Christmas Mice

Making these chocolate mice has become a Christmas tradition for my grandson, Jennings, and me.
The process is a deliciously chocolate mess. They are double dipped.
We end up with whole nest of mice. Also, small nests of two to six mice get put together and delivered to special people.
These mice are chocolate dipped marachino cherries with chocolate kiss heads and slivered almond ears. Their eyes are a black gel frosting that comes in a small tube (purchased in the grocery store). They're fun and easy to make. The challenge is finding cherries with stems. If you're tempted to add these cuties to your holiday treats, be sure to drain and dry the cherries before dipping. Also, use a tempered chocolate (candy bars or chocolate meant for this purose) rather than chocolate chips so they don't end up spotted white.

I wish all of you a happy and peaceful holiday.

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"Turning Leaf" Shoe

All the fabrics I used for this shoe are designed by Jane Sassaman.
Jane's polka dotted fabrics are a big favorite of mine. The shoe is one piece of the blue/green one. I fussy-cut leaves that are from a couple of different fabrics. They were dissected to fit the curves and fill the spaces of the shoe.

The labels for the boxes are free-motion embroidery. I wrote out the words on tracing paper just the way I wanted them to appear. I then sprayed a temporary adhesive to the "right" side of the paper.
I adhered the paper to the wrong side of a heavy satin fabric with the "wrong" side of the writing face up. A heavy thread was wound on the bobbin and a fine one was threaded on top through the needle. I free-motion stitched over the written words.
The stitching perforates the paper making it easy to tear away when the embroidery is complete.

I devised this method through much experimenting. Any style of writing can easily be reproduced. The ease of stitching with the heavy thread in the bobbin as apposed to its being the top thread makes very legible letters.

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"Vamp" Shoe

A friend had given me a "skin colored" fabric with a variety of hand-painted faces ... both men's and women's. I believe it was intended for making dolls. This vamp's face didn't get placed on the vamp of the shoe. It just wouldn't have shown up on that upper front part, although there certainly would've been space for it on a real shoe.
Pictured above is the newly constructed shoe and box. Below is the quilted square.
The fabric for the box is a striped commercial fabric that I had painted. I don't recall if I had intentionally applied the paint that way, or if I had used the fabric to clean up excess paint from something else. At any rate, I love my "paint rags".

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Making the Shoes

This little 4"x6" book is the inspiration for the shoes featured in "Imelda's Dream" as well as a number of small wall quilts. The sticky notes mark the ones that were favorites.
This is the Christian Louboutin shoe that especially intriqued me. Its silhouette is the ideal for a pump in my opinion. There is a classic elegance to this one. The curve of the heel is so graceful and sensuous. This pump looks like it would hug the foot so it would feel like it belonged there. Oh, I wish I could wear this one. Well, maybe not. I would never spend the money to buy it. Louboutin shoes are mega $$$$$.
So, instead I had a fun time dreaming up variations of my own. Many of them have already been posted. Making these shoes was like eating peanuts. As each one was created it got pinned to my design wall. I hadn't a clue how they were going to be used at that time.
To make a pattern I scaled up the picture from 5"s to 8"s. I did this by tracing the picture in the book and then drawing a grid over it. I then drew an enlarged grid on another piece of paper and drew the shoe within it, duplicating the smaller drawing in relation to the grid.
The drawn pattern was refined and transferred to the paper side of freezer paper. I cut this last drawing apart into the structual elements of the shoe. This gave me the option to play with the pieces to create a great variety of shoes from just this one pattern. Some have a different fabric for each separate piece while others have several paper pattern pieces combined to make one part of the shoe.
The pattern pieces were ironed to the front side of fabric. Then I cut out the pieces leaving an 1/8" edge on the sides where "allow"(ance) is written. Phooey, I see that I got the upper foot (vamp) pattern piece upside down in the photo. The fabric pieces were put together while the freezer paper pattern was still attached. Tiny dots of glue were applied to the "allow" edge. It was easy to align the matching piece. I waited to remove the freezer paper until after the glue dried. A new pattern needs to be cut when the wax wears off the freezer paper ... after about six shoes. That was when I decided to flip the drawing to reverse the direction of the shoe.
I drew a box on freezer paper that a pair of shoes in the size I made would fit inside. It was cut apart on the lines and constructed in the same technique that was used to make the shoes.

Stay tuned for more construction techniques for this quilt, as well as the shoes that haven't been featured in a posting yet.

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"Ebony & Ivory" Shoe

Another black and white graphic ... with a red sole. Mmmm, where would one wear this shoe?
The key board is contructed with silk satin fabric. The ribbon is a dimensional bow. Musical note sequins decorate the box lid.

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"Dicey" Shoe

Who wouldn't feel a bit dicey wearing these heels. Viva Las Vegas!I love black and white graphics with red thrown in.

