I have a reason why I craft.  See, the majority of what I do gets undone 5 minutes after I’ve finished.  The laundry, the dishes, cleaning up the living room.  Regardless of how often I do it, as soon as I turn around, I’ve got to do it again.  In some ways, my code writing work is that way, too.  As soon as I finish one piece, it’s time to update it and modify it.  And let’s not even talk about how I say the same things to the girls over and over again.  Every day.  Every hour.  Many times, I feel like I never have closure with anything. And it’s hard to recognize anything as an accomplishment when it never seems to be finished.  I know, I know…zen and the art of dishwashing and yada, yada, yada.  I guess I’m just not far along enough in my enlightenment to say to myself “the journey of cleaning up the house is accomplishment enough.”  Yeah, not there yet. 

But, my crafts?  Well for the most part they give me a sense of closure.  When I finish them.  Which I’ll admit doesn’t happen as frequently as I’d like.  (Steve’s probably laughing hysterically as he reads this, thinking about all the half-finished “projects” I have around the house.)   When I do finish them though, I really enjoy the feeling of having created something that will last, at least longer than a couple of seconds.

I’m going to be honest here.  This craft did not give me that happy, contented feeling.  I’ll explain why in a minute.

I am a hopeless craft blog addict (I’m also a food blog addict, but you probably already knew that).  One of my favorite craft blogs in Infarrantly Creative.  Beckie does some amazing things.  Honestly, I am not a particularly creative person.  I’m able to copy projects that other people come up with fairly well, and on a good day, I can take someone else’s idea and tweak it to give it my own personal spin, but actually coming up with something cool and creative on my own?  Not exactly my forte.    A few months ago, Beckie started creating these awesome Countdown boards using MDF board, some paint, her Silhouette machine, and Hershey kisses.  She did a St. Patrick’s Day one, an Easter one, a Summer one and a few others.  I was hoping that she’d do a Halloween one and I wasn’t disappointed.  Really, I guess I could have figured it out myself, but ummm…can you say laziness on my part? 

I was so excited to start this project.  From the beginning, though, it was rife with difficulty (let me be perfectly clear here…none of my troubles had anything to do with Beckie’s instructions or the idea…it was all idiocy on my part).  Abigail and I had to go to two stores to get the board (Lowes wouldn’t cut it for us because their saw was broken).  Then, Steve drilled the holes for me and it took him three days because the drill battery kept dying (I think we’re investing in a corded drill very soon!).  Then, I had more trouble with the spiderweb stencil than any sane person ought to have with a stencil.  I ended up using it as a reverse stencil – I painted a square of the board silver, placed the inverted stencil on the board and repainted the black – does that make sense?  It worked like a charm that way.  Then, I didn’t have any regular Modge Podge and had to use Glitter Modge Podge which I think actually turned out pretty cool.  Then, I couldn’t find any adhesive tape – I have like three dispensers and two replacement cartridges but none of them matched.  Ughhh!  Finally, finally, I got them finished (did I mention I made two of them – one for Gracie and one for Abigail).  All I wanted to do was take a picture.   I set one in the kitchen.  I bumped it and all of the kisses fell out.  Some of them fell on the floor.  Ella Bella ran over and gulped them up, wrapper, numbers, and all.  Ugghhhh!  So, I moved them to the bathroom.  Yesterday, before I could get a picture, Abigail went in there and knocked the whole thing over.  Again with the kisses on the floor!  Finally, finally I got the picture.  But, I was so frustrated with the whole process that I wanted to cry!  I think a huge part of the problem is that I got a really, really cheapie easel to hold it up and it slides and collapses very easily.  Also, I think Steve & I messed up drilling some of the holes and either got them too deep or too shallow so the kisses don’t sit flush with the board. 

The girls think these are the coolest thing ever!  They’re begging to eat the kisses and have already come up with ideas for a Christmas countdown board, a Birthday countdown board, and Gracie suggested we make one for each month.  I told her I didn’t know about that!  This morning, though, I’m ready to admit that I’d like to try and make another one.  Because, they are sooooo cool and they really do look awesome sitting on the counter.  And, while the process may not have been as smooth as I’d like, I do feel some sense of accomplishment which is the whole purpose.  Right?