Crafting within the lines?

Yesterday, I received an email from Manisha of Midwest Lotus that got me to thinking & I thought I’d share some of those thoughts with all of you.

She was worried about her project for the first challenge because, even though it was a lighted object, it didn’t fall into the lines of the inspirations I had put links to in the challenge post. I wrote back & told her I think the joy of a challenge like this one is that is it open to interpretation. Where I might create a candle holder, someone else may create a piece of wall art from glow sticks. Isn’t that the joy of crafting in general, taking an idea & putting a twist on it to make it your own? I think Susi & I are hoping these 52 challenges will inspire us & everyone else to try something new & stretch their crafty chops throughout the year. How each person does that is really up to them. It’ll be exciting to see how everyone uses their own talents to personalize each challenge. That’s why the only rules in Iron Craft are about when you can post the pictures of your your completed projects, we don’t want to put rules on how you actually interpret each challenge & stifle your creativity in any way!