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"Winged Foot" Shoe

Anyone could "dance like a butterfly" in these shoes.
The three printed fabrics are metalic. To carry through the glitz, I added glitter glue colors to the butterflies. Star sequins decorate the box lid.

To see the quilt in which this block belongs go to "Imelda's Dream".

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The "Bearfoot" Shoe

The theme for this shoe is based on a personal experience I had with a black bear a few summers ago.

The Bear Facts

There was great excitement when we saw a black bear 25 feet from our cabin early one morning. Also, it was thrilling to discover a cub's paw prints in the mud on another morning. But it was downright bone chilling to chase a bear out of our cabin.

That unforgettable day my husband had gone horseback riding while I stayed at our cabin to leisurely do some stitching and reading. I had been quilting out by the river all morning until it clouded over and turned chilly. So, I went into the bedroom to read, while waiting for Lee to return.

About 1:00, I thought I heard him on the porch, and he was obviously having a problem with the screendoor. I finished my paragraph and got up to help him. As I came into the livng room, the bear, walking upright, came through the door! We were 6 feet apart, and eye to eye. Without hesitation, I raised both arms and yelled, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING IN HERE? GET OUT!" He turned and stumbled out of the door. Just then two young women drove across the bridge, and saw the bear on the porch with the screen door wide open. They drove up honking the horn to scare the bear up the mountain.

Lee arrived 20 minutes later. He wanted to take me out for lunch and BIG glass of wine to calm me down, but I was okay about it all. However, I didn't sleep too well the next couple of nights imagining alternate scenarios. What if I'd walked in on that hungry bear tearing up the kitchen? What if I were still in the bedroom when he entered? What if ...? I became well-known in Estes Park, and am now called the "Bear Lady". (Lee says if I had just stepped out of the shower, I'd be famous as the "Bare Bear Lady.")

Thankfully, I've not had another personal encounter since, even though bears have been spotted in the area every summer since then. Needless to say, I no longer keep a fruit bowl on the table just inside the door. That screen door gets latched when we're inside and the door gets pulled shut when we're not.

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"Pretty In Pink" Shoe

This is the kind of shoe my mother-in-law, Dottie, would've liked. She would even have worn it at the age of 89.
The flowers are cut from a trim and then clustered under tulle. A metallic cord is couched along the sole. The front edge of the box's top is shaded with an orange oil stick pastel.

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My Shoes

I too like funky, fun, and pretty shoes but can no longer wear those with much height in the heels.
I did wear a pair of fun new beaded wedge shoes to lunch and a gallery last spring and my back was out for a week. Aargh! They really were comfortable all the while, but by bedtime I could hardly walk.
So, I got these for summer fun.
I also have "art" shoes. These were purchased this way. I have to tie the long laces around my ankle to keep them on.
These were a favorite pair of white leather shoes that became grungy, so I painted them with fabric paints and inks. There's a coating of mink wax on top. This was done several years ago and the paint has never cracked. It hasn't worn off the rubber sole either.
Guess I'll have to dream on with Imelda and just continue going bare/sock footed and don only flat shoes. These are what I wear most often in the winter weather.



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"Patchwork" Shoe

NO, I didn't piece all those little squares in the shoe. That part is whole cloth.

Tiny sequins decorate the top of the box. Each sequin was dipped into glue. I used curved tweezers to grasp and place them. There are five tiny stitches through the fabric and tulle around each one to keep them from migrating too far if the glue lets loose.

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"Rock'n Roll" Shoes

I live with the "World's Greatest Elvis Fan". So of course I had to make a rock'n roll shoe featuring the King.
My husband tried to talk me out of the one I made for "Imelda's Dream" quilt. He was disappointed that I wouldn't let him have it until he opened his birthday present of this large one made especially for him.

Click on the blue highlighted type to get to my previous postings about Elvis quilts that I've made.

Go to "Elvis Is Coming" to see Lee's Elvismobile and read about an exhibit of "some" of his collection in our local museum that celebrated Elvis's 70th birthday. That was the second museum exhibition featuring Lee's collection. The first was the Historical Museum in Holland, Michigan when it ran a series of exhibitions featuring folk art. Lee makes or embellishes a lot of Elvis stuff. It all has his "tongue in cheek" sense of humor. I'm not a big Elvis fan, but I love my husband's "zaniness" about the whole thing. He calls me his Elvis enabler

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"FrootLoop" Shoe

First, the vegetable shoe. Now, the fruit shoe.
The berries were all cut from a quarter yard of a fruit printed fabric. There were a lot of berries. Enough to make three shoe quilts. One for "Imelda's Dream", one for Alicia's and my friend, and this one that I donated for our guild to sell at the annual quilt show.

"Fuit Footwear"

The dragon flies and ladybugs nestled among the berries came from a different fabric. I decorated these bugs with glitter glue to make them look like jewels adorning the shoes.

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