I have a fair number of Facebook friends that have a music background. At some point, one of them posted this saying about a how a piano can be compared to life and it really resonated with me.

The entire text was a bit lengthy so I did shorten it slightly but the meaning is still there.

“Life is like a piano; the white keys represent happiness and the black show sadness. But as you go through life’s journey, remember that the black keys also create music.”

I typed in the text on my “pages” app and chose a font the size I needed for one of my pallet signs. I traced the font onto some tracing paper then used carbon paper to transfer it to the wood. I could have typed it out on the computer, printed it out then transferred it to wood but I would have had to wrestle my husband out of his computer chair. Sometimes it is easier for me to just use my iPad for all of it.

The burning of the letters took quite awhile and then I added a bit of white paint.

This is my box of piano keys.

I haven’t yet found a use for the long wooden portion. I snip off the key portion using the bandsaw then just sand a bit by hand. The two outer white keys had to be painted white as the key is just a piece of wood with a thin plastic white or black top. The wood on one end of all the keys where they were cut needed to be painted also.

I decided to use notes G to E for this project. In order for the keys to sit well together, you have to take a section of them in numerical order. Each black and white key is individually numbered. I used keys 45-56.

I find it easiest to glue all the white keys together first and clamp them overnight. I then glued them to the pallet sign and finished by gluing the black keys in.


If you think about music, you need those sharps and flats to create the best sounds. In life you need to feel and show both your happy and sad emotions to be your best self.

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