Custom Lapel Pins

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I was on a duck hunt with my best friend on a chilly, sunny eastern Idaho morning. He brought his one-year-old red lab, Blue, on his first duck hunt. Blue wasn’t new to gunfire; he had already experienced plenty of driven shooting, but this was his first time chasing ducks. He was steady, confident, and ready to work.  

That morning, a mallard drake came in clean. My buddy took the shot and dropped it. Blue didn’t hesitate. He marked it, went straight out, and brought that bird back like he’d been doing it his whole life. Watching a young dog perform so well, especially on his first duck hunt, is a memory you don’t forget.  

Later, we were standing at the tailgate of his early-2000s Silverado, cleaning birds, talking through the hunt, and already planning for next time. I kept looking at that drake, with its green head and curled tail feathers. It was too good not to remember.  

So, I pulled a few feathers and tucked them in my pocket.  

When I got home, I kept thinking about that morning, my best friend, his dog, and that first retrieve. I wanted to hold onto it somehow. So, I decided to use those feathers as inspiration to create a handcrafted accessory: a mallard drake lapel pin.  

That was the first custom piece I made with a personal story behind it.  

When I gave it to him later, it wasn’t just a pin; it was a symbol of Blue’s first duck hunt. It represented that unforgettable retrieve, us sitting on the back of his truck in Idaho, and it was a memory you could carry with you.  

That’s where this journey began—not in a shop and not at a desk, but in a field with a good friend and a good dog, leading to unique decorative pins that hold special stories.