Mistakes happen. We all are learning and sometimes the best way to learn is to make mistakes. Do you know how many times I cut the wrong side of vinyl? Or forgot to mirror a vinyl project? Why do you think every time I write a vinyl post, I tell you not to do these things?
I want all of you that are afraid to take your Cricut out of the box to read this and then OPEN THE BOX! You won’t regret it!
My Mistakes
When I make a mistake on a project I see it as a learning point. I even tell you when I screw up so that you don’t make the same mistake. One of the biggest was when I was making this project:
I was very careful and made all my measurements. The sides were 4H x 5W. I made the whole project and foiled my embellishments. Unfortunately I put all the embellishments on and was putting the box together when I realized that I made the sides 5H x 4W. I sat there and looked at it for a while until I realized my mistake. The whole project had to be remade and if any of you made the project you know that wasn’t easy. But I learned to check first and mock assemble things BEFORE putting the embellishments on.
This is why I now make the projects a couple of times before I post them. It takes longer but at least I can help you do it right.
Mistake 2 (at least the 2nd one I’m telling you about)
Another example of “Think First Silly” was when I was doing this project:
This project had two big problems. First of all I tried to put the tabs on the inside like this:
You can see the gaps at the top. It just didn’t fit together right and looked terrible! I could have cried. But I went out and bought more vellum and reworked the project.
Of course then there was the second oops. I even included it in the tutorial so that you wouldn’t make the same mistake. I put one of the few pieces that had to go right side up (there are only a couple in this project) upside down. Luckily I found it before the glue dried and could fix it.
The Funniest (at least now that time has passed)
The funniest was when I was making my video on slicing. I designed this card with a cut out to slice from the base card. And I went on and on about choosing something that didn’t have any closed areas that would result in loosing the center. Well I finished the video and posted it. Then I was getting ready to write a post on the card design and actually made the card. Unfortunately I had put a border around the sentiment and when I made the card the whole inside of the card was cut out! I took down that video quickly!!! I included the story in the remake of the video so that we all could learn from my mistake.
The One Nobody Saw Until Now Anyway
One of the recent ones never got posted. I saw this beautiful card that Anna Griffin made on HSN Craft Day with a 3-D rose in the middle. I wanted to make one for myself with my Cricut. So I looked at her die (There are pictures of it all over the web) and tried and tried and tried to make this work. and if it had the card would have been beautiful
But it didn’t work. I haven’t given up yet though. I am going to make it work with access images if it kills me.
Final Thoughts
Just remember, don’t skip projects because you might make mistakes. You probably will dozens of times. But each mistake teaches you something and makes you better.
And with me telling you about my mistakes, you at least won’t make the same ones. You can make new ones (and tell me about them). But just think what you will learn.