# Rubarb meets concrete and steel - family project



## Uglydog (Jun 27, 2013)

The wife took a Community Ed class with her lady friends (girls night out).
Evidently, they used a very large rhubarb leaf placed it on a ball of concrete, pressed it into the ball to form a bowl shape, placed a sandbag on top, allowed to dry, then splashed it with some paint.
I was assigned to make a stand.
I used some large rebar drop to create a tripod.

This is the sort of project that could easily be done with children (well, maybe not the actual welding, depending on the age).
It is a great project for the NOOB welder as it is ok if the welds look like bird sh.. as it is a bird bath!
... although the 6g positioning gets gnarly. 

Daryl
MN


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## Ray C (Jun 27, 2013)

Hey, my wife loves the bird bath.... Very cool!


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## churchjw (Jun 27, 2013)

Got to love the honey-do projects.  I think the stand goes very well with the bath.  It would look great in a garden with morning glories growing up it. All of her friends are probably so impressed that you can weld (and did it for her) that they will never think to have the weld x-rayed for testing.  :roflmao::roflmao::roflmao::roflmao:

Jeff


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## DMS (Jun 27, 2013)

Looks cool.

You know, when I first saw the picture, I thought it was a stool. I think you should make a few more and see how they work in this respect


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## Maxx (Jun 27, 2013)

I agree with DMS, at first I thought it was a stool also.

Around these parts here you don't let people know that you have a welder because everybody and his brother will be by with something to fix and expect it done for free.


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## sniggler (Jun 27, 2013)

So you set a minimum price for welding and never look back you never know what might turn up and what characters you might meet.

The bird bath is really cool as is the stand, consider high fired clay with glaze that's arts and crafts and the american arts and crafts movement produced some of the most amazing multi material art with metal as a prominent feature.

The trade school stuff from 1900-1930 when mechanical skills were respected is fantastic. In the seventies and eighties school shop programs around the country were gutted on the theory that all kids should go to college. We forgot the time honored system of apprenticeship wherein hundreds of years of collective experience is passed on. People long to build things its in our dna. 

We have a guy on this sight building model aircraft engines that are absolutely art  thats a dedication to craft for the sake of craft.

Bob

for arts and crafts see roycrofters, frank lloyd wright, greene and greene, l and jg stickly, and blacksmith samual yelin, gruby pottery.


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## Shopsweeper (Jun 27, 2013)

Pretty!

Oh, how I miss the rhubarb pies, the fresh morels fried in butter, the gooseberry jam, the fresh sweet corn, the acorn feed and whey finished pork cured in to hams in a real smoke house, and the cold well water on a hot day.

You can take the boy off the hog farm...


I love my adopted state, but I wake up some mornings SWEARING I just heard the lids of the hog feeders banging.


What a nice way to combine your projects.


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## Ben (Jun 27, 2013)

Your wife did a nice job on that bird bath(I thought it was a stool at first also) and the stand looks perfect for it. Keep up the good work!


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## SE18 (Jun 28, 2013)

nice work. Folk here in virginia don't know what rhubarb is; they think it's some sort of fishing lure


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## Ray C (Jun 28, 2013)

Just as an aside...  Rhubarb is a very invasive plant.  When I lived in Illinois, my neighbor planted some along a fence bordering a garden patch we shared.  First year, it grew nicely and more the next year and the next year...  Every year we dug it up like crazy and it kept on taking over.

And speaking of invasive, I have a wisteria bush in the front yard.  -Don't ever make that mistake folks.  It throws out strong roots just beneath the soil surface for 20 - 30 feet in all directions.  Impossible to pull it up and keep it from devastating and choking-out any other bushes or garden patch greenery.  I do believe it's illegal to knowingly transport/transplant it in some southern states as it goes totally unchecked w/o a winter frost to slow it down.

Ray


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## macrnr (Jun 28, 2013)

Ray C said:


> Just as an aside...  Rhubarb is a very invasive plant.  When I lived in Illinois, my neighbor planted some along a fence bordering a garden patch we shared.  First year, it grew nicely and more the next year and the next year...  Every year we dug it up like crazy and it kept on taking over.
> 
> And speaking of invasive, I have a wisteria bush in the front yard.  -Don't ever make that mistake folks.  It throws out strong roots just beneath the soil surface for 20 - 30 feet in all directions.  Impossible to pull it up and keep it from devastating and choking-out any other bushes or garden patch greenery.  I do believe it's illegal to knowingly transport/transplant it in some southern states as it goes totally unchecked w/o a winter frost to slow it down.
> 
> Ray


We had rhubarb growing wild here, but it went away. We used to harvest it every year and make Rhubarb pie. We have been trying to get some to grow for two years now, with no luck. I really love Rhubarb pie. Mmmmmmm


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## Ian Bee (Jun 29, 2013)

I showed this to my wife, we both agree, this is waaaaay cool dude!


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## Analias (Jun 29, 2013)

I was surprised to discover, from Alton Brown on Good Eats, that rhubarb leaves are poisonous. You should only eat the stalks. I have been eating it all my life in pies and preserves. Go figure. 

Sent from my Xoom using Tapatalk 4 Beta


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## SE18 (Jun 29, 2013)

my grandma in upstate NY (born in 1890) used to make rhubarb pies. She had a patch in the back. You've gotta add a lot of sugar b/c if you eat the stalks raw, they're really bitter. As kids we used to dare each other to see how many stalks we could chew before puking


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