Sandals for Warmth

I have found that i can warm up considerably while inside by having my feet on a thick foam pad instead of the floor.  The foam that i have had at the foot of my desk all winter was package padding from a company that sells athletic mats and other exercise equipment.  It is an inch and a half thick!  But when i would get up form my desk i had to leave the pad behind... until i made sandals out of them!

You  will need the following tools and supplies to make a pair of flip-flops for yourself.

• foam padding
• seatbelt webbing
• curved needle
• thick thread
• scissors
• very sharp knife

I used a Lansky sharpener to hone my knife between my cut-outs and found a huge difference when i used a freshly sharpened knife.  

The curved needle works well because the foam won't fold over like fabric. 

I have about 4 extra sections of the foam padding that i am happy to sell along with seat belt webbing that has been salvaged from autos at the dump.  Contact me if you're interested.

I used a pair of flip-flops as a template for mine.  You could use your own foot or make a rectangle that fits your foot.  Just trace or draw the shape you want on the bottom side of the piece with the Sharpie. 

The pair of flip flops you see the bottom of in this photo have a "thong" between my big and next toe.  I don't like how that feels with socks... otherwise i might just have settled for these quarter inch thick insulators on my feet.

Use that very sharp knife to cut the pattern out.  Use safe practices when cutting!  I found that a sawing motion was necessary but left a somewhat jagged outline around the final product.

Wrap the webbing around the sandal and your foot where it will be comfortable and mark the length of the wedding to be cut.  It should be tight on your foot but i suggest that it overlap on the bottom so you can stitch the two ends together securely.

Begin by doubling the thread over and passing that through the needle and knotting the 4 threads.  Then when you stitch you'll be using four threads at once.  Push through the back side of the webbing because the knot will probably not hold in the foam.  Use a whip stitch.  Keep the stitching low on the side of the sandal to allow for some flexibility of the strap.

Wrap the strap around your foot to determine placement of the second side.  Make sure it is tight!  Wearing thick socks when doing this will help if that's what you'll be wearing when it is cold inside.  If you're just going to wear shoes inside, just give this a 0.5 rating of "worthless."  But I'll just laugh at you later for tracking dog doo-doo into your house. 

If you overlapped well you'll find that you can connect the two ends together while attaching the strap to the foam pad.

Now repeat for the other one!

I have found that walking around on an inch and a half of foam is very springy.  I almost fall off of the sides of it at times.  One of my sandals is tighter than the other at the moment and that foot slips around a little too much. 

If there was any problem with sliding around i might attach a rubber "sole" to the sandal but in my house i'm good.