black – Page 6 – A Smith of All Trades

How to NOT glitter shoes

January 4, 2013January 4, 2013 Jessica Smith

I don’t often talk about projects that are total flops, but I had an oober flop of a project last night that I thought I’d share in case anyone else is thinking about trying it. I had an old pair of black pumps that are SO comfy and SO beat up, so I wanted to try my hand at glittering my shoes with Mod Podge.

Well, it was bad. Really bad. I had skimmed some other tutorials on how to do this and finally was ready to part with my pumps and try it out, hoping for the best.

Turns out I followed a bad tutorial. Meh, oh well!

Here’s what I did:

I Mod Podged sections of my shoes and spread thick layers of glitter on top before shaking it off.

After I had the whole shoe glittered I let it dry for a few hours.

And here’s where I went terribly wrong. Dun dun dunnnnnn.

Once my glitter was dry I wanted to secure it to the shoe so it wouldn’t fall off as I walked. SO… I put Mod Podge on top of the glitter to seal it on the shoe. DO NOT DO THIS! Haha. Please. Don’t.

Mod Podge Shoes Gone Wrong

By sealing the glitter with Mod Podge I pretty much took all of the shine and sparkle out of the glitter. Boo.

By the time it dried, my shoe was so boringly black with no sparkle at all… ugh, such a fail. It also had a terrible texture to it

To make matters worse, even though I tried to make it better, I painted the tops of my shoe, the heel and the strap gold. Ugh. Bigger mistake.

Mod Podge Shoes Gone Wrong

Ugliest. Shoe. Ever.

Thankfully, I took this project one shoe at a time and didn’t waste any glitter or Mod Podge on the other shoe. Not so thankfully, I ruined my possibly awesome shoes. Oh well!

After looking around the interwebs to try and figure out just where I went wrong, it looks like a lot of people seal their glitter shoes with a clear glaze spray. That’s what I’ll be trying next time around.

Anywho, I figured I share my mishap since there seems to be lots of glitter shoes on Pinterest. If I can save another project from going awry then that’s a good thing!

Craft Projects

Marble Tray

January 3, 2013January 3, 2013 Jessica Smith

Months ago I was at my momma’s house and we stumbled upon a huge jar of marbles that used to be my step dad’s. I knew he loved the marbles, but I didn’t know why he was keeping them in the closet and not out somewhere in the house so people could see how cool they are. I asked if I could take them to make them into something cool, which is what I did for his Christmas gift.

Enter the Christmas tray from the thrift store. This bad boy was uglyyyyyy. So ugly. But, it was the perfect size to make a cool tray for John.

I took the tray outside and spray painted it black.

When it was all dry I filled the bottom of the tray with marbles and started to prepare the epoxy resin to fill in the tray.

For this tray I used Parks Super Glaze.

To use the epoxy you mix equal parts of the hardener and the epoxy together. I like to mix mine in disposable cups so I can just toss them when I am finished. Mix everything together really well then pour it onto your project. It will level itself out, so just make sure you place it on a level surface.

Here’s the tricky part — you have to let it sit in a dust-free zone for three whole days. Rough, I know. You also need to keep your project in a warm area. The epoxy will not cure if it dries in the cold. I learned this the hard way.

And because I learned it the hard way, there was one tricky spot on my tray I couldn’t get to cure. So I solved the problem by painting a label onto the tray in chalkboard paint so I could write “John’s marbles” on it. I accented with gold paint and the tray was complete.

My parents have an antique room in their house, so that’s where John put it after I gave it to him on Christmas.

This project was long in the works, but I know my step dad really loved it.

I love using the epoxy and am definitely learning new stuff each time I use it. It is such a cool finish on projects and I will definitely be using it again in the future.

Christmas, Craft Projects, Gift Idea, Holiday, Pallet Projects

Mini Anchor Sign

December 14, 2012 Jessica Smith

One of my really good friends love to sail and is soon to be sailing a boat in the Caribbean with her hubby — what a neat vacation idea!

I wanted to make her something for Christmas so I grabbed a leftover piece of pallet wood and brought it inside to make a sign with an anchor on it.

Pallet wood is really…. splintery. So I sanded and sanded and sanded. And when I thought I was finished, I wasn’t, so I sanded some more.

When the wood was smooth enough to work with, I sketched an anchor onto it. It wasn’t pretty, but it was good enough.

Nice anchor, huh? I didn’t care about the terrible sketch because I filled the entire thing with gray and black paint. Then, I wrote her last name on the sign.

With the sign painted, I needed to drill holes big enough to pass a small rope through, so I busted out the drill and created two holes at the top.

Then, I used a water-based stain to color the wood. I’ve never used water-based stain before, but I like it a lot. The wood soaks it up right away and there is a huge variety of colors to choose from. The color I picked for the sign was Minwax’s Driftwood stain.

I only used one coat for the small sign, then I let it dry overnight.

Then next day I touched up some of the paint, mainly the black lines, and added rope and an anchor button so my friend could hang her sign.

Here’s the finished product:

I gave her the sign yesterday and she really liked it. Yay!

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