Craft Experiment: New Blue Shoes

Ever had the desire for a new pair of colorful shoes but not the money to go buy a pair? Ever been frustrated by the lack of color selection in discount stores? Ever had a pair of shoes you didn't use anymore? That's what happened to me. So I tried an experiment.

One pair of pumps I no longer wear
Painter's Tape
Plastic bags (to cover my work surface)
One acrylic marker-blue
One jar of Deco Art Triple Thick Glaze
One sponge brush

I set the shoes on plastic bags to keep my work surface from getting painted on.

First, I taped every area that I didn't want to paint.

Then I used the marker and "painted" the shoes. I allowed 3 hours for drying between coats and paint a total of three coats on the shoes.

Then I removed the painter's tape.

I coated the shoes with the Deco Art Triple Thick Glaze using a sponge brush. The purpose of the coating is two-fold. I want my shoes to be shiny and I want to seal the paint so it won't come off if it gets wet.

And this is the finished experiment. I love the color peaking out from under a pair of bootleg jeans!

(I did find that a little of the paint came off while using the glaze and the final look had a little too much clear goo dried on. Next time I will try coating the shoes with Modge Podge Dimensional Magic instead. It makes for a thinner coat.)

Free Online Books to Read

Would you like to read online books - for free. Like to learn about how to's or have a history paper you need to write? Here is how you get access to free online books written prior to 1920.

1) Go to books.google.com 
2) Select "Browse Books and Magazines". 
3) Select "Advanced Search". 
4) Type in the subject you are looking for and select "Full View Only" and then click on the "Search" button. 


Then any book from 1920 or before that Google has scanned into its book store can be downloaded and viewed for free. When you select full view only you are telling it to search only for books you can read for free. These are books that no longer have their original copyright privileges due to age but have been found in large libraries and scanned by the Google company. Be sure that anything needing a Bibliography include that Google provided the book. I have read recipe books from the 1880's, books about the Victory Garden from 1918 and runaway slave stories pre-dating the Civil War (according to the book publish date). There is much of history you will find there that you won't find in ANY history book today. You can search for a subject, name, location, war, etc. and find plenty of great books.