Supersize My Crafts and Add a Side of Baby Heads

07 I Wanna Be Your Joey Ramone

Last night I was chauffeured to the Etsy craft extravaganza in front of the Make store located the Bishop Arts District in Oak Cliff.  Both times I’ve been to this funky area of Dallas I haven’t been driving just taking in the views on the way.   Crack house.  Prostitute.  Scary motel with a crackhead who is a prostitute…..pawn shop, and Bishop Arts District!  Judging by it’s surroundings, I would have never guessed it was there.  It’s a little weird to have an art gallery offering you wine on one street and down a block is a wino passed out in the gutter.   But it works.

The craft fair was happening out in front of the Make store and all these cool crafters were there.  They make bags, jewelry, clothes, headbands, pot holders, paint glass, and I’m guessing are also developing a cure for diabetes.  They made these nifty paper chains and hung them around the tents.  As the sun went down, it was picturesque to watch them swinging in the 500 degree breeze.  About all I can craft is a heart out of paper, you know where you fold the paper in half and draw half a heart on one side.  But to be honest, even those come out crooked and awkward.  I am amazed by artists and makers of goods, because that does not flow in my veins.  I guess to be fair I can also make a thumb print turkey.  Thank you first grade.  But the real crafters were excited to put their raffle tickets into the drawing to win some kind of super scissors?  glass paints, a sewing machine and other fancy stickers and buttons.  One way to win raffle tickets was to take photos in costume, so I dressed up like an evil cowboy and shot Mylynka.  Two times!  Bang!  Bang!  I think she’s going to be ok…

As the Make party died down, our party went in search of air conditioning.  Because at this point everyone had sweaty back and sweaty butt.  Both of these things make you feel so disgusting.  I would like to apologize to Orange County for everyday I whined about it being cold at night.  So we took our sweaty selves to Green Pet, which is an upscale pet supply store with natural products for puppies and kitties.  This is where I met Fred the cat.  My life has now been changed forever.  Fred apparently lives in the pet store.  He is 15 and makes the cutest face if you call him.  The cashier said that her best customer had died and so she took Fred and now he lives in the store.  Aw Fred…very sweet kitty.  They have awesome treats and toys for pets, but it was a little out of my free price range.  While I kept this to myself, the whole time I was petting Fred, I wondered what they would do if you ate a bag of cat treats.  Would they make you buy it?  I wonder if that has ever happened at this store.  I’m glad I did not test this theory.

After we departed from Fred, our little group saught air conditioning at this art gallery.  Weirdest.  Art.  Ever.  It was almost as bad as a furniture store I went to with Ashley Roe once, where the entertainment center had a giant panther crawling up the side.  That store also had chairs that I think they stole from Seussical: The Musical.  Anyway, this gallery had some cool stuff, like metal animals forged from kitchen utensils and giant glass bowls.  But that also had art that makes a statement but would be uncomfortable to wake up to.  Like the dead baby doll art.  Okay, I’m not saying that taking tiny baby heads and putting them in a big metal cage makes you a sociopath…but I think buying it and displaying it in your bedroom might.  I appreciated the bizanarrness of all the baby heads (there was also a gumball machine that dispensed doll heads for 5 cents) I think if I went to sleep with all the doll heads staring at me every night,  I might forget I was potty trained.

We left the dead baby heads, and went into the most fun store ever…the Soda shop.  Um.  It can only be described as pure awesomeness.   This place has every soda you could ever desire including Zenmaster, which is such a cool name I would buy it even if I knew it had been filled with arsenic.  The decor is hip and Todd showed me a picture on his phone of a woman dressed like wonder woman.  He had been at the shop once while she was standing there and people were sketching her.  Todd cheated and took a picture.  But who is really the winner?

Besides the sodas and decor, this store has the happiest bathroom on earth.  I walked into it and I just thought I want to live here!  I can honestly say that no other bathroom has inspired me this much.  There was a little yellow chair and a yellow door and soda wrappers all over the bathroom.  It was so pretty I didn’t pee because it just seemed wrong.  There are plenty of bathrooms out there, I didn’t need to pee in the nice one.  Like the candy that you buy but never eat because it is too pretty.

So after all this, we went to Eno’s to have pizza.  We sat upstairs and it was a very cool restaurant.  It reminded me of the bar in Austin where I got smores when I turned 25.  Neat tables, dark with mood lighting, delicious Root Beer Floats. Kandice, Melanie’s friend, had the most delightful story about a crazy neighbor she has.  Kandice lives in a nice area of Dallas, I think by the greenbelt, and was telling us that one of the mothers there, hates one of the other mothers.  So she did what any sane, mom addict would do and walked over to the dreaded neighbor’s yard, and tased her.  Yes.  She tased her!  This was not enough of a crime to keep her away.  On a separate occasion, the crazy lady ended up running from the cops.  Being handcuffed and put in the car and then kicking the windows until the police opened the door and she sprinted away and had to be tackled.  I bet she was on COPS.  I was pleased by this story, but I couldn’t think of anything to add.  Except I am glad no one has ever tased me!  Be nice to your neighbors.

Good times.  Good food.  Good conversation and a whole lot of dolls heads.