Monday, April 25, 2011

A sign of the times

It's time.
It's time to get a new sign made for the end of the driveway.
This one was done in 1994 and it seems a bit dated and worn.
Tired- time to retire.
We have yet to find the time to come up with a new sign but I think we need to chuck this and start over.
When we had our first sign done it was before computers made it easy to design your own.
Yea, we are talking back in the dark ages, before the earth cooled.
It was 1982 and a fellow potter student had a back ground in graphic Arts and she designed our sign, stamp, business card and logo. There is no font that matches what she did back then and we have had others try to repeat the logo without much success.
But- things change and what seemed up and coming then seems more like the hair-do of the 80's.
You know how you look back and think- gee, did we really wear that, did we all go for the poodle perm look- guys fess up some of you were right there getting yours done too.
It is time to maybe start anew.
Time to think about changing the look- new colors maybe.
One of our hesitations has been that we have had problems with folks who think our sign looks better with rocks and eggs added.
I know- we were not thrilled with the additions, but they liked it enough to come back more then once.
There is also the issue of the open/close sign.
We paint one, they steal it.
We paint another one and take it down every night for a year and then get lazy- they steal it again.
We go to the hardware and buy one of those tacky looking ones, you know the ones, and they even steal those.
We have thought of ways to keep them from stealing them but it might mean jail time for one of us.
So we are still thinking about how best to attach an open/close sign which does not grow legs in the middle of the night.
The orchid is still blooming away.
She has one more pod to open.
She has started dropping a few of the blooms.
Seems our days are numbered, but I have enjoyed her everyday.
I am thinking about taking her back to the Orchid place when she is all done to see if they can lay hands on her and bring her back for someone else to enjoy.
Our days are numbered.

Mark and I took a long walk the other night.
We went up the back pasture and walked what will be a new road into the back of the property.
Today the we had someone here to plant grass on the road bed and sorta fix things up a bit.
I took this picture because it showed how different the soil is from one area to the next.
Look at how red that soil is at the top.
It might be worth trying to make a slip out of it.
Then I have to show you our trees.
See that sweet little pine tree sticking up?
We had all the land replanted after it was cut last fall.
Oh, I didn't tell you all about the cut.
Too painful- but life is full of pain and changes and sometimes you just have to roll with those changes.
Me- the tree hugger had to have the timber on the farm cut last fall.
I dealt with it pretty well considering all that had gone on before and since we cut.
Changes- you don't get to live this long with out them.

So what are we doing in the pottery?
Throwing- how about you?
M

11 comments:

Tracey Broome said...

There is an orchid place in Pittsboro that will babysit your orchids and coax them into blooming every year. Carol Hewitt uses them if you need the info. I never knew the soil could change so rapidly, that is an interesting photo of the road and the soils, so much a part of what makes NC a great place I guess! Maybe we are all feeling the changes coming that were promised last election, maybe they are different than what we thought we were going to get....I have been feeling some change is necessary too. Growing pains maybe :)

Trish said...

Yes, Meredith..see what slip colour that red clay makes.:)..I have some khaki green clay from my sister's place that I am bisquing tomorrow..interested to see what happens there.-will post a pic of it later..
I must get some throwing done this week too.
good eve. T.

Linda Starr said...

Yes, some things are too painful to talk about, try that slip, I am still learning about the Florida clay I got and what neat things it does on the surface of other clays. Once when Gary and I lived in Northern California, someone kept stealing our for sale sign, I thought about putting axel grease on the back of it and when the folks touched it, they'd get their hands all dirty, never did it though and we sold that house and moved to Arkansas, but it was fun to think of the look on their faces imagining them touching our sign with the axel grease. ha. that red on the sign really stands out.

Gary's third pottery blog said...

your town is really called whynot? :)

Unknown said...

I will miss that sign! How else will I know where to turn?

Anna M. Branner said...

Your orchids cousin here at my house is nearly finished too. Not as happy in this place as it was in the windowsill in Fburg but she still managed a showing. :)

I've been super busy here too...but somehow the pots are not getting finished....will change that starting....tomorrow.

cindy shake said...

I kind of like the sign! It seems sturdy and that nobody would mess with it! Maybe just paint the wood frame a bright color enamel? Add a cutout of a couple of pottery pieces to the upper corners(?) In these economic times I think I'd have an "open" sign that said "Always Open!"

We had vandals that went on a mailbox and baseball bat spree and to make it worse we'd hear the kids coming about 3-4am and could never catch them -I sooo wanted to have an explosive devise in our box the THIRD time is was hit!!

Julia said...

I agree with Cindy; I really like your "old" sign and maybe you could just spruce the old girl up a bit. Some people will steal anything that isn't bolted down. Somebody keeps taking my No Trespassing sign even when I switched from the nice ones to the ones that only cost 50 cents at the home improvement store. It makes me wonder what they are doing with all of them? If they were making some kind of awesome recycled art out of it, I might forgive them, but I somehow doubt it.

Laurie said...

Didn't know that about the signs. That's got to be frustrating. I'd say you're navigating these changing times wonderfully.

cookingwithgas said...

and now you have me thinking about how to spruce things up and keep some elements of the old sign.
and the Orchid- she is hanging in there.

Patricia Griffin Ceramics said...

Orchids are my hubster's new passion. He's filling the house with them and tends to them like they're his babies. It's strange, but kind of cute too. This is a big, outdoorsey kind of guy... I'm more used to him going to car shows and fishing trips. Keeps things interesting!... When the bloom is off of your orchid, trim it all the way back. The theory is that it will bloom again with even more blossoms. (Did you notice that I said "theory"?)