Decorated Sunglasses

With the new baby at home, I wanted to try branching out into glittering other (smaller) things besides shoes, so I started doing some sunglasses this year.

Like Nyx purses or Muses shoes, the Krewe of Iris throws hand-decorated sunglasses. According to this article, Iris chose sunglasses in honor of the fact that they've never had to cancel their parade due to inclement weather, which is especially impressive considering the Krewe's existed since 1917.

I love the idea of working on something wearable - the challenges for sunglasses as a "canvas" are totally different and I've been having so much fun with that. The online community for Iris sunglasses decorators isn't as big as Nyx or Muses (yet), but you can find a few examples on Instagram, Facebook, etc. My Pinterest research page (limited though it may be) is here.

In my first go I made these four pairs:

Purple and gold butterfly sunglasses with aurora borealis rhinestones:

Purple jeweled sunglasses:

Rainbow sequined heart sunglasses:

And, my favorite, teal peacock sunglasses:

I modified my shoe glittering technique to be better suited to sunglasses (I'm still working it out, but getting pretty happy with it now that I've done a few pairs). I wanted to use a lot of purple (to invoke iris blossoms) and rainbows (because Iris is the personification of the rainbow in Greek mythology). I was inspired by this pair of DIY turkey sunglasses, but thought I'd do it as a peacock (Iris' favorite bird) instead. I made the little peacock body with foam, glitter and little crystal rhinestone eyes.

I put the writing ("2015," "Hail, Iris" and "Krewe of Iris") on the sides of the glasses:

Here is my gorgeous sister modeling them:

Pretty good start, looking forward to making more!

Twelfth Night - Happy Carnival!

If you attended the 12th Night Muses Brew launch event, you may have seen some of my shoes being auctioned to raise money for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, where I work. Twelfth Night (Jan. 6th) just so happens to be Danny Thomas' birthday, so it's a nice little coincidence.

The three that were auctioned were:

1) The Lucky Dog Cart Shoe (blog post here):

The wheels really roll!


2) The Fried Shrimp Poboy Flip Flop (blog post here):

3) Ice Cream Sundae Shoe:

This is the only picture I have of this one, but it's a lot like a sno-ball heeled shoe, except with a two scoop ice cream sundae including chocolate sauce, caramel sauce, whipped cream, sprinkles and a cherry on top. The ice cream scoops are foam balls, the whipped cream swirl on top is silicone caulk, the sprinkles are multi-colored bugle beads. The shoe and cup are silver and aqua-marine with aurora borealis rhinestones scattered over the cup and along the foot strap.

Links to articles on the Muses Brew:
http://www.nola.com/mardigras/index.ssf/2015/01/sampling_the_krewe_of_muses_ma.html
http://www.nola.com/mardigras/index.ssf/2014/12/nola_brewing_teams_up_with_kre.html
http://wgno.com/2015/01/06/the-krewe-of-muses-nola-brewing-co-create-new-beer/

I couldn't attend the event, but I hear the auction of these three raised a little over $500 for St. Jude Children's Research Hospital, which is a great birthday present!! I also expect a few new visitors are here because of the auction, and if so - welcome!! Let me know if you have any questions and please share your shoes here or over on Pinterest....I love seeing other people's shoes!!

HAPPY CARNIVAL!!

Mr. Okra Shoe

Reference images:
http://10cities10years.files.wordpress.com/2013/02/mr-okra.jpg
http://handbook.neighborland.com/?attachment_id=554
http://www.gonola.com/images/IMG_1008.jpg

After putting the Lucky Dog cart shoe on wheels, I was thinking of other iconic NOLA vehicles and got the idea to do a Mr. Okra shoe. The truck is so beautiful and distinctive, I don't know why it took me this long to think to make a Muses shoe version of it! Again, my apologies for sparse notes and blurry pictures.

The shoe is primarily Tulip red with lots of little applique transfers of fruits and veggies and some lettering (FRESH GRAPES, OKRA and PLUMS on the heel, BE NICE OR LEAVE on the front). The two-tone yellow and green "Mr. Okra" on one side and "Muses" in the same font on the other.

The wheels are wooden craft wheels from Michael's, with silver-glittered Abita bottle caps as hubcaps. The wheels are on axels mounted in wee cable clips, so they actually roll. Red sequin trim along the top edge, silver along the bottom.

Finally I made a ton of glittery produce to load up the shoe with: granny smith apples, golden pears, red apples, heads of lettuce, tangerines and grapes. I hot glued them into the interior of the shoe in piles.

Jingle, jangle, jingle... here comes Mr. Bingle!

With a message from Kris Kringle!

No time to post details/specs, but here are pictures of my 2015 Mr. Bingle Shoe, just in time for the Holiday season!

(Sorry the pictures aren't better, it's tough to hold the phone steady with an infant in one arm)

2015 Blush and Bashful Steel Magnolias Shoe

Every year, I like to do a Steel Magnolias themed shoe. Last year and the year before, it was the 25th Anniversary of the film and the stage version, respectively so I did pink shoes with silver accents (because it would've been Shelby and Jackson's silver anniversary).

