Photo Friday: The Markets at Shrewsbury

Last month I hinted at some errands that I ran to buy a gift for someone’s birthday. Well the gift was for my Mom and we’ve celebrated her birthday so it’s time to share!

I went to the Markets at Shrewsbury to get it, you know, the one with the jingle that goes: “The Markets at Shrewsbury, great shopping and fun the way it used to beeeeeeee!” Or something like that. It’s not like I sing along in my car or anything.

The Markets have a ton of different vendors from meats and produce to wine and furniture. If you’ve never been, there are coupons at the entrance that you can use for all of the participating vendors.

The reason I chose to come here was because of the Old Europe Stoneware shop. The shop carries specialty pottery and ornaments from Eastern Europe. If you’ve been reading for a while, you know I come from a long line of Polish people. One of the thing the Polish are known for is Polish Pottery, which is meticulously hand painted stoneware.

My mom collects it like most women of Polish heritage do. So when I saw this star shaped bowl I thought it was perfect and unique and knew she didn’t have anything like it.

I mean, where can you find hand-painted serving dishes these days? (That’s actually not a rhetorical question – if you know of any place – let me know!)

I also meandered around and picked up some Naylor wine and steaks. On previous trips we’ve gotten ridiculously sweet Amish baked goods, a variety of grains that you can’t find in grocery stores and an unfinished hand crafted wood pie safe, which is basically a shallow armoire.

What about you all – have any local favorites you like to go instead of the big box stores? Any items near and dear to your heritage you like to buy?