Fall for Junk...September 24th 8am-3pm!

This Saturday, September 24th from 8am-3pm JB Knacker is hosting a really fun event.  We throw the old shop doors open early at 8am, serve a light breakfast, have 20% the entire shop, host 15 creative vendors out in our side yard, hand-out maps to 8 area barn sales and lure you back to the shop between 2-3pm for a junk basket drawing not to be missed!!  Tell your family and friends...spread the word 'cause this is the last event of this type for the season!

 
Our vendors who will be set up in the side yard include: Tricia Hall (jewelry and more), Sarah Dorn (jewelry and more), Jeff Tadsen (vintage refunked), Chris Backes (metal designs), Mary Husske (vintage and more vintage), Pam Hobbs (vintage and more vintage), Michelle (vintage and more vintage), Kate Hinrichs (vintage redesigns), Jenny and Becky (vintage and retro), Ann & Dorothy (vintage and repurposed), Natalie (colorful jewelry and vintage) and Peggy Petersen (vintage garden and more).

Barns on the route will be:

Carter Station w/ special guest Rusty Pumpkin ~ Story City

Junk'in 4 ~ Story City

Barntiques ~ Nevada

Red Barn Rustics ~ rural Boone  ***thanks Carla for the "Fall for Junk" name***

Junk Refunkery ~ rural Boone

Once Was ~ Boone

Bittersweet 'n Berries ~ rural Boone

Dakota Junktion ~rural Ames

I would like to thank you all ahead of time.  There is a lot one can do on a beautiful fall day...and you chose to junk w/ us...and you'll be happy you did...all of us are putting our best junk forward for you to embellish your home & garden, give as a one-of-a-kind gift or just treat yourself to a unique piece of history!
                                                       See you Saturday!

                                                                   Brenda

***Hmmm...what to put in the Junk Basket to be given away at 2:30ish on Saturday...how about an old gym locker basket "tricked-out" w/ a metal # from Urban Forge (see above) and chocolate and a couple of new mags (Flea Market Style, Country Living) and a few more surprises...you'll want to head back to the shop for a chance at this and to grab any junk you missed first time around!!

Gearing Up

September is going to be a wild ride!  The shop has turned to an autumn look w/ metal, wood, burlap and mums.  Halloween will creep into the shop around the middle of September while I am away at the Junk Bonanza in Shakopee, MN.  Not necessarily the Halloween of your childhood, but more of a grownup old world, potions and hexes sort of Halloween...think chandeliers, candelabras and ravens.  The Junk Bonanza begins Thursday, Sept. 15th...early bird entry at 8am and continues through Sat., Sept 17th!  The JB Knacker booth is coming together nicely (in my head, that is) w/ a very quirky yet functional natural history theme w/ pops of color.  The shop will be held down by paper artist, Lara Gustafson.  Lara loves Halloween...so between twirling the upstairs of the shop into a devilish nature, you may find her working on her ever popular Halloween cards and tags.  JB Knacker will also have a nice surprise for those of you who pop into the shop during those days that I am working my booth at the Junk Bonanza!

 
JB Knacker's last Main Street Flea Market will be held on Saturday, Sept. 24th from 8am - 3pm...note the early start!  We will have a light breakfast buffet of donuts, muffins, fruit, juice & coffee, everything in the shop will be 20% off and plenty of vendors in the side yard of the shop peddling their wares.  And our vendors have been good...whether you're looking for vintage, metal, funky jewelry or fall embellishments...we've got it!  We will also have maps to all of the area barn, chicken shed and carriage house sales (so far 7)!!   And will lure you back to the shop at 3ish w/ something really fun...stay tuned!

This day is also our little town's Harvest Festival.  It's a time to celebrate the bountiful harvest, enter the pie baking contest and reunite w/ old friends.  JB Knacker will be on the historical society's tour...a hay rack ride around town w/ stops at historic buildings.  Tales will be spun about the days when Doc barbered/cut hair in the front room of the shop and his wife, Helen sorted the mail.  Or back a little further when the old shop was Bush and Gerstein Music Store in the early 1900's...and maybe a few spooky tales as well - fun!

