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My dog has severe allergies and coughs and sneezes every time we take her for walks. So she is on baby Claritin - prescribed by her vet - which really helps - not 100% but quite a bit. We ran out of Claritin 2 days ago and missed a dose. The allergies of course promptly returned. She also stopped eating - a worry that occurs periodically. Now I realized she goes off her food when her allergies act up because she gets a stuffy nose and cannot smell anything. With such a sensitive sense of smell, that must be awful! Anyway she got her Claritin dose and I led her to her food - milk first. She looked so delighted to be able to smell it again and had her meal - a relief. Just thought I would put this up here in case anyone else has pets with a similar problem.

@fredk charming song, morbid theme notwithstanding - googled it as I could not catch the words - lovely accent though. @dikman, there is a mention that it needs constant kneading because otherwise the rosin will form crystals in the wax. So would not pouring it into molds allow crystallization as well?

To do what @@chuck123wapati says, you get straight line punches as well, which do the same and they are not expensive. You should get them on Amazon.

Who Indeed. So you can use either for making hand wax? I was looking it up - it appears their methods of production are different as well - that is when they are sold packaged. If you don't collect your own...which I can't , and need to buy it, is resin better or rosin, to make hand wax?

Are resin and rosin two names for the same thing or are they different things entirely?

@fredk LOL sounds familiar. I have made my reputation by losing a huge role of paper. I keep all small thingamabobs below 1-2 inches in size in one box - of which hubby knows the location. So things are getting lost less often. @TomE I have to try that!

Found a nifty little tool on Temu recently, for waxing thread as you use it. No idea how it will work for those of you working on larger projects, but for me, with my small projects, it works fine. You get it with white and yellow wax and cost me less than a $1.5. Making those little discs of wax should be simple for those who want their own mix in there. I though the container is useful.

Thank you @fredk. No hurry. This should be fun, not a chore.

After all the fuss so many make about mineral oils being bad for leather, in my experiment at least, ,up to this point, mineral oil seems to have the best effect on leathers. Good. It's cheap, no odor, non-poisonous and abundantly available. I will continue this experiment but will certainly use it in my leather preparations without needing to wonder about its safety or efficacy any more.

Not forgotten! Sunday today and decided to take a break from gift making. Two and a half months on, here are I am, with a photograph of the effects of the oils. I used mineral oil, mink oil, coconut oil and neatsfoot oil. These are my observations for today: Mineral oil kept the leather the softest. The leather has a smooth feel throughout, and is not warped, except for the piece left outside which is very slightly curved at the edges but still feels smooth and supple. Coconut oil kept the leather nearly as soft and smooth as mineral oil. It darkened the most of all the oils, although this is not very clear in the photograph. Also, no smell at all. Mink oil dried the most and caused the most warping in all locations. It also darkened the least in all locations. Neatsfoot oil fell somewhere in between, dried but not as much as mink oil, darkened but not as much as coconut oil. Controls: As expected, they dried a little over time, drying more outside and in the car than inside or in the garage. Also curved at the edges as they got a little dry. Regardless of the oil, the pieces kept outside darkened significantly, including the control; the coconut oil darkening the most; mink oil darkened the least. So oiling is not needed to darken leather when kept in the sun but without oils, leather darkens only slightly. with oils, it darkens to a deep, rich color, even without dyes. I do not plan to re-oil the leather as yet. I keep planning to add more oils to test but hate the thought of a bigger grid, more conclusions to work towards. Just being lazy I guess.

@fredk I suspect some of the people here are truly perplexed about his stubbornness in the face of so many good experiences and proof with M&G and his refusal to even consider it while others just enjoy needling him a bit.

That is beautiful. Such beautiful stamping! It is very unusual, your pattern. Lovely piece of work.

The basket weave is stunning and eye-catching. I feel that if you had used a thinner thread, it would have appeared unbalanced. I think unconsciously you used the correct thickness. Your stitching is neat and even too, so it complements the stamping well.

