Kitschy tutorial - Eyeglass brooch

from The Felt Mouse by Jennifer 
What do these two items have in common?

One is a clever re-purposed use for the other! I found this cute brooch at last year's church rummage sale. Admittedly I myself did not realize it was made from an eyeglass lens until the cashier pointed it out. I just liked the little bug.

Since that time, I have been meaning to make my own eyeglass brooches using my old glasses. Of course, I would prefer to donate my eyeglasses to the Lion's Club recycling program, which seems like a really great effort. However, since my lenses contain prisms (since my eyes are all jacked up), I have been told my glasses are not usable in the program.

Well, at least this way my funky lenses will not end up in the trash. If you have an extra pair of eyeglasses lying around, you could make a brooch as well. You will also need

~ An adhesive such as Diamond Glaze or E6000
~ Scissors or Exact-o blade
~ Wrapping paper or other ephemera
~ Paint and brush (optional)
~ Pin back
~ Adhesive to attach pin back (E6000 can be used for this step as well, or glue gun)

First, decide what image you would like to display in your brooch. I used vintage wrapping paper. You may want to test to make sure your image will not bleed when adhesive is applied (the purple flowers did end up bleeding, so had to choose another image)

Apply glue to the center of the back of your lens (the side that was towards your face when you were wearing them). You will work the glue towards the edge of the lens, like this

and blot it off. It is best to leave some extra room around the part of the image you want to capture to allow for centering and some slight folding as you work your image to fit the concave shape of the lens. It is best to do this step quickly and avoid pressing the paper more than necessary, as it may begin to weaken in areas (hence the different mermaid in the final set of brooches).

Once your image is attached and the glue has set, you can trim off the excess with scissors or an Exact-o blade. It is fairly easy to get a line flush with the edge of the lens.

Once dry, you can paint the back of the brooch if you would like. A pin back can be added with E6000 (or equivalent) or a glue gun.

and voila! A scrap item is once again made fashionable.

(If you go looking for glasses at the thrift store to use for this craft, I recommend getting the biggest lenses available. Also glass lenses seem to work better for this project. They have some heft, which is nice, and no protective coatings to react with the glue.)