Why I'm a sucky crafter...

Last night, while I was painting this little pot (to put it in our bathroom to hold q-tips), I kept scrutinizing it over and over again, wondering why I hated it so much. The colours perfectly matched the new bathroom colours. The leaves I drew, then painted in looked good (I even edged them using a black permanent marker to make it look smoother). But I kept wanting to toss it out. I was thinking and painting, thinking and painting and I finally figured out why, even as I crave crafting, buy materials to craft, obsess over doing crafts and scour Pinterest for craft ideas, that I hate everything I create. I suck. Yep, sounds completely negative but I think I really suck at crafts. Here are examples of why I suck at crafts: -I can't draw a straight line or even cut in a straight line. I have never been able to do this and I've found that things look WAY better when you can draw a straight line. -I'm impatient and want results right away. I don't like to wait for stuff to dry, to "cure" or finish. This is amplified by the fact that when I am doing a craft, it takes up valuable counter space in our kitchen and my husband grumbles about that until I put everything away...and I don't do that until the craft is finished. -I'm a perfectionist. If something looks wonky, I'll try to fix it but if I end up screwing it up more, I'm likely to toss it. I'm always critical and have high standards, which I never feel I meet. -I'm cheap. I don't spend oodles and oodles of money finding the highest quality products. My paintbrushes are dollar store, my ribbons are consignment store. If I don't buy it at the dollar store or second hand, I don't do it. Probably why my crafts LOOK cheap. They ARE! LOL -I'm a visual person. I like the way I see things but when what I do doesn't replicate that or what I thought it would look like, I get frustrated and give up. -I'm stubborn. Instead of conceding that I suck at crafts, I keep trying different things hoping it will work. So what have I learned here? Absolutely nothing. I will still do the crafts I have (cause I spent my money on them) and will probably continue to hate them (I made a canvas painted silver with blue buttons organized to look like stars (my best friend, Niki's, favourite) and gave it to her birthday back in December and every time I see it, I want to rip it off the wall and throw it in the garbage. I think it looks like a 5 year old did it. But she stubbornly tells me she loves it...I'll wait until she leaves... I'm such a frustrated crafter. I've only successfully made a few things that I'm actually proud of. The wooden massive shelf I made in Grade 9 shop class (even though I only got a 84 on it), the two cross stitches I made for Abby before she was born (I finished Winnie the Pooh and Piglet, did NOT finish Tigger and Eeyore...maybe if I have another kid!) and the "A" initial I painted and decorated with buttons. Also, the scrapbook I'm almost finished of Abby year 1 (don't remind me that she's almost 3 and I'm two years behind...I'm still optimistic!) So I've had a few (very few) successes to my many, many defeats. But I'm stubborn, so I will keep trying. I will never be one of those people who can turn crap into art or treasures but I will probably have to settle for turning my cheap crap into cheap art and hoping everyone thinks Abby did it! Now, if she becomes a better crafter than I am...sob sob...

Another big craft...

Ok, so I epic-failed on doing crafts for Christmas...but at least I remembered to get my presents all done on time and wrapped...sort of...thank goodness for gift bags!
So to kick off the new year, I have decided to pick a project from my "Crafts to try" folder on Pinterest and DO IT. I am trying to pick things that are relatively easy, don't take too much time (or counter space) and cost little to no money to do, using supplies I already have.
The next project is going to be a bin made from...wait for it...an empty diaper box...yep, Pampers and Huggies are going to LOVE me! Here's the project idea:



I don't know if I'm going to use burlap per se...but I'm going to go raid the thrift stores for some fabric (once I measure how much I'm going to need). I aim to be completely done this project by the end of the weekend. Wish me luck!

Project two COMPLETE! Knife Block

Ok...took me longer than I thought...but I blame my husband for dragging his feet to varnish it! LOL
I didn't stencil it with a letter like the craft called for cause I was just happy with the colour. So here it is...the original...


And MINE!

Project two almost finished!

My second project I completed mostly but then my husband said it should be varnished and offered to do it...so who knows when it will be finished? LOL But MY end is complete.
I wanted to try to do projects that I could complete without having to buy anything. Something simple, easy, that wouldn't take a long time...so I had seen this one idea on Pinterest that I knew I could do easily.
See below:

So since I too had a boring old knife block, I thought I should try painting it and see what happened. I ended up painting it a green shade cause it goes with my kitchen colours pretty well. Then I hadn't read how the girl distressed hers so I tried to mix a few colours together and used a plastic fork to give wavy lines...yeah it looked that stupid too...so I repainted over it (I just used acrylic paint cause I have tons) and then read how she did it and went "OH!" borrowed some sandpaper from my hubby and voila! It now looks like it's supposed to. But my husband wants to varnish it to protect...ok, good idea...so once he does that, I will post the final pic. Another mini project done. I just bought all the supplies and fabric for my upcoming "big" project that I'm going to start working on tonight (if I don't fall asleep too early!)...stay tuned!!