That will wrap up the special events in September, but I also have to give you a quick glimpse of the fun to come in October.  JB Knacker is reviving the Halloween Party.  Some of you die-hards may remember Julie and I throwing a Halloween Bash back in 2007 ~ a costume party no less.  Well, this year, the old shop will be having another spooky night on Friday, October 7th from 6:30 - 8:30ish pm.  Local artist Steve Hosch will be on hand w/ a shrine of his spooky assemblage pieces and day of the dead masks, treats & tricks will be served and everything you need to celebrate in style this season will be on hand for you to peruse...think beakers, test tubes, candelabras, refunked spooky portraits and so much more!  A fun evening indeed!

                    
                                                                                                                    Brenda


  
                                                   

JB Knacker Main Street Market and Shop Hop!

 

Fall is just around the corner...I can feel it, smell it and even start to see it in the crackly corn husks out in the field waiting for harvest.  The mornings and evenings are different...cooler, dewier and mellower (are those last 2 even real words...in my mind, they work).  I love this...maybe because in the Midwest it is such a fleeting time.

The shop will be awakened w/ all things harvesty...the old place has grown kind of used to this late summer lull where wonderful pieces slip in, are placed, purchased and slip out again....all without much of a shake up at all.  It will be a gradual shake-up...over a week's time, but by next Friday (August 26th) those that are on the Fall Shop Hop will love it!

                                      
                                                Here are the details of the Shop Hop...

The 1st annual Fall Shop Hop takes place Friday, August 26th 10am-4pm and Saturday, August 27th 10am-4pm.  There are a total of 8 Story County shops on the Shop Hop:  Blumsters, Moose on the Loose & Chicken Shed Primitives...all in Huxley; Sheldahl Crossing in Slater; Julieann's in Nevada; Antique Iowa in Story City; and Left Bank Studio and JB Knacker in Gilbert!  Each shop will be having specials, treats and together we are going in on 8 gift certificates to be given away to those that "hit" all 8 shops!

At JB Knacker, we will have shop specials on Friday (and note we will be open 10am-6pm on Friday to greet Shop Hop shoppers) and fall treats served...on Saturday, August 27th it's a bit of a different story...

The JB Main Street Market will be in full swing by opening time at 10am.  This is our 3rd flea market in the shop's side yard this year and proves to be a very exciting one!  We have wonderful vendors peddling their creatively fantastic wares from repurposed jewelry to fun metal home and garden art...vintage furniture to refunked lighting...yummy baked goods to artsy primitive goods!  Do names like Mama Peacock, Jeff Tadsen, LOL Salvage, Urban Forge and Red Barn Rustics make you just a bit curious?  Other creative vendors coming ... Keith from Anything But New, Linda from Hargrove Made It, Mary Husske, Jody from Smil'in Moon, Wanda's baked goods and Pam Hobson.  If it's a wonderfully cool pre-autumn morning, the cider will be hot and no matter the temperature outside, the donuts will be heaped on a big old platter.  We will also be having handmade demos throughout the day...think metal stamping, jewelry and journal making...). 

                                                                       Brenda

It's a New Year!

Well, it is for me anyway.  The day the kids go off to school is bittersweet for me.  They are excited and not so much all at the same time...sad to have summer go by so fast...eager to see friends.  What does the new school year have in store for my senior, 7th grader and 4th grader?  Still have the soon-to-be sophomore in college home for a few more days and my senior in college coming home from his St. Louis internship tomorrow (update: I am giving prayers of thanks as my son just called and was in a car accident...he is unhurt, and that is all I care about at this moment...we will go down and pick him up tomorrow).  How quickly things can change.  And of coarse,  little Cecilia will be my side-kick all year long...going on junk trips and working at the shop w/ mom!  What does this new school year have in store for you?  Even if you don't have kids or the kids are all out of the house or maybe not even in school yet...can you smell it in the air...a new season...a new year?

