Sheilajeanne

Canada's former PM could have used this when our current PM was a young'un! Have always LOVED this picture, because Trudeau looks so P.O.'d. The joys of fatherhood...LOL! (That's not Trudeau's wife off to his left, BTW, just an unidentified Parliament Hill employee.)

I just realized I still have that knife sheathe I made out of the old gun belt. I was probably 11 or 12 at the time, and aside from an old awl, had no tools but regular sewing needles and button thread. I also made the knife handle. The blade was a really nice Solingen steel blade from a hunting knife. The original handle on the knife was deer horn, and gave me wicked blisters when I tried to use it. So, I pressed two pieces of cedar together, and shaped the handle to fit my hand. I think a carpet tack was used to anchor the tang, and a piece of chamois leather was moistened and glued in place to wrap the hilt. The knife was my favourite knife for carving/whittling until some idiot left it sitting ontop of a red-hot woodstove on a camping trip. The wood didn't catch fire, but it was badly charred, and I stopped using the knife after that, for fear the handle would just fall apart on me. Believe me, I had some choice words for whoever left it on the stove, though the guilty party never 'fessed up! Ookay, let's remember to post the friggin' PICTURE this time! The leather thong I used to hold the knife in the sheathe has rotted over the years due to age. Maybe one of these days, I'll replace the handle, and maybe the sheathe as well, or at least redo the stitching, which has worn out in a couple of places from friction. This was my first ever effort at saddle stitching, and I think it didn't turn out too badly, given the lack of proper tools!

I don't really remember what my first project was. When I was in Gr. 7 and 8, I started taking archery lessons at my school. I made myself an arm guard and some finger tabs. I also found a rounder off a saddle at the local dude ranch, and that was my first effort at stamping leather. I stamped a four leaf clover onto it, using a jack knife, and home made tools, and used it for years as a coaster on my bedside table. It disappeared one day, and I suspect it fell into the wastebasket and got accidentally tossed out. I also took apart an old gun holster from a cap gun I had when I was a kid, and made a bracer and a knife sheath out of it. (I still have the six-shooter cap gun that came with the holster, though the catch on the loading mechanism got busted, and at some point, I sawed the barrel off so I could pretend it was a modern hand gun, and play 'secret agent' with it. Oh, and I made the holster into a shoulder rig... My parents tried to encourage my interest, but didn't really know how. When they bought me a piece of tie-dyed leather at Tandy's I had no books or tools to go with it, and had no idea what to do with it. Eventually, my interest in leather faded, but never completely died. Then, 2 1/2 years ago, I bought a beginner's kit at Tandy's. The idea was to learn to make leashes and collars to sell as part of my dog-boarding business. I took 8 weeks of free lessons and was hooked!

NOt knowing what a Brompton bike is, I had to Google it. They want $89 Canadian for that nylon bike handle. That is INSANE!!

I am also very jealous of your tool rack and its contents, Tim! I'm sure there's a few others here, too, who feel the same way, but haven't mentioned it!

I use Sunsilver on a couple of Tolkien/Lord of the Rings forums, and two dog forums. Sheilajeanne on most others, unless it's my real name, Jane F**** (Facebook mostly.) I was a moderator on a nursing forum, where I used Jay-Jay. The weird, weird stuff that went on on that forum!! One of the mods had her identity hacked, and another was stalked by a poster! I was VERY glad I kept my identity a secret, and never let out any personal information!

Are you talking about pockets with gussets? Like this belt bag I made? You have to take tucks in the front of the pocket to get the flap closure to fit properly.

Was just in Tandy's in Mississauga this past week, and they have a number of small gator hides on special right now, also a lot of snake. But OMG, it's EXPENSIVE! If you have to buy from them, best thing to do is show them you have a business license, and then you will get wholesale pricing.

I can get a 2 amp bench grinder from Home Depot or Home Hardware for as little as $70. Would have to check and see how hard it is to change the grinding wheels to a burnisher or sander, though! https://www.homedepot.ca/en/home/p.21-amp-6-in-grinder-with-led-lights.1000788068.html What size motor would you recommend? I am currently using my electric drill.

Very, very nice work! Did you put any sort of stiffener in the panels to keep the leather from bending?

