book review: craft-a-day

A couple months ago I ordered Sarah Goldschadt's book Craft-a-Day, and have been holding onto it for a review in the new year. Why? Because this is a perfect time for you to get this book and get crafting through 2013!

The idea behind this book is this: make a simple craft every day for a year.



The projects are dated (but not year specific) and organized by themed weeks, with templates in varying sizes to be used for the projects in each theme. For example, last week was Fox week and you could make tags, plush, a finger puppet and more. All of the projects use basic materials like paper, felt, etc.

Quite honestly, I wish I had thought of this idea. It would make for an amazing year of blogging, but I think it's even better as a book. Why? Because you can always pull this book out, flip to the current date, and have something new to get you making! But better still, there are 52 themes in here that you could actually use any time.




Sarah shares simple and straightforward instructions for making each item, plus offers many extra tips to enhance things (such as how the bird magnet above gets a coat of extra protection!). The style of the templates and projects is very cohesive, which is especially good for the animal plush and finger puppets...they can play together so well!



Every once in a while, there's a project that is so simply stunning, it jumps off the page. Like this glittered leaf card. Wow! How does something so basic look so fancy?




As you might imagine, a book with 365 projects is a big book. 432 pages, in fact. But one thing I wasn't aware of before buying this was that there's a fair amount of overlap within the projects and themes.

For example, fish cake picks, a heart cake topper, fox cupcake picks, plus many other themes to go atop baked goods. The same goes for making stamps, cards, garlands and so on. Yes we all do this, adapting an idea for other holidays and themes, but I would have loved to have seen a few more types of projects throughout. That said, I do understand why she chose to keep things simple. For simplicity and the fun of having something to make every day!




Included at the back of the book is a how-to section for the basics of crafting the items. It's not very extensive, but these are techniques that most crafters will already be familiar with already. There are also bonus templates to add on and use with certain projects (or on their own).



Craft-a-Day is a book that I think would be extra fun (and handy!) with kids. You can bet that it will be my go-to when my little sister is unsure of what to do with herself and in need of something crafty to work on. What's the date? Hey it's cloud making time!

And if you want to get even more out of this, visit the author's blog. There are fun ways to connect with her and others who are making a craft-a-day (or just a craft along the way). But perhaps my favorite thing is that you can choose to get this book as an iPad app! So great!

Bottom line: this is a perfect book for those looking to simply create every day and I'm glad to have it in my collection.