First Shoes: baby gift tutorial

I'm slowly getting back into crafting since having Penelope. Oddly enough, I feel more crafty in the summer than I do in the winter, which is weird because I'm stuck in the house all winter, you'd think I'd be gang busters with the crafty things. But no, I think between the kids being in school and obligations I have during the school year, I'm left with no time, energy, or brain activity to do any of it.

But I have a cousin having her first baby, so I thought, perfect gift idea: I'll make a shadow box for her first shoes. I had done this with Olivia and Jackson's shoes, and I have them hanging up in our hallway next to my absolute favorite pictures of them, both at 9 months. I have the things to make a box for Penelope as well, and I already know which shoes are going in.

Aren't these adorable? It's hard to tell, but the glass says "first shoes" using Making Memories rub on letters. Each box is painted to match the shoes, and the back board has a piece of matching pattern paper that coordinates with the shoes and paint. Also, I used rub on letters for their names and the  year they were born. It's a really simple craft, something you can make for a baby shower gift- who doesn't love a personalized gift?

To get started, you need a wooden shadow box. The ones I used for mine above weren't as deep as the one I found for the project I'm doing today. The box I have now is much more deep, which works out because then you don't have to worry about the shoes fitting. Olivia's box above could have been deeper, her shoes are kind of squished in there. So I recommend taking the shoes you are crafting around to make sure they will fit in the box.

Find a piece of pattern paper that compliments the shoes you are using, as well as paint for your box. Now, because my box is so deep, I had to decide if I was going to paint just the outside or if I would paint the insides as well. In the end, I decided to just paint the outside. I ended up doing two coats of pink acrylic paint and used a foam brush because it's what I had handy.

For the letters, I used Making Memories rub on alphabet letters. I didn't have enough of one letter font, so I ended up using one font for the name, one for "first shoes". Because the box is so deep, I decided to use the letters on the front of the glass so it would look like there was more depth to the project.

Once that was done, I adhered the pattern paper to the back board of the box, I used my regular scrapbook adhesive. You can also use Mod Podge, but because I used my last foam brush on the paint, I had to improvise. I also found a coordinating pattern paper to adhere to the sides of the box since I didn't paint, and I didn't want to see wood.

That's what it looks like with the shoes. Now, obviously you aren't going to gift this with the shoes adhered inside the box. I usually gift the shoes (obviously) with a very small tube of E6000. I find that a couple dabs of that holds the bottoms of the shoes to the inside of the box VERY well. So the parents can do that once the shoes no longer fit. And, the more worn the shoes are? The better.

The best thing? Is that if you put the name on the glass, and say... the parents chose to name their kid something else, you can rub the letters off with a razor blade and it's just fine. (Have fun with that, Stephanie and Kyle!!) HA!