Happy Halloween...and Merry Christmas too!

...or it will be when I get these little cuties done. I will say, I have learned some things about myself today - mainly, that I am just not smart enough to truly understand the ins and outs of pattern making. I have made simple patterns before and it has been fine but, for whatever reason, this one nearly did me in. It is a good thing I have become so flexible in my old age...Lol

Here's where I started. I gathered my supplies and then fooled around with a sketch until I liked what I thought would be the finished size.

Then, I cut a pattern 1/4" larger all around for seams and cut out four pieces.

I sewed the first two together and lightly stuffed the shoe.

I say lightly stuffed because I knew the stuffing would reduce the size a bit but, I had no idea exactly how much!

I thought I would be OK with this but after constantly trying to convince myself of that, I knew I wouldn't be. And so, I blew up the pattern 120%. That definitely helped but I don't really think that is what I should have done to get the result I really wanted. The shoe got smaller in some places but not others. I pondered it for a bit and decided that I am just not smart enough to figure out how to remedy the situation so I am just going with the larger ones. Of course, that meant repeating all of the steps up to this point.

Even though these are not exactly what I was going for, I think there will be enough room now on the front of the shoe to sew the buttons and add the laces and any other embellishments that I decide on. I'm going to hold on to the smaller shoe and see if I can't find some way to use it when the decor comes out - maybe in an arrangement of some sort?

I mixed some black acrylic paint with textile medium and gave them a good coat.

When they were dry, I came back and scrubbed in some brown just to make them look a bit scuffed up. At this point I was thinking that I should have just gone with straight acrylic paint because the textile medium made the fabric soft and the brown just kept soaking in. If I ever do this again...LOL NOT!...I will know better.

I sewed on the buttons and laced up the shoes then I "tried" to hot glue them together. Again, the textile medium disrupted the hot glue bond so I ended up using a few stitches to tack them together.

I added a hanger and the tag and, I'm really not sure how, but I like them! I think they will look cute hanging in my witch vignette this year.

Maybe I'll move this picture to the chest and hang the shoes from the knob?!?

We had a fun day this weekend. My two youngest grand children spent the week with my brother and sister-in-law and they culminated the fun with a "Christmas in July". I will admit that I don't have too many good photos because, even though I took my camera, I didn't take any pictures. I kind of thought everyone else was but, I guess I was wrong. In any case, a good time was had by all...even if they don't show up here. Lol

There were lots of cookies. Presley made some rolled sugar cookies and we all helped to decorate them and then there were some yummy Spritz cookies as well made during the week.

And, I loved that the cookies were displayed on the platter that we all made as a memento of our 40th anniversary skiing trip to Snow Shoe Mountain way back in 2005!

We had a wonderful meal and then played a gift swap game and everyone got to pick a hand painted ornament as their party favor. Here are Uncle Joel and Presley making the ornaments...

...and here is the one I chose. There were so many cute ones that it was hard to choose.

And, I wanted to share my beautiful flowers from daughter #2. My girls know me too well...every time they visit, they come with food, wine and flowers. These beauties are still looking great all these days later!

So, another week has begun and there is still not much on the calendar so I guess it is time to start on some more of the Christmas ornaments I've been thinking about. And, I think I have a bit more of the late summer decor tour to share so, stay safe and stay tuned.