Decoupaging My Wedding Shoes - Star Wars Stylee

How To Make Your Star Wars Shoes

Decoupaging with Comics

Here is a little background info into my shoes & Star Wars wedding theme bringing us fittingly to what I am about to do to them! My Wedding Shoes - The Next Episode!

What you will need:

• Your Shoes!
• Mod Podge
• Small paint brush
• Old Comics & Magazines in desired theme
• Piece of cardboard to protect work surface
• Kitchen towel (for wiping fingers as you go)

Mod Podge is a special craft glue that also acts as a sealant, glue and finish. I purchased the 236ml Matte version but there are other types such as Gloss, Glitter, Pearlescent etc etc. It cost me about £5 on line (Hobbycraft (UK) no longer stocked it). It is safe, low odour and just peels off fingers like PVA glue :)

The comics and mags I purchased via Ebay were an old 1978 Star Wars comic and a set of special publication magazines from when Episode 1 first came out in the cinemas. This was a little bit of sacrilege and I shed a tear as I took the scissors to them  (I will withhold my address for fear of reprisals from hard core SW comics collectors! :P)

Episode 1

Prepare the shoes by taking off any diamanté like I had on mine. As these shoes were satin and pleated they were possibly the worst sort of shoes to do this too, I sealed them fully, heels and all with 2 coats of the Mod Podge. Mod Podge goes on white like PVA glue but drys clear so don't worry :D
Go through the mags and comics and cut out anything you may need - speech bubbles, characters, special words, pictures - if its interesting cut it out! Keep some good images and speech bubbles etc for adding last for extra effect.

Episode 2

I started with the wedges and the heels, for this I picked out blue/black space background and stuck this all over, making sure to cover the whole area and making sure the edges are neat as you go, this saves having to sort any issues later as when it dries it dries solid! Then I did the edge around the top of the shoe as this was a prominent seam that needed covering neatly. Be careful what the inside of the shoe looks like - keep it a neat edge if you can, some people also stuff the inside of the shoe with newspaper to protect but I didn't find this necessary.

To apply the piece you want: Paint the Mod Podge onto the shoe in the area you want it, place the image and now put some more Podge on top, smoothing with brush and finger as you go. It will start to go 'off' in about 3 minutes which allows you to press down any sticking up edges (I had alot in the creases of the pleats of my shoes). After about 6 minutes give it another press, you can place other images down during this time - just keep going back and pressing it down. The whole thing should set in about 20 minutes. In general I found comics easier to stick than magazines which were thicker and took some holding.

Episode 3

Next I went around the inside edge of the shoe with other background snippets (namely Tatooine sand, Death Star and Millennium Falcon!) This left the middle section of the shoe now bare which I then filled with other back ground scraps from Padme's throne robe, more Tatooine, more space sky, some R2D2 and general comic bits. This gave a background in which to now add the main images and pictures ....

Episode 4

Now split the nice images and speech bubbles you have kept back in half roughly so you can evenly place these between the two shoes. I worked going from shoe to shoe, checking the spacing, colouring etc. as I went, this way you can keep on track of it easier. At the end of this you will have covered your shoes in fantastic images!

Episode 5

I covered the shoes in 3 fairly thick layers of Mod Podge allowing each layer to dry completely which take approx 1 hour to set. Some people have also sprayed a sealant onto theirs however the Podge is also a sealant and personally I don't plan to jump in any puddles wearing them :) I only used about 1/3 of the Podge container and therefore have loads left over for other projects. If you only plan on doing one pair of shoes perhaps buy the smaller size bottle which you can get also :)

Final coats of Mod Podge

Episode 6

Wipe the sole and the inside of the shoes with a damp cloth to remove finger marks, dust etc and Voila!!!!!

Episode 7 

COMING SOON! ..... Wearing them out possibly at Premiere in 2015!

My Wedding Shoes - The Next Episode!

On the 18th May 2013 I married the true love of my life, the father of my children and my sole mate in a small ceremony at a country house in Staffordshire. However there was a slight twist to this wedding ... the theme was STAR WARS!!

