DIY Sparkle Socks (Bling-ing Irish dancing poodle socks - tutorial)

So anyone who is (or has) an Irish dancer knows that you can never have enough bling, including on your socks! The little miss' sparkle socks were starting to look not so white, and although they made her feel even more dressed up wearing them, you couldn't actually see much (if any) sparkle from them when she was on the stage. This isn't really surprising as the sparkles on them were fairly small* cheap plastic/acrylic gems. I knew I could do better and decided to make my own...

* The stones were size ss12 to be precise. That size of gems was standard on socks at the time we bought them, but it looks like larger stones are now more common.

After deciding on the size stones I wanted to use, I counted on the socks how many I would need, went to my source for crystals, and calculated the cost of all of my options... Swarovski crystals probably would have provided the best amount of sparkle, but the cost was rather much higher than I was willing to spend on socks. Preciosa weren't much cheaper, so I decided on Arabesque. My preferred crystal supplier has only recently started supplying Arabesque crystals which are marketed as a low cost option, but they still have a nice sparkle - just not as much as the Swarovski or Preciosa options. I looked at the gems on the little miss' store bought socks and figured even the low cost option would be better than what she was wearing - especially since I was going up a size (actually two sizes).

I wanted the crystals on the socks to be clear crystal rather than the AB coated ones, which now also seems to be standard at the places I usually buy from. I went with size ss20 and I'm really pleased with the outcome. I used just over 50 stones per sock (keep in mind these are size petite socks for tiny children's feet).

So enough of my babbling, here's how I did them...

First I got some scrap polar fleece fabric* and rolled it to around the same width as the little miss' calves, wrapped the rolled fabric in baking paper and taped it in place, and pulled the socks up over them. The fabric was so that the socks would still stretch to fit her when the glue was dry, and the baking paper was to stop the glue from going through the socks and sticking to the fabric.
*You don't need to use polar fleece, anything you could roll up & fit in the socks should work.

I double checked the placement of the stones. I wanted them to look like this:

And then I started gluing*.
I squeezed out dots of the glue where I wanted the stones to be, I got into a rhythm of dabbing on a row of glue dots at a time and then pressing the stones onto the glue.
*I use Gem-tac glue.

I worked my way around each sock, and then left them overnight to dry.

The next day I took the 'stuffing' out of them and voila!

They've been worn a few times now and they haven't lost a stone yet. :)