Tuesday, March 5, 2013

The Design Worked on Paper

Yes, I had it all planned out on paper. I was feeling quite confident that the design would work perfectly in reality.

It did not. Has that ever happened to you? After spending time (hours, days, weeks) pre-planning a special project, accounting for all the pitfalls, drawing a draft on paper, etc...the ‘thing’ just doesn’t work.

What do you do? Give up and toss it into the trash? Throw it across the room in frustration? Alter your design or expectation? Scream? Cry?


I’ve done all of the above at different times in my crafting history.

What went wrong in the first place? Did I over-estimate my skill level? Were miscalculations made during the planning stage? Are the materials not appropriate for the design? Am I stupid?

Such a frustrating situation has happened to me this week. I finished a tablet weaving project, my first single diamond shape pattern trim. I was feeling pretty proud of my accomplishment. Look how clever I am! (Patting myself on the back)


I thought I had all the variables figured out now. I decided to try a multi-diamond design next. I warped up the loom again after carefully mapping out the design on graph paper. No problem, this would work fine.

That was an incorrect assumption. I simply have not been able to get it to come out like it does on paper. After several failed attempts, only making it worse, I’ve set it aside for now. I’ll tackle it again in a week or two when my frustration level subsides a bit. *smile*


Maybe I should have accepted the variation that was evolving instead of trying to ‘fix’ it. Hindsight is 20/20, isn’t it? 

No comments:

Post a Comment