Hello From Oklahoma

[ArtS]

Welcome! Looks like you're off to a great start!!

Art

[Becca4U]

Thank you all for the warm welcome. I really regret not taking more pictures of my work.

I did do one piece that I wish I had taken pics of, but it was just to difficult to do. I would like to share the story though.

My dad was a very, very gifted artist, however seldom kept his work. My mom did manage to save some of his stuff, but he would burn most of it. From sketches to oil paintings.

I always tried to draw, but my work was never up to his standard and I quit. As an adult I got into leatherwork and finally got his approval for my work. He asked me to make him something and I couldn't figure out what to make.

In 2006 he was diagnosed with colon cancer; his second battle with cancer. He put off treatment and he passed away on July 4th of 2007. I regretted not getting around to making him something.

During the funeral arragements my mom was flustrated trying to find an urn (he wanted to be creamated). They told us we could have the ashes in the little box that comes from the crematory. The director also told us that ashes could be interred in anything we wanted.

My mom then asked me if I would make a leather bag for the box. That dad would have liked that. Oh boy, I said yes, I would try. I had three days. Talk about a emotional mess. There is no way to convey how difficult this turned out to be.

I ended up making the bag out of a warm brown oiled chap leather I had and used the celtic cross pattern from Tandy. I tooled the piece on 4/5 oz leather and colored the cross in gold acrylic and did a back ground in hunter green. I added his initials over the cross and stitched it to the bag. It came out nice. A lot of tears and memories went into that piece.

I don't know if I can do another on such a time crunch, but other family memebers have asked me to make ones for them. My sis wants one now, and wants a strap added so she can use it as a purse. Not sure about that, sounds a bit creepy to me.

Anyway, just wanted to share.

[jawilliams]

Well hello Okie!! I moved about 5 years ago from OKC after being there 22years. Up here to Joplin. If you are close to the stockyards in OKC, you might go to bently gaffereds. They do leather work and some repair. JR is real helpful. I got to watch them in the back. Don't know if they are still there but it might be worth trying. Good luck.