A Puzzle for the United Way

craft, ,
Finished puzzle
Puzzle in its display frame.

Here’s my craft project for the week—a puzzle for the United Way Rally on August 5th. I’ve been on the committee to plan the rally for the last three years, and every year they challenge my crafty skills. This year, we wanted a big gesture that demonstrated how the United Way, the agencies the United Way supports, and our community are all interconnected.

Interconnection is the theme behind the UW logo “Live United,” and it’s why I am a big supporter of the United Way. Everyone in Cass County knows someone (or is someone) who has been touched by services supported by United Way. If you or someone you know has received blood from the Red Cross, gotten a ride from Cass Transit, used the Y, or been a Scout, you’ve benefited from UW donations. I give time and money to United Way because I know that every dollar is helping people right here in Cass County.

I designed the puzzle to focus on that interconnection. There are 15 agency puzzles, each in one of the small circles around the edge. Within each circle are seven facts about that agency, and each fact is on its own puzzle piece. The United Way logo was in the middle of the puzzle, with concentric rings radiating out to the edges, and the puzzle itself was the shape of Cass County. At the beginning of the rally, each table assembled an agency puzzle. Then, near the end of the rally, each table placed their puzzle on the main board to make the complete puzzle seen above. The last pieces placed were the campaign goal for 2011.

Work on the puzzle
Cutting all the pieces to fit.

Here, I’m trimming down the agency puzzles so they can be mounted on foam core. The puzzle was too big to place on a single piece of paper, so I carefully lined everything up so you can’t tell where one sheet ended and the next began.

United Way puzzle
Fitting the pieces for the United Way logo.

Here I’m lining up the mounted pieces with the center pieces. The concentric rings really helped with alignment! To give you an idea of the size, the big worktable is 5 feet by 5 feet.

Close up
Closer view of the puzzle pieces.

Once we had all the pieces cut and mounted on foam core, we could start cutting the individual puzzle pieces. There were 110 pieces total. My mom, Lynne, helped by cutting, cutting, cutting, and then cutting some more!

Cut pieces of puzzle
It's getting late and the studio table is full of puzzle pieces and debris.

We ran into a snag at this point. The puzzle pieces needed to be magnetic to attach to the sheet metal backing. My first idea, to use magnetic primer, was a complete fail. If you’ve been thinking about using it for a project, be sure to test it first. A magnet will stick to it after two coats, but it itself is not magnetic, which is what I needed for this project. Also, it makes a very rough and irregular surface, which would be hard to paint over if you were putting it on a wall.

Plan B was to attach magnetic strips to the pieces. Mom had picked up quite a pile of magnetic strip at garage sales, so we thought we were set. Unfortunately, we didn’t have enough, and some of the strip was so old that the adhesive wouldn’t stick. Mom made a late night run to Walmart to get more strip. Unfortunately, the adhesive on it wasn’t any better! Out came the glue gun as a last minute rescue.

Chocolate finish
Chocolate helped fuel the finish.

By this photo, we’re nearly done attaching magnets! The emergency chocolate helped get the project done.

Putting the puzzle together at the rally was fun and chaotic, and I hoped everyone learned something about the agencies and about the support the United Way provides in the community. The completed puzzle will be displayed at Logansport Memorial Hospital, starting on Live United Day, September 16th, so check it out. And if you don’t already, consider giving to United Way so you can touch lives throughout Cass County.

—Loryn

Pamphlets to the Past

garage sale finds

One of the more interesting garage sale items I found this past weekend is a booklet titled Business Letters and How To Write Them printed originally as Business Executive’s Handbook in 1937. I love these vintage pamphlets. They are an intimate conversation with history. These authors are speaking to you in the same voice they spoke to their contemporaries. I can learn and marvel at the conventions and manners of the early 20th century without the distortions of nostalgia and history books.

I was drawn in first by the section on stilted business language. The authors advocate a clear, organized and cordial style rather than the use of a special “business” style which “involves the elimination of all friendly feeling from the letter.” I am going to post a partial list of their phrases to avoid and I am pleased to note that their opinions are still valid and still needed:

as per your instructions; attached please find; contents duly noted; regarding your communication; this letter is for the purpose of inquiring; please be advised that; and pursuant to

I recognize every one of these and I may admit to using one or two, but  I refuse to admit to ever using “pursuant to.”

