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The Packer
It will fit.... We are chock-full, jam-packed and full to the brim. We are ready! Cory has packed, unpacked and repacked our trailer trying to find room for everything we want to take. He mumbles and mutters something each time I drag out another special item to add to our inventory. It doesn't sound like "oh, goodie!" Our RV is also packed full so we may have to sleep on the dash until we unload on Sunday. We leave this Saturday for our show in Brimfield, Massachusetts. This is a huge show: 5000 dealers on 20 fields which line Rt. 20 in the town of Brimfield. The dealers come from all across the USA and shoppers come from all over the world. The field we set up on is called The New England Motel field. I think there are about 400 dealers on our field. We used to set up our own tent but our age has encouraged us to have a tent set up for us which seems to be the choice of most dealers. It does make the set-up and tear-down process much easier and less exhausting. The tent is 20' x 20' and we fill it "full to the brim" and beyond. The show runs all week with the numerous fields opening on varying days. Our show opens on Wednesday. When we leave on Saturday, we shall take the New York Thruway and then get on the Massachusetts Turnpike. We stay at the rest area on the Turnpike that is closest to the exit that we take to go to Brimfield. We arrive at our field on Sunday morning. Our field has a small campground of sorts where we park our RV. It has electric and water but no sewer hook-up. Once we pull into our field, Cory unhooks our trailer and leaves it along the main roadway while we go park our RV. The promoter uses a tractor to hook onto our trailer and take it to our tent for us. The roads through the field of tents is very narrow....it would be utterly impossible for us to try to do that with our RV. Just getting our motor home backed into our camp site is a test...Cory passes the test but the bumpy road and low hanging trees does not allow us to just whistle a Happy Tune while we park it. Sunday, we set up the RV which
Repacking
Getting the job done is quick and minimal and really nothing compared to what we do when we settle in Florida. Most of our day is spent unloading our trailer of treasures into the tent. Sometimes Cory hires a porter to help with some of our bigger items....any help is much appreciated. We don't arrange anything or unpack the boxes with our wares...just happy to get it all shoved into the tent so they can remove our trailer and park it at the back of the field until it is time to leave. By evening, we just collapse. Monday we spend arranging the goods inside the tent. Display tables are set up, boxes are emptied, the big items are organized.....and our "store" is created. By evening, we are just about dead. I think we are still saying this is fun! - so far. Tuesday, we get up early and "shop" the fields that have opened. This has to be why all the fields don't open at the same time....just getting around a couple of them in a day is enough to make you want to call 911 in order to have a stretcher to collapse upon. We enjoy this time as we are able
Packed!
Ready to go. to see the dealers we have made friends with over the years. It is like a big reunion. Early to bed which is eagerly welcomed. We have to get up around 4:45 AM because our show begins at 6:00 AM on Wednesday. It is usually dark so we use our outdoor RV lights inside our tent to light the way around our canvas sided factory. The mad rush, the throngs of people, happens within the first couple hours.....these are the serious buyers and they know what they want. If you don't have it...too bad. They just run pass your tent. Once the hoopla is over and the wild dashing and running has stopped, the atmosphere becomes calmer but hopefully with a steady crowd still coming through the tent. From this point on, we "work" from 8-5 each day until Sunday afternoon when we finally start the tedious, exhausting job of packing up. Of course, if the Gods have been good to us, and we have managed to sell a lot of our goodies, the job is much easier...it just depends. We either sing Happy Days Are Here Again or 500 Tons! It all depends! We will leave our campsite on
Family Time
Tim, Lory, Sara, Cory, Kim Monday and head home. I shall keep you updated during our week at Brimfield so you will know if we are saying "boy,this is fun"or if we are saying "are we nuts or what?" Stay tuned....
Last Sunday, for my birthday, we met some of our family and went to a good flea market in Avon, N.Y. We should have taken our van because we found many intriguing items (packed in our trailer now), some that we had to walk away from (not an easy thing to do) because we had already squeezed all that we could possibly squish into our car. Lory & Sara we almost confined to sitting on the floor with all the stuff heaped around them. It was a good time and ended better as we met more of our family at a local restaurant. We always enjoy and appreciate those family moments we can spend together .... top it off at a flea market....wow -- Utopia! Spring is beautiful...the rich green grass, the budding and flowering trees..even the dandelions look cute. Everything looks new again. Everyday brings changes in the surroundings. The little yellow birds are enjoying the seed we have set out for them. I saw my first hummingbird at my feeder today. I wonder if it was a banded one that we saw at the "Hummingbird Sanctuary" we visited last year when we were in Red Bay, Alabama.....oh, yeah - Sweet Home Alabama. So many memories. I'm glad we could share them with each of you.
See you in Brimfield!
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