I am a control freak. I really struggle to let go of things and have people do them for me. Being a perfectionist and being frugal, I absolutely hate it when I pay for someone to do something that I could have done myself with better quality results or attention to detail.
Occasionally I find a professional that meets my fussy standards and I can let go of my controlling nature and let them do their job. It astounds me how many businesses out there are underwhelming with their service. Businesses that should be experts in their field, that get paid to do what they do, but cannot deliver something better than what I, who is not an expert, could do myself.
Due to my inability to let go, there are many times when I attempt to do things myself and I fail miserably and wish I had just gone to an expert. Examples of this include altering my own clothes, baking cakes, house decorating and even cutting my own hair (trust me I would dye my own hair if I could!).
I also love a DIY project. I love learning or trying new things and seeing how things work. I also love the challenge of seeing something someone has produced and if there is a flaw, trying to reproduce a better version myself.
Earlier this year I had a regretful DIY experience. It all started when I decided at the last minute to have some flower crowns made for my sister’s birthday. I was walking past Jenny Bourke Florist the afternoon before her birthday and on a whim went in and asked Jenny and Kaitlin if they could make some flower crowns. As it was before market day, they were low on stock. Not only that, I had given them only a few hours notice (I wanted to pick up in the morning) and I gave little direction on what colours or theme I wanted.
The next morning I was blown away by the flower crowns (one is pictured here). They were beyond amazing and my sister loved her surprise. We spent a beautiful day at the beach sipping bubbly, eating cake, followed by a beautiful dinner in the evening all while rocking our flower crowns.
However I decided that I loved my flower crown so much that I wanted to keep it. How hard can it be to dry out flowers? The pictures here are of my flower crown after I had let it dry for a about a week or two (I cannot remember exactly). I was pretty much keeping it in a bag in the back of my fridge. A cold yet dry place seemed the perfect spot to keep it. As you can see from the photos here, the crown still looks amazing when semi dried. My attempt seemed to be going well BUT I was a little too confident. Instead of seeking advice on how to dry my crown, I just left it in the back of my fridge as I had been doing.
A couple of months later The Captain pulled a plastic bag out of the fridge and asked “What’s this?”. Inside was a mouldy, stinky, yet still somewhat pretty flower crown. Oops!! Needless to say (very sadly) I no longer have the flower crown. Next time I will be sure to seek advice or enlist an expert to dry my bouquets!
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