I’ve Never Met a Craft I Didn’t Like

Have you ever walked into a craft store intending to get just one little thing to finish a project? And left with a full cart? Full with everything you need to start a new craft? Me too! There are just so many cool things to try! That’s fine if you have unlimited time and money. But if you’re like me, you really have to work to find the time to do your card making and crafting. I usually end up tinkering with my new goodies for a couple of days, and then it all gets put into a box or stuck under the bed, and I forget about them…until the next time I go to the craft store and the routine repeats itself.

I don’t know about you, but I’m at the point where I might be able to open my own craft store!

Quickie: Focus on Only One Type of Craft, or Two At The Most

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to try new things. It’s exciting and fun! But that is one of the reasons that we struggle with finding time to craft. After all, we have full-time jobs, families to take care of, and so much more. So, if you have a hard time finding the time to do your crafting as I do, it may be a good idea to stick to just one or two types of crafts that you really love and keep your focus and your pocketbook on them. It will be tough at first but try it. You will find that doing so will improve your ability to spend quality time on the crafts that you decide are the most important to you.

After a long hiatus from crafting, I recently converted a shed into a crafting paradise. I thought it would be a good idea to go through my crafty stash before moving it all into the shed… oh my word, did I ever have a lot of different kinds of stuff! I had supplies for knitting and crocheting, sewing, watercolor and acrylic painting, candle and soap making, jewelry making and beading, scrapbooking and card making, stained glass, t-shirt designing, and coffee cup making. There were things that I didn’t even know that I still had. Sound familiar?

One Craft Or Two

I couldn’t bring myself to get rid of a lot of it, but I decided that I would try to limit myself to working on just two different craft types: stained glass (after all, creating a space to do my stained glass was the reason I bought the shed in the first place) and card making. It’s been six months now, and I am amazed had how focused I have been.

In fact, it surprises me that I’ve spent most of my time on the cards rather than on glasswork. I’ve only done one piece of glass since I moved into the shed. It’s interesting that as I spend more time and money on card-making supplies and need more room to store them, I’ve begun to wonder if I really need to keep all that other stuff. Maybe I should get rid of some of the stash for the crafts that I am not focused on to make more room for the card-making supplies.

One Project At A Time

A best practice that I learned while working on my doctorate is that it is more efficient to finish a task before going on to the next one than to attempt to do several different tasks all at once. It takes more time to work on more than one thing because you have to “restart” for each task: you have to find the tools and supplies you need for each task, remind yourself where you were when you left off, etc. This concept is magnified when you have different crafts that take different tools, skills, and thought processes.

My experience with reducing my focus down to card-making and doing stained glass has been very positive. In addition to the pure joy that comes from creating beautiful things again, I have produced many more cards than I thought I could in the little bit of time that I have to work on them, and there is a fantastic sense of accomplishment each time I finish a card or a set of cards.

So, try it out. You don’t have to do anything but pick just one craft type to focus on and then work on it. And then the next time you go online or enter a craft store, make a B line to the craft(s) that you’ve decided are the ones that you will continue with.

Need Somewhere To Jot Down Your Crafty Ideas?

Check out How To Make A Crafter’s Travelers Notebook.

Happy crafting!