Pictures from a recent visit to Shipshewana, Indiana

One place I have always wanted to visit is the Shipshewana Flea Market, well on Labor Day I had an opportunity to check it out. It was okay, not something I would visit again, as most of the booths either sold knick-knacks, or "as seen on TV" merchandise. Usually while the Flea Market is open the cattle/horse/antique auction is also going on. Many people descend upon the little town of Shipshewana to attend one or both of these events each week, traffic is very heavy, so be warned if you ever decide to go.

I love visiting Shipshewana, one of my favorite stores there is Yoder's, they have a hardware store, department store and small grocery all sort of separated yet together in one building, there is a large hallway running through the center of the building, the walls are hung with beautiful quilts, and lined with an abundance of rocking chairs, mainly occupied by husbands. The hardware store carries all the usual hardware type things, and looks of cooking ware, china, toys, very heavy duty laundry drying racks, carts to haul your laundry basket to the wash line, brooms, outdoor cooking cauldrons for making large vats of apple butter, just to name a very few of the items to browse. The department store reminds me very much of an old five and dime store, it has a large fabric department, with an amazing selection, large rolls of table cloth fabric, bridal fabric, quilting fabric, wools, flannels, and on and on, rack after rack of quilting stencils, tons of quilting notions, and cross stitch items, hook after hook of buttons, lace, and that is just one half of the store, the other half sells good quality shoes, work boots, cowboy boots, underwear, cowboy hats, Amish hats and bonnets, work clothes, and baby clothes, they have lovely cardigans at very reasonable prices, handkerchiefs, cloth napkins, table cloths and dish towels.

While visiting Yoders' I was pleased to find a child size broom for grandson Henry, he is two, and just loves to "help" sweep, I also found a couple of quilt stencils that will work well for the quilt I am currently working on.

Shipshewana is the home of the Davis Mercantile Building, the original building burned down a number of years ago, but a new one was built and it is four floors of fun, there is a very large carousel on the top floor, a favorite with many children, an old fashioned candy store, a wonderful fabric store for quilters called Lollys, and the usual knick-knack stores, it is a nice place to wander around. There are plenty of restaurants in Shipshewana, the largest is, The Blue Gate, great food for a good prices, lots of noodles, potatoes, fried chicken, roast beef, you know lots of comfort food and then there is dessert, if you have room.

For a relaxing day out Shipshewana is the place to go, I visit a couple of times a year and always enjoy myself. http://www.shipshewana.com/

Below are a few pictures from our most recent visit.

One of the booths at the flea market!

Emily took this picture, I really like it, it is another flea market booth.

Henry is very pleased with his new broom!

A cutsie schoolhouse we found on a back road as we traveled home.

This made us laugh, a buggy towing a boat!

Some type of steam powered contraption sitting by a barn.

AHHH, one of my favorite places to go, YODER's!!

Well you know, when there are horse and buggies around you are going to have manure.

Horses waiting patiently for their owners to finish shopping.