Junk Market Gals - Part 2

The Junk Market Gal entourage. L to R front: Amy, Sue, Kimberly L to R back: Me, Lanette, Kathy & Candy
Take away Amy and Kimberly and the remaining 5 are the fearless, talented Junk Market camping girls. Not! Keep reading to hear more...

Sorry gals, but I had to use this photo above as an opening act to Part 2, since it represents best our time together. Fun times, filled with laughter and antics. The above photo took place at the blogging party at Amy's booth and the book signing that Sue & Kimberly did.

So its now 7:00 am Friday morning. Wake up time. After a breakfast of baked goods by Kathy and fresh fruit and coffee from Sue, we are ready to go at 8:00 am. Ooops! Not quite yet. We need to find a mis-placed credit card, cell phone, and camera. Than we can go. Ooops! Not quite yet. We need to load Lani's truck with Sue's books for the book signing, a Junk Market sign, poster boards and other props. Now, we can go. Ooops! Not quite so fast ladies. We need camping supplies, so we start loading loads of stuff we later end up not using, but they made us look like Junkers for good props around our campsite. ; - ) Remember people, this is 6 ladies plus a teenager that we are trying to all get out the door by 8:00 am. Ha!

After a final leave time around 11:30, we get on our way and make a pit stop at our own Kimberly Melameds garage sale in which we all found our own stash of goodies, we were off to the Oronoco Days. We drove in a caravan of 3 vehicles, with 2 ladies per vehicle, since we were camping and had lots of stuff for that, plus we needed room for our goodies coming back home. We arrive in the early afternoon, park and find that our original campground reservations at a local KOA isn't so local (about 40 miles away). So, Sue calls the Pfarkel sisters for help. The Pfarkel sisters invited us over to where they were camping and Sue was able to secure a site nearby these ladies. Later you'll find out just how lucky we were.

The Pfarkel sisters rock!

Sue and Lani went off to secure camp sites for us and Kathy, Candy and I took Beca with us and started wandering the Flea Market. We were 4 rookies to the Oronoco Flea Market, the temps were around 95 degrees, we were hungry, some were tired, and we were all confused. Things got better several hours later when we reunited with Lani and Sue, for a late lunch. Time of lunch: 4:30 pm. We surely needed a refill from our 7 am breakfast if we were going to tackle this huge Flea Market and make any progress at all. Let the fun begin!

Candy in back. Lani, Sue and Kathy in front were their "Blondes Park Here" slogans.

Junkers can be a strange lot. Here these felt slogan printed thingamajigs tickled more than one funny bone. The final choice for the photo opp is: Blondes Park Here. Just figured out while posting that I was the only brunette in the bunch. No wonder we couldn't get our tent set up. lol

Q: How many blondes does it take to set up a tent?

A: It never did happen, until the brunette Pfarkel sisters came to help.

Ha! Ha! Just kidding Junk Sisters!

Candy, Lani and Kathy are finding all of these a hoot as the pick through the pile. I bet this vendor was happy the Junk Market gals with a sense of humor stopped by his booth. He sold quite a few of these to our group of ladies.

Gretchen a former farmers daughter had to have a photo opp with this life size cow in the back of a vendors trailer. Makes for fun memories. This vendor was selling some pretty cool loot.

Sue and I being goofy!

Just across from the cow vendor, was this wonderful booth. Lots of primary colors and very cool vintage finds were being sold. This area was particularly cool. Junkers do have a sense of humor.

Sue and Kathy

We all loved the graphics and photo opp this wheel provided, so lots of photos were taken with it from our group of Junk ladies. Unfortunately, some lucky shopper had already purchased it as it had a SOLD sign on it. Would love to see what the new owner does with it.

Striking a pose with the cool wheel.

I've never seen anything like it. The entire town is turned into a Flea Market.

If front yards aren't set up with vendors, than cars are parked on them for a fee.

Kathy and Lani discuss which of the many offerings Lani can't live without.

Unfortunately, the vendors are closing up shop and that means the fun is over at the Flea Market for us ladies, but it is only just starting back at the campsite.

Junk Market Gals Camping Fiasco

Here we are. The fearless prepared campers. lol Most of us have not camped in 25-30 years, and than we had men in our group of campers that had some basic Boy Scout skills. Man, I wish I would of paid more attention to how to set up a tent back then. lol A note to readers of this blog. This is not what we got to sleep in. Photo opp only, and this is where the friendly Pfarkel sisters laid down their heads. A lovely retro motor home.

