Have you ever "self-taught" yourself a hobby or a craft and became an expert in it?

Question

I sometimes read in magazine articles and biographies where a performer or artist would say how they successfully taught themselves how to play a certain instrument or develop a new skill without any outside interference. Have you ever done something similiar without any help?

Answer 1

I was blessed with an artistic talent. Most craft things I want to do, I just stumble my way through, and teach myself. When I hit a stumbling block I will buy an instruction book to find out where my problem might be. I usually stay with a new craft, until I master it. I took a college courses to become a professional floral designer. That is something I wanted to learn the " professional " way of doing. Otherwise. I'm self taught.

Answer 2

I'm left handed and wanted to learn to crochet. Everyone in my family is righthanded so my mom bought me a book for lefties. I couldn't figure it out. A couple days later I picked up a pattern book of my sister's and with some yarn and a hook, started to go through the book. An hour later, mom came in and I showed her my new hat. She thought my sister made it for me until I showed her how i was making trim for a matching scarf. I now have taught both left and right handed crochet and have my own business making specialty items. BTW, that's also when I found out I was ambidexrious (didn't say I could spell though!)

Answer 3

For Christmas one year (I was around age 11 or 12), I received a box of Sculpey modeling clay. I didn't use it much at first, but soon after, I desperately wanted a Mario action figure, which was, at the time, virtually unattainable. So, I found a game instruction book with a few good pictures of him, broke out the clay, and set to work.

It took me about two days of tweaking to get the sculpture looking as close to the pictures as I wanted. I had never molded anything before in my life, and it looked so close to the picture that my mother gasped when she saw it. She found some acrylic paints to color it with, and by the end, I had the "action figure" I wanted. After that, I spent a great deal of my free time making sculptures of video game and cartoon characters, most of which have unfortunately been lost in the process of moving several times. I haven't done much sculpting in the past couple of years (I'm now in my early twenties), but I hope to have some free time to do so sometime soon.

Answer 4

I am largely self taught when it comes to sewing my daughters ice skating dresses. And while I am no expert they look really good -- good enough to compete in.

There are no reference for how to work with the type of fabric they require and only a few web sites that mention anything about stretch fabric and they don't talk about skating dresses. I have been able to ask a few people a few questions but they don't really answer since they don't want you as a competitor for their little market and I can't blame them really!

To buy a dress like the ones I make for her would cost me over a hundred dollars and they will only get more expensive as she grows so it was figure it out or die trying.

Answer 5

I taught myself to knit from library books . I have knitted many fairIsle, intarsia, and cable patterns. I discovered that the only thing holding me back was the word "can't". For years I knew how to crochet but always said I can't knit. Then I told myself that if other people could do it, why couldn't I? I persevered and practiced on swatches and progressed to the point where I was knitting beautiful sweaters for others. I'm still learning new things all the time.

Answer 6

I tend to keep my hobbies at a limit because when I do so much of one hobby at a time, it just starts to bore me. I think that having a good variety of hobbies allows this to be accomplished easily. And I agree Yahoo! Answers can be obsessive for some...thankfully I don't have the patience for it all of the time!! :) =] Hope this helps.

Answer 7

Yep!! and now I am the Spinning editor at BellaOnline!!!

I taught myself to spin wool fiber into yarn, then started other fibers, I taught myself to weave nice fabrics, not just rugs.

My total expertise is in spinning on the Walking Wheel, it is a very contrary ancient piece of equipment. But oh; so much fun to work with in public.

Answer 8

I taught myself to fix and make costume jewelry when I was in my early 20s. I bought a few little books about jewelry-making and then never looked at them. If you're interested enough, you can teach yourself just about anything. As it's a hobby, there's no pressure

Answer 9

I taught myself to make cards on a photo editing program. I was just playing around, not actually trying to make cards, when I realized I could make them. I had the help of the program. . .
I taught myself sign language, but I had a book to show me the hand placements.

Answer 10

Sure, I do it all the time. It's much more fun to figure out something on my own than to follow someone else's instructions. I've done it with cement garden decor, woodworking, sewing and plastic canvas.
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