10 Minute No-Sew Barefoot Sandals

I kind of expected that I’d go a little nuts on baby shoes when expecting a girl. Shoes are, of course, the most adorable thing that can be purchased for a baby, and this is an indisputable universal fact. But here we are, almost 9 months into this whole raising-a-daughter thing and Darcy owns 3ish pairs of shoes. Impressive, no? None of these 3 pairs, however, matched her outfit for Bekah’s wedding, and you know how cheap I am, so I figured I’d see if I could DIY something that look cute with her outfit without pinching her fat little feet or costing much.

And my gosh, they turned out darling.

Add barefoot baby sandals to the list of things I thought were ridiculous before having a baby girl, but now think are precious (it’s an ever-growing, embarrassing list).

I already owned the elastic I needed to make these shoes and only needed to buy a little bit of ribbon for the bows, so I’m not sure what the price would be if you were starting from scratch--I’m going to guess in the $2-5 range. Much less expensive than a pair of store bought shoes, totally comfortable for baby, and easy to customize to go along with whatever outfit you’re trying to match. And not turning on the sewing machine is always a plus in my book.

To make these sweet little sandals, you’ll need:
- a small amount of fold-over elastic (I used about 16 inches total). My elastic was leftover from making a batch of baby headbands, and was purchased from Elastic By The Yard on Etsy. I suppose you could use regular elastic for these if that’s what you already own, but fold-over elastic is slim and a bit shiny, so it looks really nice for a project like this, plus it’s smooth and soft, so I bet it’s more comfortable for little feet.
- a small amount of glitter ribbon (or, you know, whatever ribbon you want). I got this gold glitter ribbon at Walmart, and bought 1/2 yard. I still have quite a bit left over.
- hot glue gun

Step 1: Cut a length of ribbon that can wrap comfortably around baby’s ankle and the bottom of her foot. For Darcy (currently almost 9 months), this was about 7-8 inches. Lay it out in a Z shape.

Step 2: Bring the top end of the Z down and hot glue it to the middle of the center piece.

Step 3: Bring the bottom end of the Z up and hot glue it over the top piece. Look, it’s an 8. Nifty.

Step 4: Bow time! Hot glue a small piece of ribbon—about 3-4 inches—in a loop.

Step 5: Cut a 2- or 3-inch length of ribbon in half lengthwise.

Step 6: Pinch the loop into a bow shape and glue a small length of one of these strips around the center. Cut the second strip into 2 pieces and trim the ends into points.

Step 7: Glue these two pointed strips to the bottom of the bow, then hot glue the bow onto the elastic.

Ta-da! Quick and painless. Slip the upper loop around baby’s ankle, and the lower loop right underneath her foot. Baby girl be stylin’ and fancy.