Best friends make bird feeders as gifts for building fund
By Barbara Gartman
Monitor Staff Writer
GUN BARREL CITY–Two friends, Del Byford and Pat Sharp, have found a way to be both creative and generous.
“We couldn’t afford birthday and Christmas gifts so about five years ago we started making feeders and bird houses as gifts,” Sharp said.
Now they are very busy completing bird houses and feeders to be used in “October Fest” set for Saturday, Oct. 29, at the Cedar Creek Church of God, Gun Barrel City.
Visitors to the July Fest (July 2) in Gun Barrel City got a good look at several styles of birdhouses they have made. 

Monitor Photo/Barbara Gartman
Pat Sharp (left) and Del Byford show off a Dallas Cowboy bird house they made, complete with a Cowboy helmet and a lone star on the white and blue back ground.

“We are doing this for our (church) building fund,” Sharp said, explaining the church’s plan to expand at its present location.
In addition to giving the items to the church, they also donate to Special Olympics.
“We love doing this,” Sharp said.
“Del does most of the birdhouses in state outlines and then he cuts out a small state bird and puts it on the house,” she said.
Sharp paints the state bird and the state flower, giving them beautiful, realistic coloring.
So far, they have made bird houses for 16 of the 50 states, including: Texas and Oklahoma, of course, Arkansas, Maine, Ohio, Illinois, Tennessee, Louisiana, Indiana, Alabama, North and South Carolina, Nebraska, Colorado and New Mexico.
“This is something we can do to help with our share of the donations,” Sharp adds.
Then showing her spirit and sense of humor, she laughs at her next comment.
“This is not really a business, it’s a way for me and Delbert to stay busy and keep off the streets.”
“However, we do sell them to individuals where we can. We usually earn just enough to buy more wood and supplies,” she added on a more serious note.
The couple are best friends and companions and they each have a serious problem that has put them both in wheel chairs.
But neither Sharp nor Byford lets their situation affect their ability to love God and to be productive.
Both face crippling ailments that they refuse to give in to.
Byford has Multiple Sclerosis. He was diagnosed with the disease in 1971.
“Before the disease put me in a wheel chair I was able to do a lot of things,” he said.
Then as the problem wore on he was unable to do things the way he used to.
“Then I found out I could do things like the cutting and shaping. I really do enjoy it,” Byford explained.
Sharp has an inherited condition from birth called CMT.
CMT, or Charcot-Marie- Tooth disease, is a neurological disorder, named after the three physicians who first described it in 1886.
CMT is not caused by anything a person does and it isn’t contagious.
CMT usually isn’t life threatening and it almost never affects the brain.
But it does cause damage to the peripheral nerves and neuropathy, muscle weakness and wasting, including some loss of sensation, mostly in the extremities of the body such as the hands and feet.
Although her hands are twisted into permanent fists, Sharp is the one who does the painting and a lot of it is very intricate work, as she details in the feathers, beaks and eyes of the state birds.
Sharp and Byford enjoy the company of neighbors and friends who often come over just to enjoy watching them work.
Nils Peterson is just such a friend. And his wife, Candy, likes to crochet and make gifts too.
Byford has three grown sons.
Sharp’s son, Todd, and his wife, Kim, own Sharp Construction. Her younger son, David, is the manager.