Opening Day Kicks... The Tutorial :)

I always feel pretty crafty when I go up north to visit my parents... maybe it's because Andrea is so creative & crafty, or because she has her very own craft room & an abundance of supplies or just because I have loads of free time.

So even though I was only visiting for a day, I decided it was time to accomplish one of my very first Pinterest projects! You can find my inspiration here, unfortunately I have googled and can't find the artist to give proper credit... but they did an excellent job on their finished product! 

First I started with a pair of canvas Roxy's which I found on sale (SCORE) at DSW!! 

Once I had decided on my two designs, I printed each from the computer in a size that fit on the front of each shoe. I chose the Old English D and a Detroit Tiger's logo. 

Andrea recommended that I use tracing paper, which required me to transfer the Tiger's logo onto transparent paper by tracing the printed logo. Once I had transferred the logo (see below); I then secured the tracing paper (dark side down) onto the shoe with the transparent logo face up with a few pins.

NOTE: I did not find the tracing paper to be helpful at all. In the future, I will trace the outline of the computer print out straight to the shoe, like I did for the Old English D (photo below). I ended up free handing the inside of the Tiger's logo because I could not see the tracing marks. 

Computer logo transferred to transparent paper for tracing onto the shoe

I found this way to be much easier; printed logo pinned straight to shoe

Traced Old English D ready for paint

Once my shoes were ready, I used acrylic paints to color in the logos. I did researched and found that some people choose to outline with paint markers first, but I decided to drive right in with a small bristle paint brush & acrylic paint! 

The shoes only required one coat of paint

Here you can see how the tracing paper worked on the baseball shape

The paint took only a few minutes to dry between color blocks. Once most of the color was complete, I decided to outline each logo in black. I definitely think outlining them was a plus and adds to the color pop.

I still need to spray them with a treatment

I also hand painted baseball laces on the back of the heels

I painted on a large piece of parchment paper for easy clean up

LOVE!

I am happy that I decided to give this project a try! It took about two hours, from tracing to finish. It was super relaxing and fun! I showed our Director of Costuming (who taught me how to sew my Halloween costume) and she thought they were a little plain for me :) but once I explained my whole outfit, she then agreed that they didn't need any bling... although I'm thinking of adding a few quarter size baseballs on the sides, we'll see though  :)

xoxox

PS My co-worker Jas really wants me to start a separate blog about my DIY projects & fashion statements. However since I have a hard enough time updating here, I told her in this case, two is not better than one :) She did though, come up with some awesome names for blog #2; so from here forward, I will tag any & all of my creative projects with "The Pink Apron" :) Thanks Jazzy Jas!! :)