How about a guy like me, where do I fit in.

Let me tell you a little bit about myself so we can see if I am at the right place. I build things, creat things I guess one would say. I build stoves, cookers, trailers, all kinds of mechanical things etc. you name it and I've probably built it, not your average items mind you but unique in design as well as in operation. I built my first engine powered welder complete with automatic throttle, still have it, in fact a large part of my creations were made using it as the welder. I converted an old lawn tractor into a yard machine, on steriods too I'll add, 30 some years ago that I still use today for doing everything from digging the hole for our cellar or our swimming pool to leveling out our yard to plowing our garden, using ingenuity and old parts that were not designed to be used in the way I use them but with modifications work fine for years in their new incarnations. I'm just an old boy who had to make my own toys as a kid as all my bro's and sis's had to do too, they mostly grew out of it, I didn't. If someone else has done it I pretty much don't have much interest in it for me to do, I use my own designs, very seldom use someone else's. I like assembling and modifying items in a way as they were not intended to be used as orginally conceived. I very seldom hire anyone to do anything for us as I can do it and that way I will know exactly how it was done so as to not have to worry about it later. I see what I do as crafts but not sure this is the right forum for me and it'll be no prol'em if so. Anyways :hi:

You might feel more comfortable in the DIY forum, but as far as I'm concerned, you're a crafts kind of person. I'm very much the same way, as I will try my hand at anything and do it my way. For example, I've turned two leaves of a mahogany dining room table into the sides of a daybed I constructed, and one of the legs of the same table is now the base for a side table in my living room. To me, those things are just as much arts and crafts as my crochet, knitting, decorative painting, canvases and sketches, along with all the other things that can be created with ones hands.

Here's one of the projects I mentioned...

That table and the daybed were my inspiration for daring to try an English library-look wainscoting in the bathroom I just redid. I'm really proud of the job I've done in there.

but if there is another economic depression coming, I'm moving in next door to you. ;o)

A craft is a skill, especially involving practical arts. It may refer to a trade or particular art.

The term is often used as part of a longer word (and also in the plural). For example, a craft-brother is a fellow worker in a particular trade and a craft-guild is, historically, a guild of workers in the same trade. See some further examples below.

The term is often used to describe the family of artistic practices within the decorative arts that traditionally are defined by their relationship to functional or utilitarian products (such as sculptural forms in the vessel tradition) or by their use of such natural media as wood, clay, glass, textiles, and metal. Crafts practiced by independent artists working alone or in small groups are often referred to as studio craft. Studio craft includes studio pottery, metal work, weaving, wood turning and other forms of wood working, glass blowing, and glass art.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crafts


Welcome to the group, I hope you find a home here. What you do is certainly more than do it yourself, it is both creative and functional.
I hope are ready for us to pick your brain!

I design and build furniture. Being self-taught, the construction techniques can be pretty "creative" (;-) But, it's always solid.) I also landscape, sew, crochet, draw, paint, make mosaics, sculpt, etc.

It's about being creative and using your hands, mind and heart.

(Maybe you can give me tips on welding, when the time comes?)

:hi:

He would never stop trying to figure out the yard machine. I think he's going to grow up being an engineer (like my dad and brother). *sigh* Now, if only I could get him to stop messing with electric cords . . .

You're a crafter. It's a large category. :) Hmmmm . . . I'll bet you could design a really nice electric spinner or better carder. Hmmm . . .

....or an electric warping wheel...or a turbo charged loom....hmmmmm
anyway. welcome to the crafts group, Madokie!

:bounce: :hi: :yourock:

I got spanked for doing some primitive chromatography when I was a kid, involving black ink, tissue paper, water and my parents' liquor cabinet. I never tired of twitting them that I helped them pay off their house doing a more sophisticated version of what they spanked me for. :)

He does these weird electric cord "installations" where he figures out how to hook them all up for some pretended purpose. Then, there are the keys. He still hasn't outgrown his key phase--at four and a half. Oh, and tractors with his pretend farm (which is very real to him--I get daily updates with how the animals and crops are doing). I figure he'll find his own path somehow, and it will most likely involved taking things apart or figuring out how to make them work better.

I have a good friend in Huntsville (Engineer Corps) who sounds so much like you. He's always inventing or thinking of inventions.

During one call I asked him what he'd been doing and he said he'd been 'thinking about air.' Coming from anyone else I would have thought they had a screw loose, but he was actually planning how to use air powered devices for speed bumps, lighting, so on.

His projects don't always work, but he has fun making them and his mind is sharp and innovative.

I've tried my hand at welding and it's not easy. I admire a strong, handsome weld and the person who does it.:hi:

I'd love to see some of the things you've made.

It's just bigger and noisier crafting than most. I'm a guy, too, and I cross-stitch; it's very relaxing. I do household carpentry, too, I've built a shed and a deck (both visible on Google Earth), and I'm working on the basement, though it's been on hold for a while because my back got buggered up. It's getting better though, and I'll be slinging them 2x4's again soon!