Since I don’t have any pictures from the weekend, here’s a series of pictures from our trip…of me in bathrooms. No, not doing anything dirty! Just me in wonder of some really odd public restrooms.

Rest Stop in Ohio. Loved the green walls!

A restaurant in D.C. required you to get a token from your waitress to use the restroom.

What must have been the dirtiest bathroom in all of Pennsylvania.

Loved the painted walls at Betty’s in Columbus!

A few other really exciting things that have happened over the past few weeks that I haven’t had time to blog about:

A great blog post by Amy Schroeder featuring all the ladies from Etsy’s “Crafty Blogging” panel

Detroit Urban Craft Fair applications are open until September 24th! This is our 5 year anniversary DUCF, and believe me, it’s gonna be one hell of a party!

One of my Record Notebooks was included in this Disco themed Etsy Treasury

One of my favorite customers, Genevieve in Seattle, and her husband Leif had their baby! Congratulations Gen and Leif, and welcome to the world, Peter!

and you guys sure know how to throw a wedding!

I got to see little Josephine for the first time

Went to the Farmer’s Market

Visited friends and checked out the Bizarre Bazaar at Theatre Bizarre!

Where I got a handmade hula hoop!

Plus Handmade Detroit is nearly ready to launch Detroit Urban Craft Fair applications! Can’t give away any details right now, but this year’s DUCF is going to be INCREDIBLE!

]]> http://rewarevintage.com/blog/2010/08/16/a-fantastic-weekend/feed/ 3 http://rewarevintage.com/blog/2010/07/26/party-weekend/ http://rewarevintage.com/blog/2010/07/26/party-weekend/#comments Mon, 26 Jul 2010 22:03:19 +0000 Bethany http://rewarevintage.com/blog/?p=2032 Dan and I both took Friday off to get everything ready for our big party on Saturday. First we had to find a new entertainment center for our new (used) flat screen TV, so we happily spent the afternoon at Ikea!

I was in a very 70′s mood obviously, sporting my newest vintage T shirt in my collection (gift from a fellow vendor at the Royal Oak Garage Sale), my huge bell bottoms, and having just finished making my new purse!

Made from 70′s drapery fabric, and a vintage belt!

As always, we left with so much more than we planned on getting – had to get matching coffee tables too, of course!

The party was SO much fun! We had so many friends come by, and loved showing our home to a lot of them for the very first time. We ate barbecue, fresh veggies I’d picked up from the farmer’s market that morning, roasted marshmallows on the fire, and tried our best to play lawn sports in the dark backyard (even tougher, and more fun after a few drinks).

I just wanna say, I think we’ve got the best dang friends! Besides everyone coming out although we live quite a ways away from the city, Crissy helped me prep dinner, Mark and Josh brought us firewood to use as ours had gotten soaked in the storms, and we were given a bunch of really great whiskeys (we’re big whiskey connoisseurs in the Nixon house) and other super cool birthday gifts. We were so happy to have everyone over and hanging out in our home (and Kona was loving it, too)! It was the best party ever, and I didn’t even notice we’d stayed up hours after bed time.

We made chicken and waffles for the breakfast club, and I have a feeling this will be a new tradition – so good!

and oogled the crazy awesome carved wood signs for our websites that Mark made us!

Then capped off the end of the best weekend ever by watching Fraser’s fireworks in my brother’s front yard party.

]]> http://rewarevintage.com/blog/2010/07/26/party-weekend/feed/ 1 http://rewarevintage.com/blog/2010/07/21/royal-oak-garage-sale/ http://rewarevintage.com/blog/2010/07/21/royal-oak-garage-sale/#comments Wed, 21 Jul 2010 15:18:27 +0000 Bethany http://rewarevintage.com/blog/?p=2008 Once again, we had a great time at the Royal Oak Antique and Garage Sale! I got to meet some internet friends in real life, visit with my family and buds, talk with fellow vintage sellers, and see a bunch of my regulars from past shows!

It was an exhausting, great time. Oh yeah, and we sold a TON of stuff.

Dan kept joking that he was going to put this sign out when I wasn’t looking.

The Royal Oak Antique and Garage Sale always has a lot of vendors selling stuff you don’t want – sham wows, cheesy printed blankets, crystal nail files, Tupperware, bootleg and random DVDs (like the vendor next to us)….but also always has hidden gems that make it all worthwhile. I picked up one more piece of the vintage polka dot Pyrex I’ve been hunting down over the years (now I’m only missing one bowl!), a 1950′s Girl Scout troop leader dress, a cool skeleton key to wear as a necklace, and a 70′s T shirt – all for less than $25 dollars.

As usual, I totally forgot to take pictures with most everyone who came by to visit…but I did remember to ask Dan to shoot a video! Why yes, I do have mad skills folding T shirts (years of working in the mall when I was younger all paid off).

Beth Folds Under Pressure from Bethany Nixon on Vimeo.

We just had to get dinner at Slow’s before the game (of course), and Kim met us for drinks and dinner before we headed out to the game. It was perfect weather, and a beautiful evening in Detroit.

I wore the dress I’d just finished making that morning. It’s inspired by a new Megan Neilson tutorial, but I used a romper I had that had a number of holes in the shorts instead of a tank top, and a floor length black jersey dress as the skirt. It came together so easily using her tutorial, and I love it!

