Having Fun in Dallas and Denton

This month my husband has been working incredibly hard getting things ironed out in the technology department of our school district for the beginning of school. One day he worked for 12 hours and spent 8 hours of that in a conference call. Needless to say, he was in desperate need of a day off. Luckily, he got two! We spent three days going around the Dallas metroplex, which is huge, and I feel like we barely scratched the surface of cool stuff to do and see.

On Thursday, we went to the Dallas neighborhood of Deep Ellum and the Dallas Museum of Art. Deep Ellum is a funky neighborhood right off of downtown Dallas that is famous for it's graffiti lined streets. It was revitalized in the 90's and has lots of small businesses, lofts, and as goes with the territory, hipsters. We drove around looking at graffiti and stopped in for lunch at a super delicious burger/sandwich place, Uncle Ubers. It was some seriously good food and they had the most hilarious vintage advertisements on the walls for silly things like x-ray specs.

Next we went over to the Dallas Museum of Art and walked through every single gallery. My feet were killing me by the time we left! I took one of my blythes with me to take photos with, which I haven't done in months. I got some nice pictures in the sculpture garden (and only a few weird looks) and saw so many great pieces of art. I particularly liked the Slavs and Tartars exhibition which was awesome black and cream wool rugs but my favorite was The Museum is History exhibition.

After the museum, we attempted to go by one of my favorite local shops, We Are 1976, but they were closed this week for travel. Bummer!

My husband in The Museum is History exhibition, matching the Rothko. 

Chihuly in the Museum Cafe

The next day, we went the opposite direction and went to the suburb Southlake for some green chile and Container Store shopping. Central Market hosts Hatch Chile Fest every year where they bring in tons of green chile from Hatch, NM. You know we can't miss out on what our state is famous for! They roast them, sell them fresh, and they had so many foods with green chile mixed in including chocolate, cheeses, and even apple pie. Heaven!

On Saturday, we went up to Denton (which is the closest to where we live) to check out the Denton Community Market, a weekly art and produce market. It was super cute and had lots of great local vendors selling everything from beef jerky to hand carved wooden wine stoppers and of course, food trucks! 

My favorite booths were The DIME Store (basically a brick and mortar version of Etsy for local artisans), these things (adorable illustrations and the cutest handpainted pendant necklaces), and most of all, Denton Design Company. I chatted with the owner Darien for quite awhile about crafting, dolls, and her completely awesome trailer. She even let me check out the inside of the trailer, of course I totally want one of my own now!

Earrings at The DIME Store's booth. 

The cutest booth of all, Denton Design Company! 

Embroidered fabric buttons at Denton Design Company

Last but not least, we stopped by SCRAP Denton a resale shop for craft supplies. Holy cow, I thought I died and went to creative heaven. They had a room stacked to the ceiling with fabric, piles of vintage sewing patterns, notions, knitting needles, yarn, old trophies, beads, wood of all shapes... just about everything you need to make well, anything! I picked up a drop spindle for $1, a ball of vintage wool, and then I found the books and magazines section and went a little crazy. To my credit, the magazines were .25 or 10 for $2. I managed to get 9 issues of Interweave Knits (two from 2006, all of 2010, and all but the winter issue of 2011), a Mollie Makes, and then I also grabbed two books for $7, one about polymer clay jewelry and the other a vintage Better Homes and Gardens book of knitting and crochet patterns which look surprisingly modern. Not bad for $13! 

I'm pretty sure my husband is exhausted after I dragged him all over town but we had a lot of fun and made some good memories!