Yeti Feet- Make Yeti Footprints in the Snow!

Sometimes it can be nice to take a walk through the woods after a snowstorm and find little animal footprints- deer, raccoon, squirrel, yeti, etc. Unfortunately,  Yeti do not seem to be all that common in my area (Or exist, like anywhere.) so I decided to make a little prank. These easy to make devices attach to your shoes and allow you to make the footprints of a yeti in the snow.

For those of you who may not know what a yeti is:
"The Yeti or Abominable Snowman (Nepali: हिममानव, lit. "mountain man") is an ape-like cryptid taller than an average human that is said to inhabit the Himalayan region of Nepal and Tibet."
(Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yeti)

 It is a myth that it exists, and the creation of these shoes is done as a joke.

Step 1: Supplies

The supplies needed here are pretty basic. For supplies, we will be using...
- A paper outline (More on that later)
- Hot Glue
- Wood
- String
For tools, the list is a little more complex:
- Saws (just enough to get a good shape out of the wood)
- File (for shaping)
- Drill (and drill bits, of course)
- A rotary tool (like a dremel. Not entirely needed, but very helpful)
- Hot glue gun.

Not too bad, right?

Step 2: Creating the Outline of the Foot

As a yeti does not exist, there is no real definition as to what the foot would be like. I decided to get creative, and I figured that a yeti would have feet that were like a cross between a yeti and a bear. I did some googling, and found out what a black bear has for feet. I printed the two feet out onto two separate pieces of paper, and added the typical human foot outline. This gave me a nice stencil to work with.
You can find your own Bear feet or check out use mine:

Step 3: Hot Glue-ing Things

Now that the outline was ready, I began to hot glue it. The goal here was to raise the surface and create a bit of texture. You may be wondering why I did not simply carve it out of wood, and it is a question I pondered for a while as well. However, I came to the conclusion that the hot glue would give me more traction and be more forgiving of the weight put on it- it would act like a rubber while the wood could break.

After I had covered everything in hot glue, I added more height to the ball and heel of the feet. The goal here was to create a more realistic depth. Don't worry too much about the accuracy of the hot gluing, as it will be a making a mold in snow (which is not known to have lots of detail).

When I was done with this, I peeled everything off of the paper.

Step 4: Attaching to Wood

After I had pulled the pieces off of the paper, I placed them onto a 1 inch thick piece of wood. This would act as a firm base for my feet, and I hot glued the feet in place when I was sure they were where i wanted them.

I then went and cut out the feet, and I filed the edge to be as close to the edges of the hot glued pieces as possible. Afterwards, I cut down some of the pieces in between the toes and in between the toe and foot. I was hoping to give more height to pieces so that there wouldn't be any bizarre flat pieces in the footprint. Again, I was not trying to be super precise, as the snow would be forgiving, and the imperfections do make it more realistic.

Step 5: Drilling Things

With the footprint piece done, all that is needed now is to give a way to mount it to the foot. I began by drilling 4 holes- two in the front and two in the back.

I wove the string as shown in the images above, except I did it around my foot (in the shoes that I would be moving around in the snow in). I kept a bit of string left over as my goal was to be able to tie them as shoes. 

Step 6: Usage

Now that they are all built up, it's time to use them. Although they will leave an impression in all kinds of snow, it is difficult to leave recognizable tracks in anything other than wet, compact snow. I tried to take a few photos of it here, but pictures of white on white are kind of difficult... I hope you can get the general idea from what is here, however.
In order to wear them, use the string that we put in earlier. The back loops go around the back of the shoes, and the shoes go through the other loops. The two ends then tie together.
Of course, to make tracks, I put on the new feet and walked around in them. I found that they were not too awkward to walk in, but they were difficult to run in. 

Step 7: TaDa!

So there you have my design for working yeti feet to leave yeti footprints all around the place! I hope you enjoyed this Instructable, and please feel free to let me know your thoughts, ideas, and opinions. As always, have a nice day!
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