She's crafty.

So, yes, I'm talking about me. And yes, you all know that in fact I am NOT crafty, however, this last weekend I tried to be. You see, a grand prize was on the line, and my competitive streak kicked in. As I was working with my glue gun and scraps of paper the song "she's crafty" kept running through my mind. From Beastie Boys License to Ill album. Ahhh....good times. Thus, my post title.
Anyhoo, I thought I would tell my little story of how being completely pathetic can make winners out of us all. A "feel good moment" for those of us that aren't good at anything. Most of you have no idea how this feels...but I'm a regular in the circle of the talentless. And btw, this is a looong, post that may be a good distraction from your everyday work regime. So if you get so bored that you want to die while reading, no offense here. I got that way a couple of times as I was typing, however by that time I'd already invested WAY too much time to quit. Much like this entire experience.
I was invited to a "garden party" last weekend. As I'm not of the regular party-going crowd I wasn't sure what all a garden party entails. One thing in particular though, was that we were to make a hat for the occasion. And there would be a prize for the best hat there. My original plan was to do something along the lines of a princess hat....like the big cone with the streamer coming out of the top. I felt like that was something I could maybe handle. So I began gathering my materials...because I refused to go buy stuff. Because I'm cheap. I had all these toilet paper and paper towel and Christmas wrap rolls that I'd been saving because the kids said they'd wanted to be spiders for Halloween this year. And then a couple weeks ago changed their minds. So, instead of taking them to the recycle bin, I decided they would be my "raw materials".

I started out with the cardboard rolls. About three wrapping paper ones and a couple paper towel and toilet paper. This is what I ended up with:


Jeff and I had a few laughs. It was obvious that even the cone/streamer design was too complicated for me to handle, so I just began "feeling" my way along. This is usually par for the course when I try making something. Forget directions. I hate directions. Directions involve me doing reading I just don't feel like doing. But this time, I couldn't admit defeat. I couldn't let some paper hat kick my trash. So I soldiered on. After hours of work, umteen sticks of glue through my glue gun and tons of paper later, I ended up with this:

Obviously it was ugly. My sister had sent me a couple pics of her hat, which was cute and supposedly "Derby-ish". Something I later found out is desirable in the hat-making scene, though I'm still not sure what exactly it means. I won't tell exactly how many hours it took me to get from the previous pictures to this, but rest assured, it was simply pitiful that something that hideous could take so much time. I put it aside and put Syd to bed. She was as pooped as I was, as she had helped me "organize" my supplies all night, which added to my timeline. Jeff and I watched Kill Bill, and I tried not to stress over my lack of creativity.


Saturday morning I got up determined to make my hat cute. I have to say, I'm pretty lucky as far as being a mom goes. Both Riley and Cole told me I did an excellent job on my hat...and they thought it was pretty. Riley even said to me, "Mom, for someone that never really draws stuff or makes stuff, I think you did a really good job". (Honestly, it was a bit of an ego boost to get her approval).
And Cole said it reminded him of something he needed to "meditate with". I'm not exactly sure what that meant, but he's kind of been on a big meditation kick, so I'm sure that he wouldn't meditate wearing something that totally threw off his chi.
Muffy sent more hat pictures. And they ticked me off. (Meaning it was cute. Her hat said: garden party, and mine was a oval-esc paper hat with more paper hot glued onto it....in the shape of something you'd see on a Devo music video). So in order to cuten it up, I cluelessly worked on it off and on all day...pretty much avoiding any type of motherly tasks. And, as previously mentioned, my children and even Jeff supported me. It was hard for Jeff to understand how I could possibly take so much time on something so trivial--something that he could have done in a half hour. But, I am not Jeff.

I figured some bows would pretty it up. But obviously that was too complicated for me, as well. So after investing more time, I came up with this:

And only had time to make two of them, as I kept failing and burning myself with the hot glue gun. It was time to go show my complete failure to all the garden party attendees. I got dressed and Jeff said that he was going to take my picture, just to document all the time I spent. And then I was on my way.

After meeting up with Muff and getting to our destination, I noticed a few things. One, the back yard that we would be "partying" in, was beautiful. Like, professional garden beautiful. The girl that threw the party is a book-clubbie of ours, and her father did all his own yard work. It was no less than amazing...I've never seen the likes of it. He also loved birds. He had about four different homes scattered throughout his back yard containing parrots, and exotic pheasants and cockatiels.

Two, I was grossly underdressed. I showed up wearing jeans and a T-shirt, while everyone else was sporting cutesy summer wear. Dresses, pantsuits, linen ensembles. And lastly, EVERYONE'S hat was different from my creation. Like, completely different. And I was suddenly too embarrassed to actually show what I had spent my weekend working on. I guessed I missed the whole "Southern Bell" vibe, while everyone else just had the innate knowledge that that was the theme. Somehow I got way off base by ending up with "upside down plant holder".


Some of the lovely ladies of the evening...and I missed taking a pic of the hostess and her mom. (Sorry Andrea!) The party was catered, and candled and lovely and delicious and fancy, and all things that told me I should have made more of an effort. Andrea and her mother, Fran went above and beyond I don't think I have ever taken the time and thought that went into each and every food course, decoration, and little gifts that they showered us all with. So when it was time for party-goers to explain the ideas behind their hats and how they searched for the perfect elements and whatnot, I began to panic. But I finally beat my insecurities down and decided that I was going to use my ONE true talent. My ability to B.S. When asked to see my creation, I went into full "selling it" mode. I suddenly bragged about it being created out of recycled materials, and how I had used toilet paper rolls to create the shape and such. (Something that I'd been embarrassed about before, but took a chance that by bragging about it, I'd convince others that it was just me being "earth conscientious"). And then I sold them on the fact that after I was done with my hat for the evening, instead of throwing it away, turned upside down would make a lovely plant holder, and really, how much more "garden-esc" can you get than that?

So, the end result, my friends, is that I WON THE FABULOUS PRIZE!!! And it was a vote by my hat-making peers, I'll remind you. I won lotions and gourmet popcorn, and candies, and bath salts and flowery stationary and lots of stuff that was well-thought out and good smelling and extra fancy. And the girl that showed up with the gigantic piece of crap wearing the holy jeans and sporting sweat rings under her arms WON!!!!!! Being pathetic and talentless must be a talent all on its own. I am proof. That was my weekend, y'all. Hope yours went just as fabulously!