Sights from Deer Widow's Weekend in Michigan

The theme for last weekend's Birch Run show was "Deer Widow's Weekend". Sunday was the first day of deer season, and evidence of the theme was everywhere. The outlet mall, restaurants -- even a truck stop where I filled up was trying to attract the hunters and/or their "widows". But the hunters weren't all men -- one customer on Friday assured me that she would be in her tree stand come Sunday morning, trying to bag her buck before her husband did. And on Sunday morning, we saw a hunter park his truck in the corner of the expo center parking lot, and go marching into the adjacent woods with his shotgun over his shoulder.



And those deer widows came out in herds -- this was the view out the front door and around the corner on Saturday morning. Notice all of those pink flyers -- I had already been through the line handing them out!



Our booth continues to grow -- 60 feet this time -- but I think we have reached our limits and need to scale it back a little. Our usual 30-foot booth strikes me as "10 pounds of potatoes stuffed into a 5-pound potato sack", so there must be a happy medium somewhere.



Like several other shows this year, Tim Hammonds from Scor-It had a demo and a free make it/take it at one end of the booth. He taught Judy Davidson, Nora Bussell, and Donna Sheetz how to teach his make it/take it, and they went to work.



And no, Nora is not bored -- just intense . . .



In the middle was Sue Nelson from Heartprints.net -- Sue has such a following from her website. Everywhere we go, customers mention her card gallery. And there may even be the tiniest bit of envy from some when they find that we know her. Sue was right next to Karen this weekend, so she had opportunities to teach Karen about the art of spoiling a first grandchild rotten . . .



We put Judy at the opposite end of the middle table for most of Saturday, demoing Flower Soft. Judy, Nora, and Donna are quite versatile, but at one point it looked like Judy had misbehaved and Karen sent her to stand against the wall . . .




And Sue Rothamel from USArtQuest was holding court at the other end of the booth. Sue even brought her own visual aid -- that is one seriously big bottle of glue . . .



And then there were the hats. These aren't really hats -- they're vases -- the lady at left was selling them in her booth. But once Sue put one on her head, it became her constant companion. Can't you just imagine it decorated with all kinds of glitter and paint?



There were also sights to behold. Elvis and Pricilla made an appearance (see the "Blue Suede Shoes" post from earlier this month) . . .



And I really liked this lady's crown. It had ribbons that were marked "Chemotherapy", "Surgery", and "Radiation" -- and the caption said "TREATMENT -- The Only Thing I Completed All Year" . . .



There were LOTS of t-shirts and sweatshirts with lots of unusual sayings. Some of them were even repeatable -- the one at right is a little out of my league, but it did seem rather fitting for one of our customers!

I didn't get to take a picture, but I did want to send out a special thank you to Elizabeth Sova. She came into the booth on Saturday, and when she checked out she told me about a purchase she had made at the show in Novi back in August. When she got home, she realized that we hadn't charged her for a $20 set of Spellbinders replacement mats, and insisted we charge her for them. Honesty -- what a concept. Our customers are the best . . .

One last image to burn on your retinas. As I said, the theme for the show was "Deer Widow's Weekend" -- the promoter sent out an e-mail last week encouraging the vendors to dress appropriately.



Apparently I was the only one who got the memo. The promoter actually screamed and ran down the aisle when she saw me (I didn't think I was that frightening). I had a customer take the picture with my cell phone so I could text it to my son -- the camoflauge pants are his. He outgrew them years ago, but they're about three sizes too big for me!