maxdaddy

Meaningful Christmas tree ornaments are some of those things that have very long lifespans. I bet that the folks who receive one of them will still be hanging it on their tree with pride in 20-years. I still use one every year that I made in Sunday School when I was 4 and I'm 55 now.

In the time you've been gone I've made this forum a part of my daily routine. Hopefully you'll be able to integrate a fun and creative outlet into your daily routines now. It certainly sounds like you've had 8-years of daly routines that were anything but fun and creative. Welcome back!

That's a great idea and I can see where it would speed up straps as well as wider cuts. I would think that the wood channel in the base could be a problem with thinner leather. Like the leather would be pressed into the channel instead of lying on a flat surface. I have a paper cutter around here that works similarly and it's quicker than breaking out a square every time I need to cut paper.

That came out great. I've got a side of the Tandy Sabana leather that I am planning make into a bag after Christmas. Did you put feet on the bottom or is it flat? https://tandyleather.com/products/sabana-sides?_pos=1&_sid=4168d5fb5&_ss=r

A few years ago I started using vinegroon to make all of my strap handles black. It's a very forgiving, cheap, and fast procedure... Basically I can dump dozens of straps in a plastic bin with the 'groon and swish them around in it for a minute or so. Then lay them out for a few minutes on a flat surface. I see them turn dark black quickly and after a few minutes I rinse them en-masse in a water/baking-soda bin for a bit and finally rinse them in a bin with clear water. Start to finish in less than 15-minutes and I can do *lots* of straps at once. After they dry, buff a little and apply oil and you're good to go. The oiling takes much longer than the rest of the process since it is done with a dauber. Vinegroon may not be the best solution for this particular project but I recommend that you try it just to judge the range of possibilities.

I assume there's no hole on the flat side to accept a rivet?

Nah, since the formula is vinegar plus iron plus time, I'd say just keep it onhand. I keep a gallon of it brewing at all times in a big pickle jar. The longer it sits and ‘cooks’ the better. While it’s fermenting it will bubble off gasses, so don’t seal the lid of the jar tightly, rather, leave it covered loosely just to keep out large debris and bugs. Since it will smell like a festering bottle of vinegar, and looks nasty, you’re not gonna want this mixture in the house so hopefully you have a safe place away from your normal living area where it can sit. Every few months I'll feed it another handful of nails or steel wool to keep the chemistry going. I don't even worry about straining it anymore either. I just pour it in a plastic container for dipping or if it's going to be used as an edge treatment I just scoop a little pill bottle amount out to dip a small brush in.

The stitching and molding looks great! Is it designed to clip to a belt for easy on-off?

Apply oil after the 'grooning. I always have a gallon or so of the stuff cooked up in the corner of the shop and there's no faster way to make a bunch of small to midsize pieces black, in my opinion. I think that the smell is weaker with older vinegroon than new vinegroon. I haven't tested this hypothesis scientifically though, so I'd be interested in your thoughts after a few months of using it on various projects. Be careful when attaching metal rivets, d-rings, conchos, etc. to the 'grooned leather pieces as certain metals can corrode very rapidly from direct contact.

Wow, that's intense!

Thanks for sharing the video and pictures here. Looks great. I think that the square patch covering the outside of the magnetic fastener would have been a good place to incorporate one of the interior colors, though. Maybe a yellow tassel as well? Like a tease of what to expect when you open the purse.

The bungee idea is great. I assume you then trim flush and leave the bungee inside the handle?

Nice looking rig!

sooooo..... this is what I found when I searched the web for "woodpecker stamp".

Maybe try something like this. I experimented with a similar approach and was able to get a printed image transferred onto leather. You'd want to seal it real good afterwards with resolene or something similar but I think you might have some luck with this.

I apply 3 or 4 coats of shoe polish on the flesh side of veg tanned leather and then seal it with with liquid floor wax or Resolene to get white leather. I've made white top hats, straps, and other projects this way and it looks and holds up pretty well. The flesh side is typically the 'back' side of a piece since does not have the smooth finish on it that the grain side does. That smooth finish is what makes the grain side so difficult to apply an opaque finish to, because brush strokes are impossible to avoid (at least for me). Spraying a white acrylic paint on might work, but I still think there'd be adhesion issues and the white might flake off if the piece is flexed. The backside of the leather is more 'porous' and so the white has lots of teeny-tiny surfaces to adhere to. Give it a try on some scrap... shoe polish is cheap and it comes with a built-in applicator! .

Welcome to the group. Hope we get to see some pictures of some of your projects soon.

We went to our first Halloween party over the weekend and snapped a few pictures.

You may only need a few touches with a stylus to get a couple of dimples in the narrow area. I'd give something like that a try in a small area.

This works great for me... relatively cheap and easy to source at the big box stores. I only buy the unscented variety. https://www.lowes.com/pd/Holloway-House-64-oz-Floor-Polish/1000194489

Tandy has some free patterns for leather coats and jackets. The link below is for the men's coat but they have a few others for ladies coats. THere's probably some helpful information in there. https://www.leathercraftlibrary.com/product/1214/2665-mens-top-coat-pattern-size-38

That came out great. Did you put any feet or tabs on the bottom?

Fun post! Here's my Halloween projects. My wife will be the plague nurse in the white mask and hat. I'll be the plague doctor wearing black half-mask and hat. I'll follow up with some full costume poses after the weekend. The leather is all 6-7 ounce veg-tan from Tandy. I get the white by applying 3 or 4 coats of cheap white shoe polish to the flesh side and then sealing with liquid floor wax. The black on the skull bag was obtained with vinegroon. The black on the half-mask is Fiebings pro dye with floor wax finish.

Tandy sells something they call Tanner's Bond double sided tape and it works very well for me in many situations. It comes in a few different widths and is relatively inexpensive. Give it a try, you'll probably find sometime to like about it. https://tandyleather.com/products/2535-650-tanners-bond-adhesive-tape