@Wepster I once dropped half a litre of oil on a new dress! Covered it in talcum powder, and added fresh lot several times as it got saturated. The dress was clean in 2 days! I had completely forgotten until you mentioned it here. @fredk thank you for mentioning talcum powder here. Now I can get it and keep it ready for so many uses, including giving a matte finish to leather. So no Baby powder - pure talc is probably better - via the ubiquitous Amazon.

@DocReaperNo offense taken. We all have our own opinions. The second part, I agree, which I why I said what I did. In spite of voting blue! imagine!

@fredk Thank you. I will look for that.

Hey @DocReaper I vote blue! why am I being offended here? Hmm? But the rest, the issue @jasonsmith is more that there is no need to be rude. Everyone here has their own way of doing things and disagree every so often. We communicate in a friendly, polite way, not like recalcitrant teenagers. You don't have to do what people suggest here but you don't have to knock the suggestions down the way you did. Most of the people here have decades of experience. I am a newbie too and respect that experience. You should try that sometime. Back to the topic, @fredk what talc do you use? Any plain talcum powder? Like baby powder?

@AWORKOFMARC Springfield leather is a store that sells sections of leather by the foot. You can call and ask them about the type best suited for your purpose and order it as well. I have always found their products to be good.

@Bert03241 LOL. With all the scraps we accumulate, who would not want a leather, the scraps of which we can throw into a pot for dinner?

@Nicbards Thank you. Those are very clear pics and your explanations is as well. I need to put up my pics of the leathers treated with diff oils, kept in different locations and conditions. Been very busy with Diwali and now, Thanksgiving, Black Friday and Christmas around the corner! Will try to do so soon.

@Klara And people in the third world countries go on breeding like rabbits - I can say that, as I come from one, before anyone says it is politically inappropriate. I used to be astonished at families with 13 and 15 children - one mother! Those poor women! They don't bother reading any such material, too busy either breeding or trying to feed the mouths thus created! Chrome tanned - veg tanning may use fish oils.... horrors! @Handstitched yep always vegans being eaten - that veg diet makes them more juicy and succulent, I guess. Do you think all human vegans will be too, in case cannibalism comes in after an 'apocalypse'? I mean, we are all animals aren't we? Or is that thinking politically incorrect as well? Early morning me is a bit more blunt. sorry.

@Nicbards Umm. I think I will leave the making of cod liver oil to someone else. As it is, it smells strong. This process sounds stinkier(is there such a word?). If you could see your way to putting up information on your cod liver oil treated leathers periodically, that would be nice. I am a little leery of using it, because of the smell.

Back to the original topic of this thread - mycelium leather. The more I read about it, the more interesting it sounds, as long as they completely kill the cultures. It is even supposed to smell like leather - a big plus for me because I hate the plasticky smell of PU and some 'high-end' beautiful, plasticky leathers. I am perfectly willing to discard a bag - bio-degradable after all - rather than have it come alive and heal itself. Something icky about the idea of a fungus being made to come alive in this way. But that's just me.

My great grand-mother used to say that each time there is an excess load on earth, nature auto-corrects with natural disasters and pandemics until balance is restored. Seems to be the path we are on now, whatever the rhetoric. Maybe we should all remember the wisdom of our ancestors. Nature always auto-corrects - and we are just another animal, never mind our arrogance in thinking we are special. We are not and are as dispensable as the dinosaurs.

@327fed Hmm, scientist myself. I doubt that it is balderdash. Far too much evidence for it to be so. Global warming does not mean that it suddenly becomes very hot. It is a far more complex issue. Looking at isolated bits will not give the whole picture. As I said earlier, rather than the fact that changes are happening, it is the speed at which it is happening that is of concern. But then, people have always been resistant to change and new ideas. This thread, after all, started with mycelium leather and here we are, discussing climate change - in both subjects, many not really wanting to accept new ideas. Mycelium leather might become very popular or perish as some fad and it will not affect us much. Global warming denial however, can have far reaching consequences.