tashabear

It does, thank you!

What's the difference between these two dyes? Is one more stable, less likely to crock, more fade-resistant?

I bet he uses French clip barrettes -- I prefer them to the ones with sticks. Stick barrettes only stay in my hair if I'm putting it up. The French clips (which can be glued as well as riveted) stay in no matter what.

All elastic stretches sideways. It just depends on which way you turn it. I don't mean to be a smart ass, but I'm not sure what you want your elastic to look like. Do you mean like 1" wide elastic that stretches along the width, instead of the length?

Diet Coke. I can't drink alcohol too late at night. I have sleep apnea, so I have a hard enough time breathing when I sleep; I don't need booze suppressing my respiration even further. (I'm not supposed to be drinking caffeine at night, either, but we won't tell the respiratory therapist and dietitian that, will we?)

I love the "grunge" look of the black on the yellow leather -- how'd you do that?

I don't think so... but I'm not the one who made it. I can only stand in awe.

It's a strap that hooks to the post, wraps around the butt of the knife, and hooks to the post again. I think it was tucked under the sheath in the first pic.

It's beautiful, but I'm left wondering why you didn't do the front edge of the flap?

It's used for very delicate sugar flowers. (My mom does wedding cakes.)

Wow, thank you! I need to find my Dover books; I know I have some good ones for leatherwork. I signed up for the sampler email too.

Can't you glue it? What are you trying to do?

Check with your webhost; there might be a code you can put in place to defeat photo theft/hotlinking.

You can either use a lower quality setting on your camera, or learn how to resize them and change the pixels per inch (ppi). My camera only does 180 ppi, but you only need 72 for posting to the web, or 300 if you want to print them out. I change the resolution and dimensions of the photo in Photoshop Elements (~$100). One caveat: never, but NEVER change the aspect ratio. Do not force the picture to fit a particular size (if it's 5x7, leave it 5x7; don't try to make 6x4). That's how you get distortion -- tall, abnormally skinny or really short squatty people.

WOW that was an intense day and a half! Jim is just an amazing leatherworker and a super nice guy. The class was incredibly challenging for me, but he never once made me feel like it was something I couldn't do. It was also great to meet the other students -- I hope we'll see each other again in other classes.

This. Even if you're not making a proper corset, in order to make it a nicely fitting vest sort of thing, there need to be curved vertical seams along the bust and down the back. I know that sexy isn't the objective, but pretty certainly can be, and pretty doesn't happen when they're wearing sacks. Were there no females around that could help with the fitting for these girls? Even each other? The reason why I wanted to shut up is because I can be a blunt instrument sometimes, and I didn't want to come across all "UR DOING IT RONG", when you're trying to do something nice for the girls. I often have to ruthlessly suppress my authenticity wonk self when trying to help people who just want to make cute costumes, and it's really hard.

I'm not selling (yet), though... you might be waiting a while.

I understand what you're saying, but there is a difference between "tight-fitting" and "well-fitting". The duct tape would have given you a well-fitting garment, if you made the pattern with enough ease. To each their own; I'll shut up now.

I Googled "flat nylon cord" and found this: http://www.therainshed.com/webbing_and_cord.htm

I hate to say it, but you're not going to get anything close to that shape out of your leather pieces by fitting the girl so loosely and using paper. That's a corset, and they're *not* easy. The best way to make a custom pattern for a shaped garment like that is with a duct tape fitting: http://www.thedragonsrobes.com/taping.html Also, before you cut the leather, do a mock-up of the pattern in some non-stretchy material. That way you won't waste the leather, but you can work out issues with shaping the pattern pieces. Also, you're going to need to bone it. There won't be any support with just suede -- it will buckle and fold and not have that lovely smooth line.

Dude. Wait... what? How did I never know about this? I grew up in Harvard! I've driven by this place uncounted times... Good to know. Now I can stock up on leather, yarn, and ice cream, all in one trip. I blame you for my impending bankruptcy.

A spinner is someone who spins. Say, for example, me. I'd be happy to help you out if I lived in the same time zone. Wool roving is what spinners use to make yarn; it looks more or less like this: You can buy it online, but since you don't care about color, you might have some luck with contacting Lynn's Texas Fiber and asking if she has any cheap fiber or dye experiments gone bad that she can sell you. Explain what you want to make, and she might be able to hook you up. As for how to go about making them, there are instructions here: http://www.woolcrafting.com/wool-felt-insoles.html What they don't tell you is that you don't have to wear socks in the shoes after you've put in the insoles. I mean, you can if you want, but you won't need to. Eventually they will conform to your foot and be incredibly comfortable.

It breathes -- trust me -- try it.

Curious, because this is my area of interest when it comes to re-enactment. Please know that I'm not trying to nit-pick... but do you have documentation for this hat made out of leather? I've only ever seen it made out of wool, and it's be interesting to expand one's scope.

Then skip the Dr. Scholl's and make yourself insoles with wool felt*. I have them in my Jorvik boots and they're SO comfortable. *NOT the crap felt from craft stores -- get some wool roving from a spinner and make a thick sheet of felt, then cut it to shape.