To cut a long story short we met at university and played alot of on line computer games and notably a Star Wars game called Star Wars Galaxies ....  so what a perfect theme to go with. Obviously given the venue it was a little watered down but there was alot of key elements in there to keep the guests on their toes :D

The Shoes:

Soooo here's the main deal ... On the day they were a beautiful platform ivory satin peep-toe from Belle with a RRP of £99 but I only paid £10 off Ebay (worn once before for 4 hours) - BARGAIN!

Here is a collage of the shoes taken by my wonderful wedding photographer Catherine Pound Photography

However after the big day they looked a little more like this .......

Some of the rhinestones were missing, they were mud stained and dirty in the toe area, they would not have come up totally clean by the dry cleaners and I could have dyed them black or something but that would be boring! So in keeping of my wedding thing there was only one thing to do ........

I decided to decoupage them! with Star Wars snippets none the less to keep the theme of my big day going :D I had seen various shoes done with different comics and magazines in different themes and 'professional' done ones are an arm and a leg in costs. I thought I'll give it a go seen as I'm at a little bit of a loose end craft wise now the wedding is done and dusted!

Searching the web high and low, looking at other blogs, video clips etc etc I got a good idea of how to go about it ...

Heres How I Turned My Wedding Shoes Into Star Wars Heels!

Exploring Autumn Nature

So today whilst walking home from the school run I had an idea to keep the monsters busy whilst I sorted tea..... trying to avoid the 'Muuummmmm Im hungry' moan for an idea we started looking for things on our way home we could use. I asked B1 to see any leaves or anything interesting he could find. We got lots of stuff including pine cones, a conker, lots of different types of leaves etc...

I then quickly wrote some signs, grabbed a couple apples from our tree and seeds from the bird feeder and set it up for them:

B1 is starting all his phonics learning at school and letter recognition so we spent a little time seeing what letters he knew, their sounds, the actions and the rhymes and if he knew what the word might sound like. M1 also joined in the fun, repeating after B1 :D

I then got out the crayons and some paper and we all had ago at leaf rubbing, they had fun deciding what leaf to use and the finding out which is tricky (holly!) Meanwhile tea is in the oven cooking nicely!

The last thing we did was to open the conker we had found. Its not quite conker time but we managed to get one and mummy sliced it open and gave it to B1 to discover what was inside. Had a little discussion about what it is and what it grows into before they then ran off to play whist mummy plated the food :)

Great activity to fill in the time between school and teatime to keep them occupied!

x

Moon Dough Construction Chaos!

Its the last day of the holidays before B1 starts big school tomorrow so out came the tuff spot! So I thought we'd get the construction toys & moon dough together and see what the little monsters can make (other than a mess!) This is Moon Dough. 

The texture of moon dough is quite odd - its soft, squidgy, a cross between sand and play dough! I had a few colours that have been both presents and stuff that I picked up from our local bargain shop. The boys loved mixing it up, filling the diggers, getting the men to work, making roads and bricks and stones!

Inevitably it got very mixed up and messy although luckily it just brushes off without too much hassle and odd bits can hoover. M1 ended up with no top on at one stage and they both sat in it playing happily and getting it everywhere! This gave mummy the chance to sew the rest of the name tags in B1 new school uniform!

They loved playing with the dough and the diggers literally for hours! A great mornings activity to keep the little ones amused!

x

Building our Volcano ....

We started by using the left over paper from our Alphabet Adventure B1 sculpted a volcano shape around an old plastic bottle stuck to a sweet tin lid, we then left it to dry in the greenhouse. This took some time as it was quite sodden!

B1 and I then did a couple of layers of proper paper mache to cover the volcano and give a good painting base... some more drying time later .... We took it outside and painted it after looking at pictures on Google and discussing what colours to do. Mummy found some moss for added effect!

Then we used it in our Prehistoric Play and made it erupt using warm water, food colouring, bicarbonate of soda, washing up liquid and vinegar!!

In a jug mix: warm water (enough to fill 3/4 of volcano bottle) and add food colouring and a few drops of washing up liquid. Next mix in a couple spoonfuls of bicarbonate of soda ...then pour the liquid mixture into the bottle in the volcano ...then when you are ready pour in some vinegar and watch it 'erupt'!!!!

Fab fun for little monkeys!!!

Prehistoric Play!

