Sheilajeanne

I figured out why. Alliston and Area Buy and Sell is a private group. You have to become a member to see what's posted: https://www.facebook.com/groups/266954616689963 Will copy and paste: Details Condition Used - Good I have 3 foot by 4 foot, 1 inch thick piece of black granite that was used as a base for a wood stove. No chips or damage that I can see. It's extremely heavy. 2 people cannot lift it. If you can get it out of my house you can have it for free. Priority to quickest pick up. Need gone asap. Located in Innisfil, Mapleview and 25th sideroad area.

I saw this on my local FB page, and immediately thought hey, this would be great for leather working. If you can find someone to cut it into smaller pieces, it could make several people happy! It's 3 x 4 ft x 1 inch thick. Located in Innisfil, Ontario, which is close to Barrie. https://www.facebook.com/commerce/listing/1199388950811339/?ref=share_attachment

Saw the most interesting thing yesterday. I was at a meeting, and saw there was a bird's nest just outside the window. I could see mama bird's tail, but not enough to know what sort of bird. So, after the meeting, I went outside to take a look. It was a mourning dove, and she'd built her nest on top of an old robin's nest! No, she didn't re-use the robin's nest, just put a bunch of twigs on top of it! Mourning dove nests are the most ridiculous looking things. You wonder how the babies don't all fall out and wind up on the ground! They just make a pile of twigs on a branch somewhere, usually in an evergreen tree. This bird was lucky to have a nice solid base for her nest.

In Canada, we call the 'prairie roses' or wild roses. They are the provincial flower of Alberta. The slogan on Alberta's license plates is "Wild Rose Country'. They have a lovely scent, don't they?

jnottage, thank you for chiming in, and welcome to the forum! Handstitched is indeed lucky to have purchased this piece of western heritage which you authored! Always interesting to learn about the history of our craft!

Wow, now I just learned something new! What I've done previously is wetted a scrap of the mystery leather, and tried to stamp or tool it. If it won't stamp or tool, it's obviously NOT veg-tan. And yes, rotary knives work great for thin, stretchy leather. But just like with a regular blade, you have to make sure the blade is SHARP!

I downloaded fonts from the net, then trace them. I also have several different sizes and styles of letter stamps. I've freehanded letters sometimes, too. It's not that hard. There are also Tandy alphabet Craftaids out there, though I'm not sure if they are still being produced:

Nice work! And when I saw this topic header, my first reaction was: "Wait- Dwight QUIT leatherwork for awhile? WHEN??"

Okay, I've figured it out! If you click on the header for a particular forum, a box pops up on the left side of the screen that says 'follow' Click on the box if you want notifications from that particular forum. In my account settings, I've selected that I don't wish to receive notifications at all. I prefer to read the forums in person. But, for some reason, I selected that I wanted notifications from the 'Critique My Work' forum, which is why I got the post about the Hobo bag! And doing that overrides the 'no notification setting! Fine tune your account settings, and you can eliminate all the posts you don't want to see from your e-mail!

I think because the political threads were originally in the 'Off Topic' forum, they are open to everyone. They got moved to the Adults Only forum when some of the threads got nasty, and there were complaints. I don't remember how I did it, but I have managed to turn off notifications for that forum. I still get notifications for the other threads/forums, but not for every single post that's made. It's weird - I don't really understand how the notifications work. Usually it's only for threads I've posted in (subscribed) to. But yesterday, I got a post about the Hobo bag Bert had made. And, of course, that was a brand new thread. Maybe if the Admin. would make all areas of the 'Adult' forum truly 'subscription only' we could eliminate all the complaints. I certainly agree the forum has gone downhill, and something needs to change. There is SO much valuable information here! If I have a question or problem with leatherwork, the first thing I do is search this site. If that doesn't work, I make a post of my own in the relevant section, and nearly always, SOMEONE is able to answer my question!

Squid, the 50's was a LOOONG time ago, and as I'm sure you know, a lot of stuff that was okay then isn't okay now. And I believe we're better off for it! Derogatory racist and sexist remarks are (or should be) a thing of the past. (Not that I'm seeing those in OT. It's more things like Libertard, DemoRat, etc.) And they sure aren't saying them with a smile!

Agree with Chuck! (Gee, that's TWICE in a row now - will wonders never cease! ) In street gangs, dissing someone - even in a much less disrespectful way than has been done on certain threads in OT - WILL get you killed! Nice adult discourse, huh? That comment would have gotten Doc BANNED from a lot of the forums I've been on. It certainly would have been deleted.

Agree with Chuck that this probably should go in another forum, either the Administration forum or the Feedback forum.