The section on libelous letters is as useful today as the 1930’s. To quote the authors: “The law cannot prevent a person from writing anything he pleases, but it can and often does make him responsible for his statements.” This seems to be good advice today as the seeming anonymity of the internet pushes the boundaries of gossip versus libel. If you insist on commenting about your sister’s bad haircut in your blog, the odds are good that she will discover your perfidy.

In 1937, libel was “defined as a false and malicious publication which tends to injure the reputation of a living person or the memory of a deceased person, and to expose him to public hatred, contempt, or ridicule.”

However, there were some rules to be applied:

  • If a statement could be proved true it was not libel. If “the reputation of a living person or the memory of a deceased person” deserved to be “exposed to public hatred, contempt” and ridicule, lawsuits were dismissed.
  • Also, “a libelous letter or comment must be communicated to a third party to be actionable.” It has to be read by someone other than the person defamed. Calling your sister ‘a dirty dog’ in the kitchen is not libel unless your mother was there too. This makes a lot of sense as having lawyers in the middle of you and your spouse’s private disputes would be costly as well as awkward.

1937 was the middle of the Great Depression and most of the libelous acts mentioned have to do with bankruptcy, insolvency and dereliction of duties. I suppose that it is libelous to say that corporate CEO’s are ‘dirty dogs’ who cannot be bothered with the ethics of business or concern for the future of their companies, but we can comment on the excesses of their salaries in comparison to our own. As the salaries are well documented and how dirty CEO’s are would depend on how many showers they take in a week.

The rest of the booklet is the standard stuff that we learned in typing class (when there were typewriters–aren’t you glad those clunky things are gone? And those erasers?) about letterheads, datelines, proper forms of address and the complimentary close.  (“I am dear Mr. President, Faithfully yours…” Not quite how we word missives to our elected officials, now huh?)

To me the best part of the booklet was the section called the Dictionary of Correct Usage. One of my pet peeves is the use of “bear” and “bare.” Bare witness has a totally different meaning than bear witness. I keep them straight with this sentence; I don’t know how many times I have had to bear the sight of bare bums when someone wearing low rider jeans leans over. Here is one excerpt from the Dictionary of Correct Usage and my own sentence clarifying it:

accept, except. ACCEPT means to receive with approval, reply to affirmatively, agree to; EXCEPT means to exclude, make an exception to.

I accept your offer to help me with grammar and semantics with the bad grace you would expect. I except your mother from any horribleness resulting from my bad attitude.

Really, people are bemoaning the loss of writing due to the influence of computers and texting and smart phones, but I think people are writing more than they ever have since there is such an eager and vast audience out there waiting to be entertained. At least someone out there in the ether will agree with what you say and even make the same writing errors you do.

-Lynne

Lanterns and Fortunes and Dragons, Oh My!

collections, garage sale finds
McDonald's Special Promotion
Lanterns, banners, dragons and even uniforms from McDonald's sauces promotion.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Another weekend has come and gone. It was over way too quickly. But, Lynne and I hit some interesting garage sales this weekend. If the sales don’t seem to be going very well, I have a game I like to play. I try to find the item that the seller puts out and says, “Go ahead, put it out, someone will buy it”.

To me a garage sale is a safari, or a scavenger hunt. My mind is going a hundred miles a minute trying to figure out what I will do with the item I just picked up, how does it fit in with what I have?  Do I have any idea what I may use if for? Garage sales are not for the weak willed.  A lot of thought goes in to any object you pick up, often, it is exhausting. After a summer of sales, I am usually glad to see them end and give myself a rest, and then, after a few weeks I am back to craving sales again.

Each week I would like to document the strangest, oddest, or neatest item we have found at a sale. The one for this week is a real doozy. After a bit of research I found out that in 1986 McDonalds had a promotion on their McNugget sauces. The sauces were Teriyaki, Sweet and Sour and Hot mustard. The nuggets included a carry out box and chopsticks and even a fortune cookie. For some reason, I do not recall this, as I really am a McDonalds Freak. Anyway, at a local sale, I found 4 oriental uniform shirts, 2 large paper dragons, 4 oriental hats, 2 banners and 10 paper Japanese Lanterns. The lanterns were what really sold me.

One of my boys promptly confiscated a dragon and put it on his ceiling in his room, and it looks really good.  As for the rest of the items, I think I will use the lanterns in my room, and I will probably keep the rest packed, until I decide if I can sell it or hang on to it for posterity.  After all, they really don’t take up a lot of space. (Keep telling yourself that Cheri).

-Cheri