I recently added another bridesmaid to my wedding party. I hadn’t expected her to say yes, so my calculations for my bridesmaids’ bouquets were off. (Remember those pesky kusudama flowers that I decided I had to have for my wedding?)

While trying to figure out how many could be put into a decent bouquet, I decided I hated the single-wire stems I had created and that they needed to have two or even four wires to make the stems more stable.

I ended up tearing each and every single one of them apart. No, really — some of the petals that I had glued together came apart, and I had to reshape the entire flower. Three hours and two aching hands later, I was satisfied with the thickness of the stems.

The complete and total renovation of my bridesmaids’ bouquets made me wonder what else in my wedding I wasn’t completely satisfied with, and I began to question why I wasn’t satisfied with these things. I don’t want to point fingers, but I’m pretty sure websites like Pinterest and The Knot have something to do with it.

I’ve started to notice lately that when I go on Pinterest, I stay as far away from the wedding section as possible. I thought I was just tired of being surrounded by wedding madness, but I also realized that I was becoming sad when I saw all the beautiful wedding ideas that just aren’t possible for me to accomplish.

Don’t get me wrong: the purpose of this column is to prove that DIY is possible for everyone, myself included. I wholeheartedly stand by the fact that anyone can turn out a beautiful craft if they have enough time, inspiration and glue.

However, it is still entirely possible to get bogged down by all the lovely things you see online that were probably created by professionals, who have oodles of talent and are paid to make stuff instead of having to cram their craft time into random spare moments. That’s why blogs that showcase DIY attempts by actual humans are equally as inspirational to me as any DIY website out there. Check out [Pinstrocity](http://pinstrosity.blogspot.com/) sometime.

If you’ve been trying out crafts and you find that a lot of them aren’t working for you, I want you to know that it’s OK. The act of creating something is one of the most rewarding yet difficult things a person can do. It takes time to get good at it.

I’ve talked before about how freeing DIY is. It’s actually a good thing when you make mistakes, because you’re making them all by yourself, and no one can give you an F or take away your gold star. I want to amend that statement: only you are capable of giving yourself an F or taking away your pat on the back.

Sometimes the voices in your head tell you that your lines are crooked, or you didn’t pounce your glass correctly, even when everyone else is telling you how amazing everything looks. The stakes are even higher when you’re DIY-ing for a wedding, because you want everything to look perfect, or at least better than everyone else’s wedding (let’s be honest, we all want our weddings to be the “Best. Wedding. Ever.”). But unless you’ve burned down your building or accidentally hot glued your fiancé, you don’t get an F. You get an A, for awesome.

I’ve given myself permission to avoid Pinterest for a while, while I calm the voices in my head that say I’m not good enough. It doesn’t matter if my crafts look like I bought them on Etsy or not. At the end of the day, I’ll be marrying my best friend, and nobody will remember whether if things were crooked or slightly gooey.

No matter what happens, I’m giving myself a big gold star for DIY-ing out of love for my fiancé, and excitement for our marriage. Whether you’re getting married or just making things for others or yourself, if you push past your fears and failures, you get that big gold star, too.