We had such a great time at our first festival in Monroe this spring that I couldn’t wait to try another one. I searched fall festivals in the Georgia area and the Cotton Pickin’ Fair in Gay, GA came up for October 3rd and 4th. It was my first experience with a juried show and after sending in an application and pictures of our spring festival, we were accepted! Knicknaques was approved for a primo spot in the Warehouse barn. That meant an inside booth and we didn’t have to worry about a tent and the weather.
I had a short list of things I wanted to finish and the rest of my inventory came from an extra booth I closed at Pickers Paradise. I was doing a pretty good job of keeping it low key and low stress, until about a week before the fair. My appraisal business got busy, cars broke down and Dylan decided that he needed to be picked up everyday from school instead of riding the bus. The tiniest thing threw me in a tizzy. I had chair shelves that wouldn’t hang on the wall, dresser knobs that wouldn’t stay on and burns on my fingers from paper cone wreaths but….it was getting done. The impending hurricane Joaquin was only a blip on my stress inducer. I was going to be inside and not in a tent. How bad could it be?
Wednesday, everything was finished, in my garage and ready to be loaded in the trailer. Only one problem… I’ve never driven a trailer further than the driveway. My sweet husband took time out to show me how to drive the trailer and I was feeling pretty confident. Until I tried to back it uphill into our driveway. Let’s just say I hope I don’t ever run into that problem again. 😁 Thursday evening the trailer was loaded and Friday we were on the way. Tonya’s husband, Todd and Greg were able to come help set up. There are no words for our gratefulness! They carried all our heavy furniture in, Greg unhitched the trailer and even Todd wanted to help “decorate”. Our booth neighbors were friendly and helpful, letting us borrow their ladder and helping to heave a chandelier and a birdcage over the rafters.
After our muscle left, Tonya and I decided to take a break and go find our accommodations for the night. I found a quaint little place (supposedly somewhere near the fair) called Americus Farms. They have several buildings that they rent out for equestrian events and also for vendors from the fair. It’s like a bed and breakfast, only no one to actually to cook the food, etc. I had NO information other than an email confirmation. No address, no directions and no phone number. I put the only address I could find from the website in my GPS and we head out. Now Gay, GA is small. Very small and very remote. As we headed up the winding driveway to the farm, I began to get a little nervous that I had no idea where we’re staying and it was going to get dark. We eventually saw a family out walking and asked them if they knew where we could find The Bunkhouse. Katiana knew exactly what we were talking about and said she’d show us how to get there by taking the “shortcut”. About 15 minutes into the “shortcut”, the dirt road started to get muddy and very narrow.
We were convinced we had uncovered a secret location and Katiana was going to take us to a secluded location to be tortured or killed, where no one could hear our screams. Big sighs of relief when we finally pulled up to the building otherwise known as The Bunkhouse.
Katiana went on her way and we were left all alone in the middle of nowhere in front of a big brown barn and no idea how to get in. While walking around the building to find some sort of sign pointing us to the entry, we came across this small graveyard with two headstones.
Creepy. And way too close to where we are suppose to be sleeping.
After finally just picking a door and entering a stairway, we found our living quarters.
A cute little area with a kitchen, dining and living room. 6 locked doors surrounded the big room and we opened door #2 on our key that we found in the mailbox. Our little bedroom had two twin beds and a cruise ship size bathroom.
The beds were tiny and Tonya quickly referred to them as our doll beds. The bathroom wasn’t as clean as we would have liked but we had found a place to lay our heads and our doll beds were clean.
Before returning back to our booth to finish tagging, we made the 8 mile trek to the nearest grocery store, in Woodbury GA. The very same Woodbury in The Walking Dead, which only fueled our fears of being alone at The Bunkhouse. Ghosts and now zombies were surely going to be our demise. We grabbed some food, wine and beer and headed back to the fairgrounds. Tagging took longer than expected and it was dark by the time we made it back to our haunted house with the doll beds. Still with no one around and very little lighting, I went first up the dark stairway, gun in hand. Now I know to shoot a zombie in the head but where do you aim at a ghost? After an “all clear”, we unpacked and while enjoying our dinner, our first roommate showed up. A nice lady named Donna, who was just as freaked out as we were. She was also there for the fair and had a booth selling bottle cap art. Soon, two more couples joined us and we felt more at ease. There’s safety in numbers when fighting off zombies.
We had a big day ahead of us and getting ready was going to be a long process in the morning, with only one small bathroom. So, we called it a night and fell fast asleep in our doll beds.
The weather held off and Saturday turned out to be a great day. The sun was out for a little bit and the temperature stayed mostly cool. Our booth was open and ready for business!
The crowds were crazy and at times there was a line to get through our booth. I had made my rent back in the first hour! We were able to take quick breaks and enjoy some of the fair food. My favorite, by far, was the bacon fried green tomato sandwich but the sweet potato fried pie and apple dumpling were pretty darn good too!
5 o’clock came quick and our booth was a mess. Large pieces of furniture, baskets, linens and even my chandelier hanging on the front rafter had sold. Recovery would have to happen in the morning and a total makeover was not out of the question. So we left to get some takeout from a nearby restaurant and went straight back to The Bunkhouse. A quick dinner and a glass of wine later, I was sound asleep in my little doll bed.
Sunday’s weather was a little more wet and crowds were a little slower that morning. That gave us the time we needed to get our booth back in shape. By lunchtime it was getting busier and before we knew it it was time to think about packing up. Greg, Taylor and Dylan came down and were there to help at closing time. I am fairly certain that if I was left to hook up the trailer by myself that we would still be there. The fields where we left the trailer, were not only muddy, but all the trailers that came in after ours were stacked very close together. Maneuvering, even for pros like my husband, proved challenging. Then there was the giant mud pit at the back gate entrance.
If you happened to stop in the middle of that? Let’s just say one truck and trailer stuck in that mess would ruin the entire procession of hundreds of vendors trying to get out of there. My hubby did fabulous and soon we were loaded up and on our way!
This show was another huge success for us and an even greater learning experience. I’m going to practice driving the truck and trailer and do better research on hotel accommodations. 😜
We didn’t have much time to check out the rest of the fair and didn’t get to see much more than what was right around us. The Cotton Pickin’ Fair is huge and draws people from all over. Other vendors told us that a nice fall weekend can bring in more than 30,000 people. It’s a great family event, with even things for kids to do and I strongly recommend going if you get a chance. Knicknaques will be there if we get invited back, but if we aren’t there with our booth, I will definitely be there to enjoy the fair!