It was a great game, and the Tigers killed the Mariners.

The sunset in the stadium is SO beautiful!

Afterwards, there were fireworks on the field. It was awesome! So glad we went!

Sunday I worked in our garden a bit (the zinnias are blooming now and the tomato, cucumbers and peppers have little buds on them – yay!), and Kim came over for a secret project to do with a certain someone’s birthday. Then Dan and I headed out to the opening weekend of the New Center Park.

We watched a couple great bands, ate some fresh nectarines, and had a cold drink. The park was awesome, and I’m really excited to see more bands there this summer!

Monday was a buying day, and I got so many great things for the shop (and of course a few things for myself!)

It was a really great weekend in the city with my mister. By the way, it’s his 31st birthday tomorrow – Happy Birthday Dan!!!

We came, we played, we drank, we tried our best to stay dry. Lawn Sport Olympics continues to be one of my most favorite weekends of the year.

This year the trophies were handmade etched glasses for each event (more about that to come on the Handmade Detroit blog). They were sooo great!

Jeremy won his first Grand Championship, got the biggest snifter of all time, and the famous corduroy jacket.

Ladder Ball, Badminton, Croquet, Cornhole, Horseshoes, Bocce Ball…it was all fun, but my attempts to win a trophy this year continued to fail…until Lawn Darts – Happy to say I won 3rd place!

My First Lawn Sport Olympic Trophy from Bethany Nixon on Vimeo.

Thanks to Eric and Katie for being the Lawn Sport Olympics hosts with the mostest!!!

Wanna see more pics from the LSO, or past LSOs? Check out our Flickr!

Friday was Etsy’s 5th birthday, and we celebrated at Biggby Coffee in downtown Birmingham. It was awesome to meet a whole bunch of crafters and catch up with some friends! I couldn’t resist asking for the “Happy Birthday sing-along video” .

Saturday I was excited to see Stephanie and her family, and see her try on and order her wedding dress (gorgeous!) and our bridesmaid dresses, then quickly ran back to the last hour of the estate sale I went to earlier in the week to score some last minute deals. I filled up the back seat of my car with more melmac dishes, serving dishes, some linens, vintage patterns, and two very exciting gifts for a couple of friends and then ran to the last hour of the Art Meets Craft show in Pleasant Ridge for more gift shopping.

Saturday night was a celebration 14 years in the making. Kevin, Melissa, Monica, Liz and I were all good friends from elementary school through high school, but hadn’t all been together since. Kevin and Dennis were in town from New York for a few days, and we all got together for drinks and dinner together. Dennis and Mark were really good sports and listened to hours of stories and inside jokes as we all reminisced.

Monica and I have been best friends since kindergarten. I love this girl so much!!!

Last time Monica and I hung out, for some reason I brought up these cute ribbon hair clips we both used to wear all the time when we were little kids. She surprised me with a pair of them at dinner (raided from her daughter’s room). I was proud to wear them the next day, loved them as much as I did back when I was 8!

Not sure if this was just a thing around here…ladies, did you wear these 20 years ago, too?

Sunday was Father’s Day celebration here at our home. The Nixon family and the Hahn family all got together, and had a 6 foot spread of yummy food (and 3 awesome desserts). We played Jarts in the yard and watched the dogs all chase squirrels and each other. It was great getting everyone together!

I was especially excited to see my brother. He doesn’t seem quite as thrilled in the picture, but that’s Andy! Also, FYI – my brother has a thrilling collection of records, books, vintage toys and T shirts (as evidenced by this Ramones shirt). One of these days I want to do a whole tour of his shirt collection for this blog – every time I see him I want to raid his closet!

After everyone left, Dan and I had a campfire and great conversation, with Kona exhausted and sleeping at my feet. It was the perfect way to wrap up the weekend.

The whole weekend really made me appreciate all my family and friends, how much I love my work and all the great people I know and meet because of it, and especially how fantastic my husband is. I’m an extremely lucky lady!!!

We made yummy yogurt parfaits and looked for a little sister for Kona

Then we played putt-putt

(btw, what do you think of the skirt? I spent Friday making a ton of new skirts from vintage material and sheets and this is one of them. I made two with this material and just had to keep one. And they have pockets!)

and we tried the driving range for a bit. Dan was awesome at it…I wasn’t, but it was still fun!

I’m taking the next few days to work on making and sending out new line sheets to send to stores. Do you have a favorite indie craft/ record store / boutique near you that you’d like to carry my record notebooks and jewelry in? Please tell me in the comments or email me – I’m especially looking for stores outside of the Mitten State! Hoping to start back to listing new items and blogging on the website on Wednesday or Thursday…see you then!

Maggie is quite possibly the cutest puppy ever. She has one blue eye and one brown eye, just like Bowie.

Besides puppy fun, I also got to have garage sale and junkyard hopping fun, where I got some crazy old basketball shoes, a couple records, a 60′s fur hat, vintage HUGE sunglasses, and this neat necklace.

and there was more yard work

and shopping for the perfect dress for Steph!

Then Dan and I began planning for our summer road trip (we’re thinking east coast this year) and caught up on Breaking Bad, which is my new favorite “holy crap, have you seen this crazy, mind-blowing show!?!” show. No, seriously…have you seen this crazy, mind-blowing show?!? If so, let’s discuss!