The Curse of the Creative Crafter

Did you ever look at a creative craft project and ask yourself—Why did I do it? How consumed do you get when in the passionate drive of a new creative craft project? What creative crafter’s curse was I under to carve out another horrendous DIY disaster?

I feel your pain! So, buckle-up, babe, this is all about the hustle for the handmade…

When was that first call to be a Creative of the Craft?

Back in the time of sword-wielding menaces on horseback, specialists were created out of pure necessity for their village. It was considered the birth of trade and the first masters of the creative craft.

In the times of sword-wielding menaces on horseback…

Yet, the creative art of craft could go back further with the simplistic nature of cave drawings.

Yep, it’s all about crafting art for the walls that balances the boulders in the doorway to give that special hole in the hill some street appeal. What about an intricate sculpture of stone for that starkly unused corner that may still stand today. Archaeology anyone?

A creative craft is also known as a trade, a past-time, a hobby, art, or an obsession. It’s the use of a creative skill that can churn out a luxury item, or for making that necessary item to save money. It’s anything from crafting Christmas decorations to perfecting that amber brew to rocket-launch your festivities. There are food crafts, clothes and papercrafts, and don’t forget the practitioners of witchcraft.

The term Craft can also include the crafting of images for Instagram or YouTube and stories, right down to crafting your latest tweet.

And so the Handmakers Created an Industry!

Craft is all about being creative, where lots of clever crafters curate their crafty love into an online home-based business. #Ladybosses, you have my respect!

Of course, there are Hardware Stores and large craft shops that stock materials for quilting, stamping, and scrapbooking.

Specialist creative craft stores can have wall-to-wall wool for knitters and cross-stitchers.

Creative craft studios can specialise in pottery, glass blowing, sword-making, to crafting portable fire pits for the humble backyard.

In almost every major country town you’ll find at least one Craft Corner tucked away somewhere.

There are even creative Craft Councils, and let’s not forget Craft Fairs perfectly timed for Christmas.

For those Queens of the Creative Craft, this is nothing new. But, for those new to Craft world, be warned because there are challenges faced with each new project…

The Hazards in the Hustle for the Handmade…

Yes, there are many challenges creative crafters face where their amazing focus to persevere only adds to the triumph.

Some challenges that crafters face can start small, such as the banning of scissors from airports. Or worse, when you can’t find your special craft scissors that have been borrowed permanently by a fellow family member. Paint dries in their tins. New glue hardens in the bottle, and some cleansers and glazes are toxic. Measurements are misjudged in baking disasters that cake the wall of the oven. Or you’ve spilled too much sugar into your craft beer where the bottles end up going nuclear showering the street in glass and froth.

But throughout the Crafter’s Campaign, they will cut, prick, pin, slice, drop and damage their bodies all in pursuit of a project.

Why?

Because…

The Home is the Creative Crafter’s Museum.

You have that bare spot of nothingness that is screaming for something to fill that void. You’ve searched the stores and come up short for that perfect item. So you seek inspiration elsewhere, like on Pinterest.

So, you take a seat and sip on your coffee and do the—

Scrolling…

Then—

Eureka! The muse whispers in your ear as she hammers you with a shovel-load of inspiration.

Bounding from your seat while slipping on your shoes, you do a stocktake of goods in the shed or that special magic cupboard-of-crap. Your car learns to slide around corners racing to the heavenly hardware store. There, while sucked under the veil of creativity, responsibility has no place as you blow apart your budget. But that’s okay, the family can live on Vegemite sandwiches for dinner until payday.

Land-speed records were broken as the car shudders to a standstill under the cloud of burning rubber in the driveway.

Land-speed records were broken as the car shudders to a standstill under the cloud of burning rubber in the driveway. The doors are left wide open while you’re hauling in your latest national treasure. You shove aside the bills and breakfast dishes to fill the table with shopping bags and boxes and then it begins…

Obsession Hits the Humble Home!

Dirty dishes are piled in the sink and the cupboards are bare. Cereal is spilled across the kitchen bench, and the fish tank is green. The toilet roll holder is naked, yet, within reach is the pyramid of pristine rolls still in their ripped packaging. A few runaway paper-rolls lie in the barren linen cupboard that is near the empty clothes basket overshadowed by a moving mountain of laundry. Children have hijacked the lounge room where a complex tent city is erected from the good linen kept purely for guests, where they’re having a seance with your family heirloom snowglobes. The stereo is fighting with the TV to be heard, while the lawn waves at the neighbours well above the fence line.

And you see none of it.

Glitter floats in the air in your party for one, while the snip-snip of scissors creates confetti from shredded materials. Hammers knock, chisels tap, and sandpaper scrapes, stirring sawdust skywards as paint drops like rain on dusty concrete any handyman or woman would be proud of. The tink-tink of tools masks cuss-words that’d make a truck driver blush, all while you’re trapped under the Crafter’s curse making you the centre of a cyclone.

And then there’s silence.

The moment when a DIYer Downs Their Tools…

Tools down, you lift your safety goggles, pushing back your limp sawdust-shampooed hair. You remove your face mask to show off your clown-mouth outlined from the grit and grime. You tear off your gardening gloves where chipped fingernails poke through the worn ends. But they match the paint-stained clothes, sporting new holes carved from timber and protruding screws.

But now, you step back and stare at your latest creation that shines among the surrounding chaos where dust has yet to settle.

Your eyes twinkle in the dying sunlight as your lips curl into the start of a smile. Pride builds inside you while you ignore every aching muscle in your body.

Because….

You. Did. It.

Now, you wait for it to dry as you admire it from all angles before placing it below the bent birdhouse that hovers near the leaky water fountain. This new masterpiece will blend well with the leaning pallet fence, propped up by the crumbling mosaic totem poles made from old teacups. But it’s perfect for that crocheted hammock in the corner, shaded by the woven net of grass you let grow!

Being a creative crafter is a curse that is impossible to resist

I guess that’s why being a creative crafter can be a curse because it’s impossible to resist the creative’s calling.

(*raising my hand ) If you haven’t guessed already, I too am an obsessed crafter and so are some of my characters.

In THE FOOTBALL WHISPERER, our heroine is a creative crafter. She paints pebbles and is working towards a moon door made of rocks to view through her bedroom window.

In AVOIDING THE PITY PARTY, this quirky story is set in a family hardware store that is a haven of discovery.

In UNPLANNED PARTY, we meet the introvert Emma, who has taken her love for creating as part of her craft as a party planner. She’s always handmaking new products perfect for her next party.

In the ART of DUST, we meet the single mother Kat, a clever handywoman, who loves her craftwork so much she turns it into an art form in the small outback town of Elsie Creek.

And, I have no doubt, I’ll be crafting more—both on and off the page—in the future. So why not stick around and see where this story ends by joining the #wordjourney—HERE.