Since I got my sewing machine, I had a vague idea for months that I would MAKE people gifts for Christmas this year instead of refueling the flagging economic machine like a good little consumer. The problem with this idea is that three of the five most important people in my life are men, and another is a dog, so the intersection of things they would appreciate and things I can make by hand in my nascent craftiness is tiny.

But then in December I hit on the idea of slippers. For my dad, at least, I imagine slippers rank lower than a sandblasting attachment for his air compressor on the list of gifts he’d enjoy, but higher than a scarf or a man-purse—good enough for me!

My mom needed new slippers anyway, so I knew she’d appreciate them. I know John’s not a slipper guy, so I gave him some fancy tea, an infuser, and a teakettle instead. Plus I mended a badly-torn pair of his pajama pants, and that totally counts as a homemade gift. Sam was also exempt—the hours I would spend sewing him tiny booties by hand would far outweigh the few minutes of amusement we’d get watching him chew them off his feet.

I checked out a few slipper patterns online, but none of them looked quite right, so I picked up an array of fabric and set to experimenting. I had suede for the soles, inch-thick squishy foam to put inside the soles, fleece for the linings, and various colorful things for the outsides.

I figured I’d make a pair for myself first, you know, just to refine the half-assed pattern* I’d imagined. Turns out it needed a little more “refinement” than I’d planned for. The first slipper I made was a sad, lumpy thing. It was warm enough, if you could look past its aesthetic shortcomings, and the way I made the sole worked well, but it was far from giftable.

I altered the design and tried again. The second one actually came out pretty well, if a little sloppier and a little smaller than I’d planned. Time to get on with the real slippers…except that I’d started only three days before Christmas (finals went through the 19th), and it was time to head up to my parents’ house. So, what the heck, I brought the sewing machine and all my materials, to make a secret, crafty mess all over my old bedroom.

Long story short, only my dad’s slippers were done by Christmas morning. I made my dad open his package first, then let my mom and brother open their tiny wrapped fabric swatches. The best part? My dad totally didn’t notice his slippers were homemade until my mom and brother opened their “gifts.” Success!

Pictures? Why yes! I have pictures.

Here you can follow my nearly-monotonic progression in slippering skill. My first sad little slipper isn’t shown here, but my second one, on the far left, came out okay. Next I made my dad’s slippers (the blue one in the middle), which weren’t bad, just too big. (They’re too wide in the front, and I had to sew darts into the back to make them fit lengthwise—who ever heard of darts in a slipper?)

Then I started on my brother’s (he goes to Vanderbilt, hence the black and gold). The two black ones on the left are flops, of which the left is an alternate design (to fix the width issue) that failed, and the right, when I tried it on his foot halfway through, turned out to be a good two inches too short.

The two slippers on the right are the final versions for my mom and brother. Of all of them, my mom’s fit the best, so I’m glad I saved hers for last—she wears slippers around the house almost every day.

Next we have a few close-ups:

I cut the Vanderbilt logos out of felt and glued them on. I would’ve sewn a topstitch on them if I could fit the darn things into my machine.

Here you see the happy recipients, finally warming their chilly feet two days after Christmas.

In summary…I made something! This is the second something I’ve made on my machine (after my RenFest skirt—I’ll put those pictures on Flickr soon), if you don’t count hemming pants, and I have to say, it feels pretty awesome. There were several times that I pulled a sad mess out of the machine and wondered if I’d ever make anything presentable, but I eventually finished, and I’m pleased with the results. I kinda like this crafting thing.

———
* Here’s my easy slipper tutorial, totally free of charge. This was the plan that needed “refining.”
1. Imagine what a slipper would look like inside out.
2. Make that.
3. Flip it back the right way.
The devil, of course, is in the details.

Tags: christmas, crafts, photos, sewing, slippers

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