Wow I Just Tallyed Up My Reciepts

[Guy W]

so i've been spending and buying stuff for the last couple weeks to get everything i need to start getting into the leather craft hobby and i just gave myself sticker shock! needless to say i could have bought 2 top end holsters for what i spent so far, and i haven't even finished making anything yet!!!!!

atleast i am having a good time, but don't tell the wife

[marine mp]

Well Guy...you sound like the piggy bank is-a-squelling right about now!!! I spent about 20 dollars to make my first 3 holsters. I bought a razor knife/craft blade, a piece of leather from the belt maker in town and bought a needle and thread from him also. At least you have the gear necessary. Don't complicate the process and have fun with it. I think sometimes we make it to hard. Semper-fi Mike

[Phatdaddy]

I still haven't done that...I do know however, the box that I was tucking my receipts into is too small now.

Oh well, you can't take it with you!

Kevin

[rdb]

At least she hasn't said, "Either that stuff on the kitchen table goes, or I do!"

Stick with it, and pay attention here on the Forum. Everything will work out.

[Lobo]

Assuming that you stick with it you will accumulate quite a lot of stuff. Some will prove to be useful, some things you will wonder what you were thinking when you bought them.

The next phase will be one you are sure to enjoy, with things that you were sure to be great ideas ending up as chew toys for the dogs and play things for the kids.

Then you will make something that you are genuinely proud of, show it to a few friends, and find yourself making things for others. Pretty soon you will get real tired of things like hand-stitching and start looking at machines. At some point in time your wife will put her foot down firmly and you'll be forced to move everything somewhere that doesn't annoy her constantly.

That's how things went for me. Now I have a regular production shop and ship out 1200 to 1500 items per year for customers in all 50 states and 16 other countries (so far). Couple of hours per day tending to the website and dealing with questions and orders, 3 to 5 hours per day doing production work, couple of hours per day at my club playing cards and having a few beers, couple of hours per month doing the books and taking care of the taxes. It's a rough life. Some days it is all I can do to struggle over to the club and order another beer.

Have fun. Don't worry too much about a few bucks here and there. Buy quality tools and equipment that will be with you for the long haul. Buy quality materials that make your efforts worthwhile.

Best regards.

[wizard of tragacanth]

Lobo, that's a great post... puts it all in a nutshell.

I was a little peeved that I had purchased two different leather destroyers... I mean, skivers... and now I don't use either one of them. I found a drum sander works much better for me. I guess everyone ends up with stuff that they don't need. I feel a little better knowing that I am not the only one.

Nick

[Huntbuck]

Lobo,

Inspirational, have moved to the basement, wife is suggesting I do some carpentry work to get a proper shop, kind of at a break even point now... years yet to go to get to the point you are at, but hoping to make it some day.... and the path you described is spot on so far...

[JoelR]

+ 1 to what Lobo said - as to where I am at in his description. The hardest part is not cheeping out out on the tools. Bought my first Barry King edger and can't figure why I bothered with the Tandy ones for the last year-and-a-half. The sewing machine was a hard pill to swallow (for my wife) and I am currently secluded in the corner of the laundry room waiting for some breathing room on orders so I can clean out the garage and turn it into a shop

[Blackey Cole]

I hate to think what I have spent in the last decade for tools alone. Plus the books and patterns that I have gotten I don't think of the expendables because I usually find a way yo make most of them pay for themselves somehow.