Baby Shoes Hanger

Baby shoes are the cutest. Seriously, how cute are these shoes? 

Picked these ones up at Oxfam for 4 quid!! (Yes, fairly sure they are boys!!)

But there's no confusing that these belong to a little girl! I absolutely adore them and wish the sun would shine so she can wear them! They are a new Spanish brand La Coqueta that has just moved in down the road from us and I am pretty sure the staff are going to know Baby M and I very well in no time at all!! 

Isn't there something magical that happens when shoes are shrunk down to baby sizes!!!! It is the result of this line of thinking that means we have a decent collection of tiny shoes around our house, and that is quite literally where they all are...all around our house! It drives me crazy but Baby M loves to play with shoes of all sizes and whilst its easier to find and return our big shoes, her little ones get relocated and lost for days under couches, in the dirty clothes basket or inside other shoes.

Well, having made, used and loved Baby M's book-hanger for the past 12 months, I decided that a smaller version of this would be perfect to store tiny shoes out of the clutches of tiny hands. 

You will need:

Backing fabric- 2 pieces of 90cm x 45cm

Pocket fabric - 8 strips of 25cm x 65cm

Ribbon ties - 1.20m ribbon of your choice

Cotton

Scissors

Coathanger and hook to hang

Here's my e-scetch of how to cut you fabrics and position them:

Instructions:

1. Cut all of your fabric first (I always find measuring and cutting the worst part of any sewing project so like to get it over and done with first). 

2. Pin your pocket pieces together with the right sides facing in, so that you've made 4 strips. 

3. Sew these together and turn inside out and press. You will need to leave a short end open to turn it inside out, and then fold these edges inwards and sew close to the seams. 

4. Do the same for your backing piece, however, you need to sew the ribbons in. I think every single person has at least once in their lives sewn the ribbons the wrong way when doing this, so take an extra moment to pretend turning it inside out and seeing which way your ribbons are going to face. I folded the back piece in half across the top to get the centre point for the middle ribbon, and then estimated either side where the other two should go, based on the coathanger I was going to use. 

You can see all the ribbon rolled up in the inside of these pieces, so that when its turned inside out, they will then be on the outside!

5. When all pieces are sewn you can now start placing them together. 

As my very technical e-scetch shows, the first step is to sew the sides and middle seam of the pockets. 

6. Once this is done, you are to make the pleats on the ends and middle of each pocket, to make a pocket that will fold out a little when shoes are put inside. Otherwise they wouldn't fit much in them. The green lines are supposed to show the pleats!!

7. Sew along the blue dashed lines to secure the pleats in place. Repeat with all four pocket-rows (8 pockets). 

8. Iron the whole thing and attach to a coathanger with the ribbons. 

And then fill with as many adorable pairs of shoes that you can find! Oh wait, here's some....

I was originally going to hang this on the inside of Baby M's wardrobe, but I kind of like it too much and think I want to leave it on the outside for now! Until she grows tall enough to reach the shoes in the bottom pockets, then it will be put away!!!