In the next few days, I will be posting the exciting events to come at JB Knacker in the next few weeks...the shop will be getting whirled into an autumn mode and the side yard will be full of vendors in just over a week!   

Pardon the Mess

Pardon the mess, our blog will be undergoing an transformation this weekend :-) 

It's Gonna be a Good One...Flea Market this Saturday, July 23rd !

I do believe I was supposed to have a picture of the flea market cart that will be raffled off at 2:30ish on Saturday afternoon.  A picture was just not in the cards today!  Instead, close your eyes and envision a black wire cart w/ ultra-precision wheels, luxurious rubber-grip bar...ok, ok, this is what it's all about - if your name is drawn from the galvanized bucket (have to be present to win) you get a great flea market cart (thank you Kay at Barntiques) to stash all of your flea market finds; a very cool and urban canvas # pillow w/ typewriter key tag to curl up w/ in the back of your pick up when your flea buddy has to go back for just one more find; a pretty prairie bouquet in a classic old canning jar; and a stash of great decorating books and magazines!

Our flea market vendors are set...10 of them...really talented and sweet people.  And even though the old shop has schlepped through this week without a pinch of air conditioning, my heating & cooling guy says it will be ready to go on Saturday!  My week of gathering was not hampered a bit by the numerous meetings w/ various mechanics who had never, ever seen a blower motor like the one in my furnace...no, not a bit.  The hampering crept in more of the homemaking/good mothering skills...timely meals, washed dishes or clothes, swept floor, uncluttered porch, bathed children...not-so-much!

Thankfully, I've left a nice chunk of work yet to be done on Friday...but we'll be ready!  If the crowd is as large as the last flea market (June 25th) and the rain holds off, we will be checking out in the kitchen of the shop as well as outside.  There are fun places to be checked out on Saturday (and we'll have fliers to 'em all), but we want you to return for the BIG drawing as well as one last swoop through the vendors and shop.  Then stay if you can...JB Knacker will slowly shut down by 3ish...we'll pull up a chair, open some cheap wine or crappy beer and enjoy a good small town car & tractor show...would love to have you by the old place! 

                                                                             

                                                                                       Brenda

Big Day in Gilbert next Saturday!

Small towns have a way of throwing a really good party!  And that's what we're up to in Gilbert next Saturday, July 23rd.  The JB Knacker Flea Market is back with wonderful vendors in the side yard of the shop from 10am-3pm...Tracy from Once Was, Sarah from Mama Peacock, Tricia from Vintage 35, Mary, Becky and Lara (who haven't named themselves yet), Jodi from Smil'in Moon (maybe...Jodi if you see this call me and confirm), Tawnya's cupcakes from the Ames Cupcake Emporium and several other quality vendors!  If you were at the Flea Market on June 25th, you'll know what I am talking about...awesome vendors!  JB Knacker will be a "new" shop inside...we have to be 'cause we've sold down to the bare bones...this is going to be a fun week of gathering!!  Cold blueberry infused lemonade will be on tap all day.

We're also going to have directions to 3 great barns that are opening their big old doors and letting the vintage tumble out next Saturday:  Carter Station w/ special guest Rusty Pumpkin will be in Story City; Barntiques in Nevada and Ted's Shed in Woolstock!

Head back to JB Knacker near the end of the afternoon (2-3pm) and put your name in the drawing for a flea market cart ~ or as we call it a junker's survival kit (it will be stocked w/ some fun stuff).  You have to be present to win.  We'll draw at 3pm and then relax a bit before the tractor show begins at 4pm on Main Street...I'm thinking crappy beer and cheap wine.  So, to be legal and all, BYOB/BYOW...some good old Schlitz, Milwaukee's Best or even Boone's Farm will do nicely.  I'll have some trashy snacks (but good eats) like Ritz and cheese in a can.  There will be food down the street at Open Flame and then a band/street dance at 8pm!  What a fun little town!!

Leave a comment and let me know you're coming!
                                                ~Brenda 
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