Fun Finds!

When I go on vacation I tend to avoid the "touristy" shops with "touristy" things (although, I do look a little) and I head to local antique stores and other fun shops unique to the area. I love seeing how things differ so much in antique stores from one area to another, one state to another. Prices tend to vary greatly too! Most of the antique shops I've gone to in California seem to be extremely high priced...with the exception of a few of my favorites. Utah, on the other hand, seems to have much lower prices that fit better into my budget and I find more things that I like.

Whenever we go to Utah we try to stop in Cedar City, along Highway 15, and visit a few antique shops that we love and always find great things in. This trip was no exception. I'm so glad we stopped because we found some great things. My daughter got a great old camera...a "Brownie". I finally bought something I've been wanting for a while...an antique wash tub. It even has a drain hose! I think it'll be great to fill with ice and drinks for parties and get-togethers. It'll also be a great place to wash veggies, fresh from the garden! The price was unbeatable and I love it! In fact, as we got closer to home and I was thinking about it...I thought it might even look great in the house filled with yarn!!! Here it is with a blanket I wove years ago...


Here is something else I found... I think it's a shoe form for making shoes. It's a child size 5 1/2 and it's made of wood. It'll look cute on a shelf or table...


There is metal on the bottom, at the toe and heel, where shoes would typically have nails. I figure these metal pieces probably protected the wood and allowed a shoemaker to use the forms over and over...


My favorite find of the whole trip is from a Berkenstock shoe store in Springdale, just outside of Zion National Park. I went in at the beginning of our trip to find some sandals (which I did). But, I saw the cutest shoes called Woodbys. They were clogs that came in various primary and secondary colors and they had animals on them...like a dog, cow, pig, cat, horse, or a sheep. The animal was split in half between the two shoes. I fell in love with the ones with the sheep! I couldn't get it off my mind and I HAD to get some when we went back to Zion...and, that's just what I did! Here they are...


They're my official knitting/spinning shoes! I've wanted red shoes for so long and who knew I could have them with sheep on them too! Soooo fun! And, they're really comfy too! My daughter is thinking about getting the kitty shoes. We had fun putting on the various animal shoes and holding our feet together to mix and match front ends and back ends of animals. Sooo fun!!!

The first kind of store I always look for when I go to a new town is a knitting or weaving store. So far, I've only found one yarn shop in all of Southern Utah and it was in a tiny...I mean reallllly tiny town called Panquitch. Sadly, it was closed. I'm wondering if few people knit in Southern Utah, if they spin all their own yarn, or if they buy online or travel far to get it?? I'll keep searching every time I go there...I never know what might pop up!