When I was strutting around Target the other day with my main man Beckett, I spied something that stopped me dead in my tracks.
A whole bunch of boxes of white canvas Converse All-Stars, right next to packages of Sharpie fabric markers! This is some brilliant marketing I must say. I’m just surprised this setup isn’t somewhere more prominent in the shoe area; they are on random end caps. But I found them, oh yes I did.
Time to make Sharpie Shoes.
After pondering for half a second, I grabbed some size fours and a pack of markers and brought them home to wait for Fen to come home from school. She sat right down and got to work when she saw them. (We put homework on hold for a few hours. Shhhhhhh.)
Wait- you didn’t think she’d forget the shoelaces, did you?
I love what she did. We started out by doing a Google image search for Sharpie + Converse, and perusing all the inspiration. Then she jumped in and did her own thing.
Apparently they were a huge hit at school, because even the 5th graders were complimenting her. That’s huge.
I love these projects that are open and fun, but still get kids thinking in a design mindset. They end up living with, and using the items they create, and they get to feel that sense of pride, but also think ahead to their next creation. What would they change? What do they like about what they’ve made? It all gets filed away in that creative area of the brain and is put to use the next time they pull out the markers.
* I’m not sure if Converse are still available at Target. Or you can use this link for Converse on Amazon or white Vans The white slip-ons would be especially fun to draw on.
** I discovered something wonderful the other day. Here is a chart to show you how kid-sized shoes compare to women’s. So if you can only find women’s size 7 shoes, but you need a kid size 5, it’s the same! Awesome.
Oh, hey. I don’t want to leave out you old parents who want to make these for yourselves, but couldn’t be seen in public wearing them…..
It’s the Sneaker Coloring Book, full of 100 line drawings of popular sneakers for you to make lovely. Enjoy!
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