Following on from the last tuff spot we made a volcano!! ... Building our Volcano! and what is best with messy volcanoes?? 

Dinosaurs!!!

This idea was inspired from the blog of an old friend Mrs Tutey's Blog and I just had to try it as my boys aren't quite into dinosaurs etc so thought some extra learning may help! Mummy gathered bits and bobs and made the scene for the dinos (it was raining outside so quicker for mummy to do the hunter gatherer!) and then surprised the boys with it...

We talked about when we thought dinosaurs existed (next week apparently!), where they are now (they aren't here yet!) and what the planet looked like when they were alive (jungle!). We have a large garden ornament fossil and we discussed what they think fossils are, the boys had some Happyland cave men figurines and we talked about humans and their clothes and how they might have lived ... ok for all the fellow nerds out there I know there issues in exact timelines here but for B1 & M1's sake go with it :P

We then had roaring competitions on who could roar the loudest - B1 won!

Next came the volcano eruption: So here is a link on how to do it DIY Volcano Eruption 

This wowed the boys, and mummy too because mummy wasn't quite expecting it to work! (daddy however was depressed there wasn't an actual explosion :P) Then we had a little talk about lava, where it comes from and do they think it is hot or cold ... great all round experiment and fun for the monkeys!

After some more free play it was then time for a wash and of course the dinos came into the bath for their wash too (saves mummy a job!) Good fun was had on a rainy afternoon in August and hopefully a little bit of history & chemistry learnt along the way :)

Alphabet Adventure

B1 starts school in September (Arghhhh!) and he is very good at his alphabet however I wanted to just help with distinguishing been a capital letter and its little form to see how he copes ... It is also an opportunity to introduce M1 a bit more to the alphabet and help with his pronunciation. M1 doesn't say too much atm and I'm hoping some practise saying sounds can help ....

So I got some shredded paper from our shredder and placed in the tuff spot, I then got the magnetic letters out and hid them in the paper. We went and found the letter blocks, an alphabet animal jigsaw, the easel and chalks and the Leapfrog Alphabet Caterpillar.

I let the boys rummage through the paper finding a letter, when they found one I let them tell me the sounds, we then pressed the caterpillar to make sure we were right. We looked at the jigsaw and found what animal began with that sound and compared the letter to the easel letters. Luckily the jigsaw had capitals and little letters on for them to compare. B1 was more interested than M1 but he still liked to look through and sing the alphabet song and have ago at the different sounds.

After this I then had a load of shredded paper (everywhere!) so I made up a paper mache solution and B1 mixed it all together. I had an old drinks bottle I stuck to a tin lid and we formed a volcano! After some more paper mache and some painting when its dry this will be used in our next tuff spot adventure!

Snow & Ice Tuff Spot Play

So today we have had the first play with the new Tuff Spot, so we kept it simple!

Mummy had some fake squiggly snow solution and made a big bucket of that to pour into it, the night before she froze a big dish with water and pearls and also one with glitter so there were shiny icebergs! Along with icecubes and cotton wool balls we then went on a hunt around the house to find animals that live in and around the snow ... a polar bear, a penguin, a man wrapped up warm and M1 choose a goose! (well its white!).

They were then set loose on it and it kept them amused for ages! Squishing, exploring etc... we discussed what happens when ice melts and how it melts. B1 understood this more when the main iceberg started to melt and the pearls started to loosen... We talked about whether the ice & snow is hot or cold and where they thought it came from....

Great fun was had by all, so after a wash down with a hosepipe - munchkins and all! we tidied it all away. The only issue which arose then was M1 deciding to stand on a bumble bee in which the bumble bee won! Silly child but he learnt to be kind to animals next time!

Mummy is now busy thinking of what we can do next time with our tuff spot  .... ice cream play, dinosaurs, autumn fun, buried treasure, chocolate soil ....

x

Ding Dong The Bells Have Chimed!

Hello!

Reviving this blog once again!

To update you on whats been happening I've had baby number 2 (M1) and got married! B1 is now 4 years old and about to go start school in September and M1 is 2 years old and keeping me on my toes!

Im gonna be using this blog to document all the 'Tuff Spot' activities I'll be doing with the munchkins!

x