Edit: I have put a few people on 'ignore' but have found the same problem as Squilchuk. When they are posting about leather rather than politics, I would still like to read some of their posts.

Any other forums I've been on have eventually either banned ALL politics-related posts, or had to appoint moderators to keep the conversation civil. Some of the personal insults I've read in the OT forum recently are really over the top. Yup, and a few were directed at me. It should be a rule that it's okay to tell someone you disagree with them, but calling them names because of it IS NOT. Either that, or get rid of the OT forum completely. It's almost totally dominated by a few people with very conservative viewpoints, and most of them don't tolerate any other viewpoint, and bully and insult anyone with an opinion different from their own until they leave. Why do I bother with the forum? Well, I hate to see the discussion so completely dominated by people who are just patting each other on the back and agreeing with each other. There ARE other voices out there that you should listen to, even if you don't agree. TOLERANCE, people, it's called tolerance. That's what makes a civil society work.

Well that just shows you you can't trust everything you read on the internet! Several articles that popped up from my search said it was just fine to use it on fiberglass. Anyway, if he deglazes the leather CAREFULLY, just getting the surface of the leather damp, I think it should work. But stripping the leather off would be my first choice, too, though I'd want to check with the bowyer first to make sure those cord wrappings are just holding the leather in place, and aren't part of the structure of the bow.

The bow is fiberglass. The leather should not be structural, but just decoration, or to provide a better hand grip. Okay, it MIGHT play a role in dampening vibration when you loose the string. If that's the case - and I've been involved with archery for a long, long time, and have seen many bows, so I think I'm right - there is NO reason you should not be able to remove it and replace it with something dyed another colour. It looks like it's just laced onto the bow, so removing it should be simple. If it turns out to be difficult to remove, because it's glued to the bow, you could try deglazing it first, then dyeing. The primary ingredient in deglazer is acetone, and it will not harm fiberglass. It's actually used to remove stains from fiberglass. My one concern would be a reaction between the fiberglass and whatever glue they'd used on the leather, but if you just wipe it on lightly with a rag, then let it dry, I think you will be good! I have never seen a bow that looks just like that. Very interesting design! Where was it made? And what are you planning to do with it? What's the draw weight?

Hmmm...okay, I have no way of knowing just how old these stamps are, as I bought them from a pawn shop. Given there were quite a number of older Tandy stamps in the lot, they could easily date back that far. Have never bought new stamps from Ivan.

Like I said, Fred, Ivan now makes stamps Tandy has discontinued, like acorns and holly leaves. But - good question. Maybe there is some connection. If not, Ivan is definitely trying to compete with Tandy.

I bought a large lot of stamps from a pawn shop a couple of years ago. Many of the tools were Ivan, and included stamps that Tandy used to make, but stopped producing a number of years ago. They are definitely not top-notch tools, but the do at least as good a job as most of the Tandy stamps.

I feel for you! Although the elderly lady who owned the house before me apparently had things well organized, all the many, many shelves were stuffed with craft materials of various sorts. It was quite a job for her children to get the house ready for sale. And it's made me think twice about buying more stuff, as I'm no spring chicken any longer.

And THIS is what my leather craft area looked like BEFORE I moved into this house! (Yeah, I know, I posted another view of this earlier, but this gives a better view of how I stored things.) There was a closet to the right of what you see in the photo where I stored dyes, glues etc. plus projects (kits) I was planning to work on, and also a cupboard in the kitchen where I stored large rolls of hide which wouldn't fit in the closet. The plastic drawers contain small things like rivets, snaps, letter sets, lace, thread, tracing paper, brushes and swabs, patterns, buttons, etc. The wooden things under the bench are Ikea shelves I never got around to finding a use for when I moved into the house. The room was an addition to the house, had patio doors at the far end, and got damn cold in the winter, thus the electric heater to the left of my chair.

This house was an estate sale. The old lady who lived here before me was into crafts in a really big way. She had three or four sewing machines, and what is now my craft room was her sewing room. Two 15 foot long counters ran along each side of the room. She had a kiln out in the laundry room where she did pottery. She also did stained glass and made lawn ornaments out of metal and ceramic. There were shelves EVERYWHERE in both the basement and the laundry room. I heard her children filled at least two dumpsters with all the stuff she'd accumulated over the years when they were preparing the house for sale. I never got to see what they threw out, but I'm sure a lot of it was good stuff from her crafts that they just couldn't find a home for locally. She was a widow and lived alone unless her family was visiting, so there was no one to complain about all her craft stuff. Wish I'd had a chance to see it before she died! Here's the board over her sewing area where she kept her scissors and spools of thread. I already took down the shelves that were to the left of the board.

Too funny Fred!

Good luck with that!