Monday, October 23, 2006

Cinderella Slipper Jewellery Box

Cinderella is a popular Christmas pantomime. It’s a heart-warming tale where the handsome prince whisks the girl off her feet and saves her from her evil stepmother and the ugly sisters. There's a lot of fun with Buttons and all the 'He's behind you' traditions of a Christmas panto.

Cinderella of course looses her Glass Slipper, which is how her handsome prince eventually finds her. Every would-be princess should have one of these cute Cinderella slipper jewellery boxes, however this one is made from card and plastic not glass.

All you will need is: Thin card, A clear round plastic bottle, paint, glue, pegs, Selotape and fur fabric. Don't forget to print out the pattern for the pieces (the link below will take you to the pattern that you can print out).

Cut out the pattern pieces

To begin, the main part of the slippers needs to be cut out. Fold the piece of card in half and draw around the pattern piece with the 'toe' of the pattern on the fold of the card so that the main piece turns out to be a long symmetrical piece. Join this piece in a loop with some selotape at the heel. Curve the toe and heel as necessary to form a shoe shape. Curve the toe end and cut out a slipper sole from card using the pattern and score the fold marks. Now fold them. These folds allow the sole to fit around the shaping of the main part.

Put the sole in place on the bottom of the slipper and hold it in place with some selotape.

Cover the outside of the slipper with one layer of paper mache, to give the slipper a nice surface to paint. Once the paper mache is dry, paint the slipper in the desired colour.

Cut out a second main part, but this time put the heel on the fold. Cut out this piece to be slightly smaller all around.

Stick this main part onto a piece of fur fabric which is 1cm larger than the card all round, except at the heel shaping. Put some glue on the over hanging fabric and bend it over the card and stick it on the other side of the card. Use pegs to hold it in place until the glue dries.

Cut out a second card sole (again cut out this piece to be slightly smaller all around) and cover one side of it in fur fabric as you did for the main part. When the glue is dry remove all the pegs. Glue the fur sole inside the slipper at the bottom. Then curve the fur main around and glue it in place inside the slipper.

To make the top of Cinderella's slipper cut out a top piece in card and paint one side the same colour as the base. Cut out two more slightly smaller top pieces. Cover one with fur fabric as you did with the other slipper parts and leave it to dry.

Cut the top and bottom of a clear round fizzy drinks bottle and cut up the middle so that the bottle opens out flat. Wash and dry the bottle. Selotape the slipper upper to the plastic and cut it out.

Glue the marked part (Sticking Edge) of the slipper upper so that it curves round and sticks to the underside of the painted top. Use bits of Selotape to hold the plastic in place until the glue dries. Stick the third top piece over the selotape and bottle bits. Hold in place with pegs.

Finally, stick the fur-covered top on the underside of the top piece with the plastic. This is now the lid to the Cinderella jewellery box.