Lisa Sorrell, cowboy boot maker

The heel heights match! (This is a good thing.)

Has anyone realized yet that I’m actually making two pairs of boots that are almost exactly alike?

These funny little lumps are hand wax for waxing inseaming threads. They make the thread very sticky so each stitch will hold. Making hand wax is a messy job and I am VERY happy to say that I’ve found a source for quality hand wax and I’m now selling it.

Sorrell Notions and Findings/hand wax

I put the finishing touches on this pair today. Introducing: “Cherokee Fiddle” in black and white.

I’ve been doing more traveling than boot making for the past several days, and I leave this afternoon for the Boot and Saddlemakers Roundup in Wichita Falls, Texas. Here’s a link to my September newsletter with pictures from my trip to France.

I’m in Firminy, France right now for a leather show. I’m with my friend Carina, and today we took a sightseeing drive up a mountain. The class I’m teaching begins tomorrow morning.

Here’s the link to my “It’s a Boot Life” video for September.

“It’s a Boot Life”https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6l12Q0_EfY

I’m glueing in a piece called the ball filler to bring everything up to level. Then I can lace in the steel shank. The best way I’ve found to apply the water-based contact cement is to use a squirt bottle and then spread the glue with the blade brush.

The blade brush doesn’t hold much glue so if you’re dipping glue with it, it takes LOTS of dipping. I don’t have all day so this method works better.

Goal: Inseam both boots by 6pm
Finished: 5:57pm

This morning was all about shaping and finishing the toes on these boots. This afternoon I plan to inseam one pair. I forced myself to make all of my waxed threads yesterday (there was much whining, sighing, and complaining) and that means I’m ready to start inseaming.

I’ve been searching for my missing heel pry tool for days. This morning I came into the shop and found it lying in the middle of my work bench. One of my mentors told me that when you search everywhere for a tool and then find it right out in the open where you already looked, it was taken by an old dead boot maker. They borrow your tools and put them back when you’re not looking.