The Difference Between Making Something and Creating Something

Hi my friends! I hope your day is going well!

The other day I started thinking about two words I use all the time: making and creating. At first they sound like the same thing. If I'm making a card, sewing a bag, crocheting a blanket, or stitching a felt ornament, aren't I also creating it?

Yes...but I think there can be a little difference between the two, at least in the way I experience crafting.

Sometimes I'm making something. I may be following instructions, learning a technique, using a kit, working from a pattern, or recreating a project because I like it. There is absolutely nothing wrong with that. Following someone else's instructions can teach me skills I would never figure out on my own, and sometimes I simply want the comfort of knowing where I'm going.

But then there are moments when I begin creating. That's usually when my own decisions start taking over.

Maybe I change the colors, combine supplies from different companies, use a yarn that gives the project a completely different personality, change the size, leave something off, add something that wasn't in the instructions, or decide halfway through that I'm going in another direction.

The project begins with an idea, but somewhere along the way it starts sounding like me.

I experience this often in cardmaking. I could have patterned paper from one company, ink from another, a sentiment from somewhere else, dies from another manufacturer, and embellishments that had been sitting in my stash so long I couldn't remember where they came from. Individually, those supplies weren't designed as a set. But my eye could see that they belonged together on that particular card.

In the card photo above, that's exactly what I did. I started with blue patterned paper for the background. Then I used a more muted pink-and-purple patterned paper—both patterned papers are by Craft Consortium—which I trimmed into several squares to create a collage over black cardstock from Simon Says Stamp.

The circular sentiment is a pre-cut piece from the "Damask Delights Collection" by The Paper Boutique, and finally, I topped the card with paper flowers from Crafter's Square.

Separately, they're simply individual supplies from different companies. But when I brought them together, they became one cohesive design.

That's creating to me.

Creating doesn't mean I have to invent something nobody on earth has ever seen before. That's an awfully high bar to put on creativity! Most of us are influenced by things we've seen, techniques we've learned, colors we love, and makers who inspire us. Creating is what happens when those influences pass through our own hands, experiences, preferences, and imagination.

I also don't think one is better than the other.

There are days when I don't want to reinvent anything. Give me the instructions and let me enjoy the rhythm of making. There are other days when following the directions exactly makes my brain itch a little and I start wondering, "What if I did this instead?"

Both kinds of days belong in my craftroom.

And maybe that's why I enjoy having so many different crafts in my life. Sometimes I want the comfort of following a pattern and watching something slowly take shape. Other times I want to sit down with a pile of supplies, start moving things around, and see what happens.

I don't have to choose between being a maker and being a creator. I can be both. Sometimes I make something exactly the way someone taught me, and sometimes I take what I've learned and wander off in my own direction.

But sometimes I start out making...

...and somewhere along the way, I realize I've started creating.