My 2014 Steel Magnolias shoe is here
My 2013 Steel Magnolias shoe is here

This year, I once again did a pink and pink (I mean..."blush and bashful") color scheme, but I went with gold accents and I did a spin on Shelby's bouquet. Stylistically, it's a little modern for a late '80s bride, but I like to think Steel Magnolias is timeless and that this is the bouquet Shelby would pick out if she was getting married tomorrow or, at the very least, a Muses shoe she'd be pleased to catch in February.

The interior of the shoe is Recollections "champagne." The heel/sole of the shoe are Martha Stewart "copper." The exterior of the shoe is primarily Martha Stewart "cotton candy" and the foot straps are the tinsel cut of Recollections "blush" which I used last year. The edges are lined in gold sequin trim. The lettering (Muses on one side, 2015 on the other) is Scribbles "white mist" with Martha Stewart "bubble gum" over it.

The bouquet is a mix of different flowers I picked up over time, including some pale pink roses and some of the Spring floral bunches I picked up 70% off this summer. I added a little glitter to the flowers (three shades of pink). I also added a pink butterfly perched on the bouquet and sprinkled some lovely emerald-cut pink rhinestones in the interior of the shoe for a little extra punch of tickled pink.

The pictures aren't fantastic (it was a little gray out so the light wasn't really bright enough for the flash-free pics to come out well, and with the flash they always look a little weird), but with a new baby in the house, they'll have to do for now!

109 days left!! Nearly into the double digits. How's everyone else's shoeing going?

FAQ - How do you do the lettering on your shoes???

I only really have one Frequently Asked Question, which is “How do you do the lettering on your shoes?” To save myself the trouble of writing out my answer over and over, I thought I’d put together one write up and link to it whenever the question comes up:

Every shoe I do needs to have “Muses” and the year on it before it’s considered finished. I’ve gotten better at doing the lettering the more I practice, but even so I was tired of having to re-do lettering if I wasn’t happy with it the first time, so I ultimately switched over to doing a transfer approach. Transferring takes a little more time, but compared to writing directly on the shoe, you get cleaner lettering and more control over placement/spacing. 

I developed this transfer technique for doing glitter appliques. I've blogged about it, in greatest detail here:http://glitteringshoes.blogspot.com/2013/06/transfers-mini-how-to-guide.html

Essentially, I write letters on a ziploc bag in Scribbles paint then shake glitter over the lettering while the paint is still wet enough to hold the glitter. I let it dry overnight (sometimes longer if the paint is really thick) and then the letters peel right off the ziploc. If they don't peel cleanly, the paint probably isn't totally dry – I’d wait a little longer, especially if the paint was thick. Then I glue them on the shoe with E6000. The nice thing about the transfer technique is you can try out how you want the letters spaced before you glue them down. 

I usually free hand the lettering these days, but it's also really handy to print out letters, put the paper inside the ziploc bag and trace, especially when you're matching a specific font or logo. For example, I using tracing for the "Roman Chewing Candy" letters for this shoe: http://www.pinterest.com/pin/535013630704521662/

In the beginning tracing is a big help. A modification of the tracing approach is to put graph paper inside the Ziploc bag and use the grid to guide your lettering. I use graph paper to make NOLA tiles on shoes like these: http://www.pinterest.com/pin/535013630706930710/ I make the tile lettering in two steps: first I make the background squares, let those dry, then add the letters on top.

I pretty much only use Scribbles 3-D paint for the lettering. It's got a good viscosity and doesn't collapse when it dries. I usually buy them when Michael's is offering a 25% off total purchase coupon because they rarely go on sale and the little individual bottles are too cheap to be a good use of a 40% off coupon. Another good approach would be to use a Michael's 40% off coupon on one of the 6-packs. I've also bought variety packs on Amazon: Variety Pack of Scribbles paint on Amazon

I like to do 2 or 3 iterations of anything I'm transferring so if something gets a little smudged on one or doesn't look quite right when it dries, I can pick out the best of the bunch. Some of the links in my Techniques Pinterest board cover similar approaches: http://www.pinterest.com/shoeglitternola/techniques/

If you have any questions, or anything that you're not clear on, please leave a comment here and I’ll edit this write-up. When I get more time (not super likely to be any time soon with a newborn in the house), I may add some pictures, but I promise it's very simple.

Hope this helps - Happy Shoeing!!

Some Links for Inspiration

Yay! It's that time of year again: the Miss America Show Us Your Shoes Parade! I blogged about this here last year, and today saw a link to a photo gallery of this year's shoes on the Muses Facebook page. Lots of fun inspiration there to get the creative shoe mojo flowing if you've started work on your 2015 shoes. My favorites are Miss Maryland. Miss Montana and Miss Oregon

Also, this made the rounds a little while ago, but I've been slowly working my way through the links in this awesome NOLA,com collection of "daliy meditations" on Carnival. It helps make it feel like Carnival 2015 isn't that far off...

My shoe glittering will be slowing down for a while, as my son arrived last week, but there will probably still be progress updates and pictures here from time to time.