Project one complete!

So after promising myself I would complete a project I started, I actually did it...I had it done by Saturday afternoon, which impressed me!
Step one, find the wooden "A" I had bought for Abby for Christmas two years ago...

Step two, paint the wooden A all white. I thought about using a funky colour but with me using cool buttons, I was worried it would mess up the look. I was trying to keep it simple. (*mental note: when painted something wooden and having to paint all over, don't use newspaper! I ended up switching to aluminum foil instead)

After that, I got out my trusty glue gun and, making sure Abby was occupied and NOT going to try to grab anything from me, I set to work, gluing yellow and pink buttons to it in a random (yet making sense) way. I added the ribbons first and then glued the button over top. It took no time at all. I added a little colourful glitter glue to a few buttons and stacked a few buttons for a layered look. I think it turned out pretty good and though I'm sure I won't be doing a craft every weekend, I finally accomplished a craft that I'm proud of! And it cost me $0 to do it since I already had all the supplies! Here is the end result!

First challenge

Ok, so I love decor, pretty things and have no money to buy that stuff. So what I am going to attempt to do for my first project (on this blog) is to take what I already have and do something crafty. I always tend to get excited about something, start it and then peter out, so I'm hopefully going to alleviate that by sticking to small projects that don't take me oodles of time.
PROJECT 1:
I bought this "A" wooden letter for Abby for Christmas when she was like 3 months (I got it at the dollar store and thought I'd do something crafty with it...yeah...two years later). I recently came across it and thought I should really do something with it. Then I saw this:

I thought, "Ok, I have the letter, I have paint to paint it with and I have a ton of buttons that I could decorate it with."
So this weekend, I will attempt to recreate this for my girl. I shall take a picture of the completed project and post something (victory hopefully) on Monday! Wish me luck!

My creative goals

I've always had an interest in crafting. As a kid, I always loved drawing fashion, I created my own paper dolls and made my own "clothes" for them. I tried my hand at cross stitching, embroidery, painting, watercolours, and yet, I never seem to be happy with my results, get frustrated and give up. Yep, I'm a quitter. I remember making doll clothes for my step daughter's Barbies and sometimes they turned out pretty cool. But I was no master sewer. I even have my crafty books. I have scrapbooks (constant work in progress), my little scraps of words and images that I want to put in books, clothes ideas for my "look book", images of home stuff for my "home wish book". People see me with magazines, hear me tearing out pages and don't even blink anymore. My glue stick, scissors and books come everywhere with me, hoping for a chance to put them together. And yet, I constantly feel like I'm not completing things.
I have super cool ideas and horrible follow through. I don't know HOW to fix it, but I have been toying around with the idea of doing a blog about my experiences and trying to be crafty...maybe even getting better at it along the way and documenting my successes (and failures). Here's how THAT started: First, I joined Twitter (still can't remember why), then I was looking for famous people to follow and found Lauren Conrad (of the Hills, which I loved watching). I followed her and even though I didn't do much "tweeting", I liked reading her tweets. I followed one tweet link to her site and started reading her blogs. Finding these interesting, I read one about her addiction to Pinterest. I had never heard of this, so of course, being the journalist I am (three years of being a reporter and now anytime I don't know something, I Google it!), I Googled it. Then I realized you had to join to be a part of it. So I joined (it was free, otherwise I wouldn't have) and became HOOKED. There are all these images of stuff (clothes, hairstyles, home decor, colour options, funky stuff) and you "repin" it to your page and can go through the stuff anytime you want. It's like someone went inside my brain, realized how hopeless I was and took all my little scraps of paper and put them online (my husband would be SOOO proud!). I repinned half the board and then realized I needed to organize my pins...I was in heaven. I could add, move, delete my pins and man, it was addictive! So I would click on others' pins and then end up following the link to their blogs and most of what I was clicking on were people's experiences with crafting. I was so inspired. I have so many ideas. Now, I have to find the motivation to do them.
First one...I found an image of this Heart shaped image with words written in it. I thought it looked so cool. I figured out how to do it...harder than it first looked...and went out, bought a frame and printed the image out...and it looked like a fourth grade project. I had planned to give it to my mom for her birthday but honestly, I couldn't...it sucked too much. I'll attach a pic of the project and then my version. I haven't given up on it...but it needs serious tweaking to make it way better.
So I plan to use this blog to blog about what I am inspired by and then to post what I have accomplished (or haven't).
Right now, my focus is on Abby's year 1 scrapbook (and yes, she's currently 2 years old and almost 2 months...I told you I suck!) and the frame for my mom.
Abby's scrapbook—I have 6 pages done (I'm using a friend's template, with each page representing a month, plus the day of her birth and me preggo). I will post pics as I get them done...
Here's page 1

Wish me luck!