Carol Tries on the Glass Slipper

 All right, it was a poor fit.  Too small, too big, and of a shape no human foot would never conform to.  A customer asked me to try making a pair of pink high heeled shoe earrings for charity and I had to give it a try.  CiM Gelly's sty is just exactly the right color.  It screams pink and more importantly, is nice and stiff so it holds its shape while I dither around with the torch trying to figure out how to make a convincing shape.  It was meant to be a classy, high heeled pump with a beaded decoration on top, but neither one of these things happened.  And I forgot that Gelly's sty devitrifies.  I'm running low on gas again so I couldn't heat it enough to get rid of this, and I'm not sure the heel would have taken it if I did.

 The heel gave me the most fits.  From this angle it looks pretty good, but what you can't see is that it had to be pretty wide to stand up to the heat without wilting.  The heel area in general is a bit wide, though.  I'm going to try starting with a smaller bead to anchor it and work from there, which should allow me to make the instep area a bit narrower as well.  This picture is good.  It hides the immense wideness of the wrong areas.

The top decoration didn't really work out, because I added it before I was done shaping the glass and it all melted together.  I was pleased with the fact that there was an open area between the heel and the toe.  I shall keep this and work on getting the rest to be more foot shaped.  Another thing I was thinking of was not continuing the hole all the way through the tip of the toe.  It would be really cool if I could hang the earrings from the heel, the way you'd carry a pair of shoes with 2 fingers.  I need to have the mandrel reach the toe because I am not at all confident of my ability to keep the shape of a scoop shaped bit of hot glass in the flame.  I can see the toe swinging all over the place. 

I'm not at all unhappy with the way this turned out as a first attempt.  Most of the stuff I eventually wind up with takes many tries to get it the way I like it and I've done worse.  Previously, I've made some snowmen, fish, a frog and a penguin or two.  This is an entirely new shape and much more technically challenging.  Even if I never wind up with earrings I'm glad I tried it.  I'll amend this post if I ever get it right.