well constructed, solid and clean lined. As always I was in such a hurry to get started on the piece that I forget to snap a before pic. Luckily I took one before I was too far along.

For a long while I had planned to line the top of the table with vintage yard sticks and finish it off with a nice coat of poly but then, I decided I wanted to line it with beautiful paper and shiny upholstery tacks.

I painted the table with Annie Sloan chalk paint in “Old White”.  After giving it two coats and letting it dry, I applied a coat of Mod Podge on the top of the table and laid out my decorative paper.

Note: I had previously laid out the paper in a pattern that I liked so I had a plan in place when applying the paper to the top. (Once the paper is laid down on the Mod Podge you cannot budge it!)

Looks beautiful from a distance doesn’t it?

Well upon closer inspection parts of the paper had wrinkled despite my best efforts to apply it smoothly. I was sooo disappointed!

This is where I decided I would have to adjust my plans. Originally I was not going to distress this piece but go for a more sleek look. After conferring with my friends and family I knew I would have to smooth it out by sanding the beautiful paper! By doing this I was hoping that the distressing would add to the shabby chic look of the piece when it was finished.

As the PBS painter Bob Ross would say, this was a happy accident! We all loved how the table turned out! In the future I might even wrinkle the paper up a bit before applying it on the furniture to get a “worn wallpaper” effect.

(Note: Andrea, from “Simple Expressions by Andrea” says when applying paper on wood with Mod Podge, apply one coat, lay the paper on and let it dry BEFORE adding a second coat over the top! That way you will minimize wrinkling. This is probably where I made my initial “happy accident”!)

To finish it off I had purchased fancy gold/brass upholstery tacks to outline the top portion, but after laying them out it was clear that it would be too busy and not add to the design.  I then waxed the wood with Annie Sloan clear wax and used Min-Wax polyurethane to coat the top and protect the paper finish.

Here is the final product on display at the Prairie Chick Market.

My youngest daughter has fallen in love with this table. If she lived closer she would have absconded with it, as soon as it was finished! Lucky for all of you who live in and around the P-Chick Market area it is not gone and is now available for sale. Give me a call if you are interested.

See you on the prairie,

The Prairie Chick

Linking up to Miss Mustard Seed’s: “Furniture Feature Friday”

At one of our sales we set the hutch on top of this awesome vintage dining buffet for lack of a better place to put it.

From there it went up into the attic and sat on a coffee table -  of all things! Of course it was not meant to go together so Karla (the Other Chick Designs) and I hauled it back down to my workshop! I now had a plan for it. I remembered that it had looked pretty cool on top of the vintage dining buffet so…Here is what the turquoise hutch and the brown dining buffet now look like.

Isn’t she a  beauty! What a transformation. You can never go wrong painting a piece of furniture black. It is classic and looks so rich in the room.

I gave everything a light sanding, used a couple of coats of Black Valspar paint, lightly distressed the edges and gave it a good hand rubbed wax finish. Then I sprayed the original hardware with a black-hammered finish, spray paint. And WA-LA! Here it is!

Okay so it’s not as easy as it sounds…
It took a few days to get it done…
And, it was hard work…
And, now my arm hurts…but I enjoyed every minute of it!

This piece is available at The Prairie Chick Market & Chocolate Tasting Extravaganza on February 7, 8 & 9th.

See you on the prairie,

Shelly
(a.k.a. The Prairie Chick)

Linking up to:

Miss Mustard Seed’s Furniture Feature Friday

French Country Cottage Feathered Nest Friday

The February Prairie Chick Market and Chocolate Tasting Extravaganza is scheduled for February 7, 8, & 9th. Just in time for Valentine’s Day!

This is the season of flowers, love, romantic sentiment, and of course chocolate!
Market hours are Thursday and Saturday 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. and Friday, 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. 

In addition to the Market itself, we will once again be hosting a (limited seating) Chocolate Tasting  followed by a decadent Chocolate Dessert on Friday, February 8th at 7:00 p.m. Anyone wishing to attend should RSVP by clicking on the button below. (Cost is $15 per person.)  The tasting menu will be provided by “The Chocolate Season” of Algona, IA, no less!

Valentines Day reminds us to tell our loved ones how special they are to us and it also reminds us that we are special. I invite you all to do something special for yourself. Check out the Prairie Chick Market and Chocolate Tasting Extravaganza. Bring some friends.  Enjoy and celebrate!

For the Prairie Chick Market location and contact information, please Click Here.

This particular four-year-old has been telling me like it is for a couple of years now. Ever since he learned to talk!