You can see how the front of the bag is gathered into tucks to help it stay closed when it's on your belt. Of course, this is done after the bag is turned rightside out, which makes it easier to turn. You can also see the gussets sticking out on the left and right sides. The two new pieces would be the same size as the back and front of the bag, and would be sewn into the same seam as the gussets, and go the full depth of the bag.

Do you mean 'portfolio' as in something designed to carry documents, or 'portfolio' as in a line of products?

I'd like to add two more compartments to a belt bag, same design as the previous one I did. The bag is sewn flesh side out, then turned inside out once the sewing is done. It has 2 gussets in it, and what I would like to do is to add another layer of leather on each side of the gussets so the bag has 3 compartments instead of just one. The leather is quite soft and flexible (upholstery leather). If I do this, will it still be possible to turn the bag so the finished side is out once I've finished sewing? Here's the original bag with a picture of the inside.

Mutt, if we ever meet up, I'll be happy to share a lager with you! Seems we have similar taste. My favourite is Labatt's Blue, and when I'm in the States, I find Samuel Adams lager is pretty good, too. Edit: Alpha, can you count?? That's 7 letters!

Hey, just saw this on the Tandy website while browsing for something else! https://www.tandyleather.com/en/leathercraft-projects/Making-a-Leather-Tool-Roll-by-George-Hurst

Webicons, how thick is this stuff? I have managed to find a source for box board, but it's in England. I'd be paying about .75 cents per unit for the size of board I need, which is doable. Minimum order is 50 pcs., which is also not bad, since it takes 2 pieces to make one pad, and as I said, I also want to use it to make templates. Or maybe I'll just have to start eating more Cheerios...

Lovely work as always, Tim! Your wife is a lucky lady!

Okay, I have been wanting to try my hand at a padfolio. I took apart a really old plastic covered padfolio that was falling apart to see what weight of cardboard they used as a stiffener. Darn, that is some hefty carboard! It's about 2 mm. thick! I searched through the whole of Michael's (local hobby store chain) looking for something similar, and didn't find anything even close. The only alternative seems to be saving up Cheerio boxes, and gluing pieces together to get the necessary thickness. Anyone know a source of box board out there? I'd like to use it for making templates, too. Heh, the irony! When i was in my teens, I spent a summer making binders for Hilroy. Could have had alll the boxboard I ever wanted.... And just the right size, too!

Reminds me of when I used to work for a well -known nursery in Canada (Weall and Cullen) and a customer asked me if I could cut a foot off a 6' Christmas tree, and sell it to her for the same price as a 5' tree... She actually made me go and ask my manager if this were possible. Of course, the answer was a big, fat NO!

Another dog person here! My first leather working projects, other than Tandy kits, were some dog leashes and collars! My dogs are German shepherds, and we train for schutzhund.

I purchased a sewing machine recently, too. I drove down to Ohio, and picked up the CW 8B Seiko Ferg had for sale. One thing I'm finding out, though, as I enter the world of sewing machines, is you have to be careful not to get addicted. One person I talked to said they had around 30 machines in their basement. The guy who teaches the leather working course I attended this morning has 13. Oh, and he recently bought a clicker, too! I'm fortunate that I live in an old two-bedroom house with a basement that leaks sometimes, and very little extra space, which puts a curb on any addictions I might want to develop...

ROTLOL! I like the Tudor roses. That's going to be my next project! I think it would look great on either a wallet or a belt bag like the one I did recently with the Celtic horse design.

Very nice! Just curious to know how you cut the oval window? Did you have a die or punch of some sort?

Just a useful tip for you. Many patterns you get will be in PDF format. This makes it easy to adjust the size to fit the piece of leather you are using. Here's how to do it: Pattern must be in PDF form. If not, scan it and save as a PDF Click on pattern to open it Click printer icon Select ‘custom scale’ and enter percentage you wish to resize it to. To save on toner, select ‘save ink/toner’. Print pattern If size is what you want, select ‘save changes to PDF’ when closing document. I found this out when I had a pattern in .jpg format I needed to resize. No matter what changes I made to it, and what changes I made to my printer's programming, the printer would ALWAYS scale it back to the original size!

[fist bump back] BTW, I have Robert Hardy's book on The Longbow. I just checked it out on Amazon, and it is out of print, and a good used copy is selling for a minimum of $143.00 Canadian! Won't be parting with mine anytime soon... They had just discovered the longbows and arrows from the Mary Rose at the time it came out. What a marvelous time capsule that ship was!