Art Fair

Yesterday afternoon we met Tom's brother, Dave, sister-in-law, Denise, and our niece Kathleen at the Art Fair in Ann Arbor.  The Art Fair is a huge deal in Ann Arbor every July -- there are actually four separate fairs in different areas of downtown.  They cover a wide range of products -- from inexpensive items all the way up to sculptures that cost several thousand dollars.

We parked at the high school, and took the shuttle downtown.

This actually required us to drive AROUND Ann Arbor to get to the shuttle stop, but we do it because it's much easier to park there, and then you can get dropped off at one end of the fair, and picked up at the opposite end -- no walking back to get to your car!

Now that we're downsizing, I wasn't really looking to buy anything, so we were just window-shopping, and people-watching.  We saw lots of interesting characters, like this guy playing music on the corner

and the "one-man band" on another corner!

These unique drinking fountains caught our eye, too.

The water from the fire hydrant goes into the cooler, and then through a filter, and up to the drinking fountain . . . looks pretty cool (literally!)

Then there was the art . . . these windmills were incredible

All of those colorful pieces are made of glass, and as the wind blew, they turned and spun in every direction!

These sculptures draw a crowd every year -- 

doesn't she look real!!??!!  But she's just one of several sculptures in this booth.  I think they are amazing!  He used to have a sculpture of a policeman standing up on the corner -- it looked so real that people would try to talk to him!  I didn't see that one this year, so I guess he sold it.

We stayed until the fair closed at 9pm, but didn't quite get through all of the booths, and actually missed one fair entirely!  I didn't buy anything, but it was fun just to walk around and look at all the interesting art!  A stop at Kilwin's for an ice cream cone finished off the evening for us -- it was a great night!