I was sitting next to this little fellow at the breakfast table one morning when he earnestly looked at me, pointed at the top of my head, and said, “Grandma, you have tornado hair.” I  asked him to explain himself a little better, ” What do you mean? Is it messy, curly, or what”? ” I don’t know…its all…” and at this point he points his spindly little four-year-old finger at me and waves it around in circles to show me what my hair is doing, while at the same time making whooshing sound effects.

My daughter, The four-year-old’s mother, sensing an embarrassing- this is not my kid- moment, comes over to look at me and say it must be this little piece of hair curled up here.  “NO!” the four-year-old exclaims, as he continues twirling his spindly little four-year-old finger and the whooshing sound effects, “It’s a tornado and there are lines!” Now this really confused his mother and me. Lines? What is he talking about? At this point his ten-year-old brother takes a good look at me (not just my hair, but my whole face) and says authoritatively to his little brother, “Those… are wrinkles”.

“NO”, exclaims the four-year-old, “there are lines and a tornado!”

At this point the four-year-old’s mother is getting mildly upset with him and apologizing to me for his behavior. I, being the kind and understanding grandma that I am, shush her and tell her it’s okay. I then go on to explain to my darling four-year-old grandson that when people age, their skin wrinkles or gets lines in it. He stares at me, while scooping a mouthful of Crunchy Oaties into his mouth and ponders this. I go on to show him that we, older people, also get smile lines. I, in my infinite wisdom, demonstrate this and point out the lines around my eyes. The four-year-old continues to ponder this and scoop cold cereal into his mouth.

Now all the children are staring at me and pondering this. The six-year-old, who is always quietly observing, continues to quietly observe. (She may have made a comment but I was focusing intently on the four year old at this instance.) The two-year-old does not speak much yet, but if she could have I am most certain she would have said something. Thank goodness none of the other adults were up yet to witness the honest assessment of my looks by a four-year-old.

This is the same said four-year-old who about a year ago when he was a three-year-old, looked up at me and exclaimed “Grandma you ate a lot for lunch! Look at your tummy!” Smiling and nodding to himself he repeated, ” You sure ate a lot for lunch.” He then patted his own tummy to show how much he ate for lunch.

I sure do love visiting the granny kids…

See you on the prairie,

The Tornado Hair Chick

Well here is what the Home Goods Stylescope said: Boho isn’t just carefree. She’s adventurous and passionate, loving color and new and unusual uses for things. She’s into the Revamp, Reuse, and Recycle, and she can’t get enough of foraging for a good deal while mixing and matching silk-and-knit textures and vibrant colors anywhere she can.

So there you have it. That description is not totally my style but part of it certainly rings true. The part about color!

When I am not doing my Prairie Chick thing, I work at my cousin’s furniture store. I love looking at the HFN magazine that arrives monthly at the store. It is a publication about Home Furnishing News for Industry Decision Makers. And let me tell you – it is full of style, personality, texture and color!

No one’s home should ever be boring or safe.  Take a look at this.

Beautiful, graphic color! Isn’t this a great rug? What a statement piece this would be.

These make me happy!

These too! Aren’t these dishes fun?

Here’s a fresh pop of color in a neutral room.

More color and pattern in a neutral background.

Bold, graphic patterns and shades of blue, show how the same hues can be mixed with different patterns
and still look fabulous together.

Unexpected texture, simple formality and rich fabrics combine for a beautiful room in the picture below. Notice the pop of yellow and black.
And the beautiful Collies… every room needs a couple of those!

These pictures represent the myriad offerings of home furnishings and decor that are available to all of us.
It’s a colorful world out there. Don’t play it safe! Have fun with your home and the spaces you live in.

See you on the Prairie,

Shelly – The Prairie Chick

My friend Shauna firmly believes that radio stations should play Christmas music all year long. When we hear the strains of “Silent Night” or “Oh, Little Town of Bethlehem” an inner peace settles into our hearts, the Spirit is invited in, and what a wonderful feeling it is! My friend is right. We could use this feeling all year long not just for a few weeks each December.

With all the stress and worldly pressures that we all deal with, Farm Boy and I have started to play uplifting music each morning to help us get our priorities and minds right before we start our day. One morning, as I was searching the Mormon channel, I came upon this beautiful video titled, ” O Come, Emmanuel” featuring The Piano Guys and scenes from the Church Of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, New Testament videos. It is so beautiful! I just had to share it with you.

(On a side note my daughter Makenzie had auditioned for these video projects and had a call back for the “woman at the well”.  Unfortunately her hair was quite blond at the time and they were looking for darker haired actors to portray the roles.)

I hope you all enjoy the video as much as we have. Click below to see it.

Have a blessed and beautiful Christmas.
Love,

Shelly – The Prairie Chick

(If you’re reading this post in an email go to my blog to see the video.)