My babies have been shipped

Between dealing with broken down vehicles, working on getting the shells boxed up ready to ship, and saying goodbye to my babies (shells, that is) after working on them for 4 weeks (3 weeks of actual carving) – it has been quite a whirlwind of a day.

I finally got the shells shipped about 4:00 by UPS. I used a massive amount of packing peanuts, bubble wrap, 3 rolls of tape, and doubled boxed them so they could probably drop it out of a plane over St. Louis and the shells would still be intact.

My apprentice, Bill Cox, took a photo of me standing in front of the boxes before they were shipped out (photo above). The boxes look massive. They are big, but not THAT big – I think the perspecive is a little distorting. I look like I need a vacation.

Tomorrow I will do a thorough clean-up of my shop, as I have neglected this over the past few weeks (you can probably tell by some of the photos – I tried to arrange the background of the photos so they don’t show the worst of it – but it is BAD). I have to admit, that is how I do house-cleaning also. I clean when it gets too messy to live with – then I spent several days in a frenzy of cleaning and it looks great – for a while. And then it starts all over again…

I am always so impressed when I go into workshops that are absolutely spotless – that you can eat off the workbenches (I always assume they have the same house cleaners come out and shine up the workshop). But the real question is – do they actually use the workshop? Where is the evidence??? I have evidence – everywhere!

When I grow up, I want a clean workshop (or a maid).

Maybe I’ll take a  photo of my workshop as it is right now – a disaster area, and then take a photo of it after it is cleaned up – how I wish it would be every day. Maybe that will by my incentive to be more diligent in keeping it clean… Maybe?

I’m going to bed tonight dreaming of my baby shells off on their travels and adventures. Have a happy life! Sniff.