Day Tripper

Every time I visit my dad in Hendersonville NC we go to the Southern Highland Craft Guild on the Blue Ridge Parkway.  I always buy some hand carved wooden utensils that are a mainstay of my kitchen and that I also like to give friends.  On the way to the Parkway we stopped at a little pottery.  It wasn't open but if you honk your horn or ring the bell...well we didn't, but we did look in the windows.

The drive along the parkway is quite beautiful and the day was fine.

Daddy looks good for 90.  And I look a little too urban for the landscape.  You can take the girl out of the city but you can't take the city out of the girl.

The Guild had a local fabric artist giving a demonstration outside of the center.  She uses paint and photosensitive inks to create botanical prints which she then cuts and sews into quilts available for sale inside.  She was interesting and enthusiastic about her fabric art.

Inside there was a beautiful exhibit on turned wood featuring artists from around the world.

I did not have my field press (after all I was expecting Daniel to arrive fully equipped) but this is one plant I would have collected if...

Canned Ham Update and Some Folk Pottery

I am in Hendersonville with my 90 year old dad having a great visit.  We go antiquing, play gin, drink bourbon, read and cook wonderful meals.  I was supposed to meet up with Daniel on Saturday but his reports from the road were not encouraging, and then finally were disappointing.  The Canned Ham trailer, although much loved by Daniel, is not really roadworthy.  He delayed his departure from Peoria for a couple of days in order to attend to must-do tasks just to get it on the road -- new running lights, new wheel bearings, a fix to the drain pipe below the sink, a window that was falling out...you get the idea.  His communiques late at night showed no regret but some "misgivings" about the Ham.  (should we call it Hamlet?)  While he did get it on the road it is not quite street legal.  And it's a challenge for the Red Bomb to haul it across the flatness of Illinois.  Gas mileage is terrible.  What would the mountains of NC be like?  So he is heading for NY directly to put it up on blocks and whip it into shape.  I am sure there is a reason we do not see a lot of 50 year old trailers on the road and Daniel is discovering those reasons one by one.

So just to keep this going for anyone who checks in, here are some pics from Leftwich Pottery, a folk pottery we visited in Mills River.  Rodney and Kim, the potters, were most gracious and informative.  Rodney makes incredibly complex incised and carved pots with complicated glazes.  Kim specializes in face and figural pots in the folk tradition.  You can learn more about them at www.pisgahforestpottery.com.

The outbuildings

By the back door

Rodney's pots

Detail of beautiful glaze
that is from an old "lost" technique

Traditional face pots 

Other random doings about town...I have been buying remnants of Belgian linen that I like to make bath towels from.  I hate terry.  Linen dries fast, doesn't mildew and looks nicer.  Dad and I will head into the mountains today to the folk art center.  I always buy handmade wooden utensils there.  I wish I brought my field press -- if I had it I could collect.  Lots in bloom all over.  The rhododendrons are fierce!  If you read this, send Daniel an encouraging note and a reminder to be careful on the road.