Garden Party 2011...Tomorrow (Saturday, May 28th)!

Just 24 hrs. to go 'til our Garden Party, and it looks like the weather may be just fine!  Hope to see you on Saturday anytime between 10am - 3pm.  We'll have hot coffee and donuts in the morning (not gourmet...but still good eats) and break out the lemonade and cookies/bars later in the day.  Vintage garden will be everywhere inside and outside of the shop on this day.  As well as JB Knacker's signature look...ornate old frames, wire locker baskets, crystal & silver, cottage pottery, vintage dresses, metal lab stools, ephemera, linens...so much more! 

Saturday Deal of the Day

sorry....no peonies have "popped" yet...hopefully in time for next Saturday, though!

Wow, things are growing w/ all of this rain!  The Garden Party is in just one week and the plants should be pretty lush w/ all of this precipitation.  Today's (Saturday) deal of the day is: pretty little pint canning jars w/ pretty bunches of snowball flowers or lily of the valley tucked inside ~ $3.00 each!  Hope to see some of you!

                                                                                                                Brenda

Thursday & Friday Deals of the Day

Thursday and Friday deal of the day at JB Knacker will be $4.00 typewriter key charms!  We have a plethora of fun typewriter and old cash register key charms that would look great alone or added as another charm to a bracelet or funky junk necklace.  So head on over to the shop to see what we've been up to, and help yourself to a handful of $4 keys!

And remember, all of these deals are leading up to the big garden party on Saturday, May 28th 10am-3pm...so keep checking the blog!
                                                            Brenda

Tuesday's Deal of the Day

Just starting the yard work leading up to the garden party on Saturday, May 28th.  Well, mowing the tall grass is a start...but so much more to do.  The big girl, little girl and I are heading to the greenhouse today to pick out pretty perennials and flowering baskets or at least the "ingredients" to make them.

Now for Tuesday's (May 17th) deal of the day...# pillow covers are just $15 each!  These pillow covers measure 18" x 18" and are made from sturdy canvas and hand sewn w/ an envelope type closure.  They each come w/ an authentic typewriter key tag and look great w/ an IKEA 20" x 20" feather pillow (not incl.) stuffed into each.  The #'s we have remaining are the lucky #7 and the nice even #4 and are heat pressed onto the pillow cover in large black font...way cooler than Pottery Barn (and might I add, done at JB Knacker 1 1/2 yrs before Pottery Barn)!  At $15, they are almost 50% off retail price.  Stop in tomorrow and say "Hi" to Sarah (I'll be at a park w/ a bunch of 3rd graders checking out pond life).

                                                                 Brenda

Gearing Up For a Garden Party

The Garden Party at JB Knacker is a mere 2 weeks away and boy, do we have our work cut-out for us...the turning of the soil, the sowing of the seed and the gathering of the vintage goods!  Mark your Farmer's Almanac for Saturday, May 28th from 10am - 3pm rain or shine!  Until then, check this blog daily for the JB Knacker deal of the day...it's our countdown to the big Garden Party and will be a fun teaser of what's to come!

                                ~ Saturday (5/14) deal of the day~
                                       vintage silverware garden marker just $2.00 each

One of the most delightful things about a garden is the anticipation it provides  ~ J.E. Johns

                                   

Charm Bracelet Workshop at JB Knacker

trinkets

some of Sarah's rings in a cute display at the shop

anagrams & keys and so much more can work as charms...be creative!

We would love to see a full room at the shop this coming Friday night (April 29th).  JB Knacker will be hosting a great charm bracelet workshop from 6pm 'til 8ish pm.  Sarah Dorn from Mama Peacock will be leading the workshop and I will be assisting.  If you've never met Sarah before, this will be a treat.  She has a wealth of knowledge in creating fabulous pieces of jewelry, and lights up a room w/ her positive uplifting outlook!  You will learn joinery techniques in putting your one-of-a-kind charms onto your bracelet as well as a few new techniques in altering charms such as stamping metal, inking and collage.  I have been squirreling away fun little trinkets in preparation for this workshop, and Sarah has a wonderful stash of new and old lovelies to choose.  The cost is only $35.00 for the evening and all supplies are included.  And you go home w/ a beautiful charm bracelet that you created.  This is a fantastic price for this workshop as I usually see these bracelets sell for upwards of $50.00 at shows and shops!  We will also be stuffing our faces w/ angel food cake, whip (as my kids call it) and strawberries...tea and wine will also be served.  How do you sign up?  The old fashioned way...just call the shop at 233-2600 and we'll reserve a spot for you!

Record Breaking and Dangerous

 

March was a record-breaking month for JB Knacker!  Thanks to all of you who had a part in that in a big way or even some small way...I appreciate all of you!  The last 2 weeks of March saw all sorts of cool vintage come into the shop and then fly out as soon as I placed 'em.  But one can revel in success only so long or it's back to "square one."  So...

 

The shop will be getting another overhaul in the next 2 days to gear up for April.  Wire and metal and old glass...a plethora of vintage science models that would make the most talked about art...big sturdy functional lockers in the best color...darn good ephemera...lots and lots of sturdy metal lab stools...old thick bubbly glass science bell jars/cloches (one on a funky metal pedestal)...and gym locker baskets, yeah we got'em!

 

You'd think we dismantled a high school...well, we did play a part .  It was bittersweet to walk through this once majestic 4 story school in NW Iowa...and it wasn't even my alma mater.  Listening to alumnus talk about the good old days and which room was Mr. Hinkle's...who, by the way, had a science room to die for! For the life of me, why wouldn't you take this stuff to the new building...wasteful...but I guess that's how the junk cycles.

 

I am not a normal junker when it comes to auctions...hate 'em and try to avoid them at all costs.  Well, my husband thought better on this one and dragged me along.  It was an all day deal (who has all day to spend at one of these?) and crowded (at my age, funny things are happening to my hormones making me unnecessarily panicky in a crowd)!  So I would wander off away from the crowd to let my husband bid on the skeleton in the lunchroom...off to a quiet part of the building...say, the music room (deep breath...Hail Mary, Full of Grace...this prayer has helped me through a few panic attacks in my day)...lucky for me, I spy a gaggle of wire gym baskets under the stairwell.  The rest is history (or dare I say, Physical Ed)...it was a good day.  But with the good, you gotta take the bad and downright dangerous...like driving home w/ a box full of hydrogen tanks and glass vials of neon, mercury and the element that kills superman in the back of your vehicle (didn't know what was in that box when we loaded it...should they even have auctioned that off?).

 

Well, lucky for us when we arrived home w/ our van of vintage goodness, poison and explosives, our sweet girls had baked their little hearts out...rhubarb strawberry tarts and chocolate cherry cookies...yummm!  Here's to a fun, adventurous and downright "dangerous" April!

 
                                                                                                              ~ Brenda