We were provided with (thanks to Candy from Ohio) a brand new spanky tent which supposedly slept 8. There were 6 of us, and with Lani and Kathy's mattress' it really didn't sleep 8. Poor Sue ended up sleeping in front of the door, only to be stepped on in the middle of the night by a bathroom visit by a teenager. Ooops! Sorry, Sue. You'll maybe want your own pup tent next year. ;-)

Candy, Kathy and I were setting up the tent and were a bit frustrated. It was really hot. I later went in my truck to move it, sat with the air blowing on my face, took 2 migraine meds. and checked the outside temps., and it said 99 degrees. And we're camping????? Here the Pfarkel sisters had come over to lend a hand with some of the final additions. I do believe the directions were created by a man. They had the color codes all messed up, which caused confusion. Finally, figured it out.

More Pfarkel sister help.

Ahhh, yes. Finally a man to help us out. Thanks Cheryl for your hubby's helpful hand.

Candy is tying up lose ends.

So you'd think we'd be happy we finally got the tent set up. Noooo! We decided to be a Laurel & Hardy act and move the tent to a better location. Needless to say, we had to carry it already put up. Those Pfarkel sisters that had been so helpful thought it was soooo funny that they ran back to their fancy snancy camper and grabbed their cameras to capture the unforgettable Junk Market Gals carrying their tent around the park. Thank goodness they didn't capture me doing this. I was on the other side.

(Photo courtesy of Fjerda, a Pfarkel sister)

Poooooh! I thought I was missed in the silly photos of the tent moving. Guess not! They also caught me jawing at the same time. Nice ladies!

(photo courtesy of Fjerda a Pfarkel sister)

The Junk Market gals, Sue with some of her contributors, as well as our fearless new friends the Pfarkel sisters. I say, fearless since they dared hang out with our silly group.

A few more tidbits about our camping experience. As I told you earlier, I was developing a migraine and had taken some meds. I'm pretty sure the combination of stress, heat, lack of eating and the unknown brought it on, so to cool down by body I decided to take a swim in the lake on the camp ground. Lani and Sue had mentioned there was a lake. So, I go get my suit on, walk on down about 2 blocks to the place a lady told me to go and step into the lake. Ooops! Not a lake, but a 2' pond. Oh well, I can handle that. It's water and its cooler than the outside temps. Decide to give myself a sponge (pat) bath. Turns out it was a goose pond, so I can leave the imagination up to you what my sponge bath turned out like. Unbeknown to me, since I was not blessed with a sense of smell since birth and couldn't pick up on the smell. More fun memories. Later I took a shower and properly cleaned up like I should of just done in the first place. I was trying to be missing in action for a brief period vs. a full fledge clean up. Ha! It back fired on me.

This is the "hose sisters" with the Junk Market gals. Thanks ladies for the use of your wood, campfire and grill for the steaks. I think the Pfarkel ladies have been getting credit for some of that, and I want to be sure to include you ladies too, since the wood came from your truck bed, and the grill was connected to your camper, so must of been yours. You gals were awesome and I loved getting to know each one of you later in the night (after my shower) lol, and visiting with you all.

Sue and Lani had driven to the only store around for food. Six miles up the road. No, the town of Oronoco doesn't have a gas station, restaurant, grocery store or much else, but they sure know how to host a fabulous Flea Market. Sue and Lani came back with steak, seasonings, fresh mushrooms and asparagus, as well as deli potato salad and cole slaw and drinks for all. Thank you to Amy's husband, Ron, whom after selling all day as a vendor with Amy at the Flea Market came over to grill our steaks. Lani's daughter, Beca, was his asst. chef and they made a fabulous team. The steaks were awesome, as was the veggies they grilled as well.

Bedtime for this lady was 2 a.m. The rest of the Junk Market gals turned in a few hours ahead of me, but I was having such a great time with the hose sisters that I kept chatting. The hose sisters, are 3 girlfriends that have met through their 3 husbands being volunteer fireman. Thus the "hose sisters". They are becomign true Junkers and already have the sense of humor needed to be a bonafide junker. lol

That is the conclusion of this detailed, long winded JunkMarket Gals post for Friday. Now stay tuned for Post 3 of the adventure. It will be Day 3 at the Flea Market, and include the blogging party photos as well as the book signing event. More adventures ahead!