Thankful

I have lots to be thankful for. I have a loving wife, four children and their wonderful spouses, eight grandchildren and one great granddaughter. That’s plenty enough right there but that’s not all. I have wonderful friends (whom I don’t see often enough) but we keep in touch via social media and phone calls. I have the best job in the world, I own my own business and I do exactly what I want to do every day. We don’t owe anything to anybody, no mortgage payments, no car payments and no credit card bills. My health has been challenging but not as bad as many my age and I think it’s getting better, not worse. That’s a lot to be thankful for.

All four of my children and their spouses have good values and are making a positive contribution to society. They are smart, hardworking and loving. Four kids is a lot of kids these days but four good kids is just plain amazing. I’m very proud of them. All of them also have talent in the arts and crafts arena.

My wife Pennie and I bought this small farm 46 years ago. The only crop we ever had was orchard grass hay and we only did that a few years. We did have goats, guineas, chickens, pheasants, doves, cockatiels, rabbits, cats and dogs, lots of dogs. At one time we had 22 dogs (two litters of puppies included) and another time we had 7 adult great danes. We are down to one animal, Oscar, a harlequin great dane who just turned 8. He’s my velcro dog and he goes everywhere with me. I had planned to refurbish our vacant chicken coop and get chickens again but it didn’t happen this year. I really enjoyed our chickens and will try very hard to get that work done this winter so we can get chickens and guineas in the spring.

I have an amazing shop. It started with a 24’ x 48’ building in 1980 and it grew and grew. Today I have over 7000 sq ft under roof and 3456 sq ft of it is heated and cooled. Is it any wonder that I go to work in it 7 days a week. It is my happiest place. I’ve traveled all over the world, visited five continents on business and for pleasure and still my shop is the place I most want to be. Every day I make something with my own two hands that I can be proud of. I have shipped almost 4000 items to 15 countries around the world. All of them were made in my shop in rural NC by my two hands.

I have amazing customers, patrons of my work, who have supported me since I started selling on the internet 17 years ago. I have had customers who are schoolteachers, coworkers, doctors, lawyers, US Senators, realtors, business owners, a British Dame, a famous fashion designer and a little girl who bought a ring dish with her birthday money. I am so thankful for the wonderful people that have supported and encouraged me over the years, without them it wouldn’t be nearly as fun and I’d have a mountain of bowls.

A special thanks to my friend Jeremy who built my first website. He donated his time and expertise and even hosted my website on his server for years. We met through a NC woodworking website. Thank you Jeremy!

Others who deserve special thanks include Rick who saved out a lot of beautiful wood for me and taught me how to photograph my work (so I would stop asking him to photograph them, he was a professional photographer in a previous life). My friend Bill deserves recognition for helping me many times and listening to me complain, providing racks for drying bowls and carts to move things around my shop, my friend Greg who has been on some of my wood sourcing adventures and got me a great deal on a huge air compressor deserves a lot of thanks. My friend (and father-in-law) Gary who loaned me a sawmill which I have used with great glee. If only my name was Tom, then I’d be Tom sawyer.

And finally thank you, my readers and loyal blog followers. I know I should post more often but thanks for taking the time to read them when I do.

Happy Thanksgiving!