Cyberthrasher

I need to learn how to read. I completely missed the part about it being the kit pieces.

Wow Chancey, that sounds like you're fighting off sleep right now I'm having troubles picturing what you described.

Looks like Springfield ships overseas. I'd ask them to make sure there won't be any specific problems with those products going to your country. http://springfieldleather.com/

Sounds like some good advice to me. I may end up in the same position as the OP pretty soon. One of my co-worker's might be setting me up with all of his dad's old stuff - tools, leather, and all.

Would it help to give it some good oiling and then case it?

Tandy's casing video only seems to work on very thin or very small pieces, even though I've seen others get great results from it. I would try overnight casing by following Hidepounder's guide. If that doesn't work, maybe try some kind of casing solution. Remember, it's been dying of thirst for 35 years so it's going to guzzle any fluid it comes in contact with.

Took me 3 days of hard thinking after months of random thoughts to figure out what I want for my next piece. Even then I'm not 100% sure on it.

Nice!! I'd be all over that if I still slung ink. I'll definitely be bringing it up with my buddy though next time I see him.

So, is that longhand for "bib" Did you use a pear shader on the inside of those flames?

Duck brand makes lots of tape - not just cloth duct tape. This is the only tape I haven't had issues with from THAT store. That's just in terms of general use though since I haven't backed a piece of leather with it yet. http://duckbrand.com/Products/packaging-tapes/hd-clear-packaging-tape.aspx

Now that image will be stuck in my head every time I watch either of those movies. Milo, what's the part number on that beveler thing?

Thinking about it, I'd say the clear Duct brand packing tape available at Chinamart would probably do just fine.

Hmmm, never thought of that. Makes perfect sense now that you mention it though.

I have no idea for belts specifically, but I've been casing overnight and then using rubber cement to glue my piece down to some thin cardboard like soda or cereal boxes.

my wife's just gave me some Saral paper to use when in a bind. She had it left over from embroidery. I saw that there was someone else here using it as well. http://www.saralpaper.com/products.html

I've been using similar sized pieces from pepsi boxes. All the Pepsi is stored by my desk anyway. It's pretty much the same as card stock and seems to work well for me.

Yeah, that's probably a good idea - maybe the day after though

Probably because that's how I am myself. I can read all day but I won't really retain much until I go through the process of screwing it up. I have shelves full of books from college that never got cracked open because I couldn't learn from them. Now I'm to a point where reading is a roadmap, but I still have to actually learn the hard way for most things.

I figure you're already trying, so why not read up on how to do it?

Like I tell my work study's all the time when they screw up (just about every day actually), as long as you learned something from it then it was a worthwhile process. I'd say, since you have your knife and leather now, just do your best to stop and focus on tooling for a little while. Tell yourself "NO, I have to get better at this" every time you want to go work on some other aspect of leather. I have the same attention problems, but I like to think I've done a fair job at learning how to work around them. I'm going to send some links your way here in a little bit - hopefully they won't add too much fuel to your fire.

For edge finishing, I think your best bet is to use the 600 grit wet/dry on the kit leather (I haven't tried it yet, but I think it will work). I tried water and denim on that stuff and it just didn't work at all on the edges, but it worked great on my practice leather from Zack White. Also, check out Bob Park's tutorial on edge finishing. I just don't have all the stuff to do his method. http://leatherworker.net/forum/index.php?app=gallery&module=user&user=5&do=view_album&album=164

Well, if you're going for realistic, I have absolutely NO idea. But, if you want something artistic, the first thing that popped into my head was clouds. Something like the clouds in this picture (simple google image search for "tattoo clouds") could look really nice in the background. http://www.tattoos-beauty.com/image-files/cross-tattoos-with-flames.jpg

Great start - and you're even coming up with stuff for all the tools . I'm glad to see I'm not the only one who didn't want to do the "Kit" designs. I really like what you did on that first rounder. That's a great job at decorative cutting. I found that the Tandy kit leather (at least in my case) can't really be properly finished very easily in regards to the back and edges. I don't remember the recommended procedure but I know I read it a few times on here.