The Big-Ass Book of Crafts by Mark Montano

In The Big-Ass Book of Crafts. Mark Montano offers crafters a multitude of crafts that are “home-worthy”. They are hip, trendy, fun, inspired but most of all absolutely beautiful. The book is filled with colourful photos of the creations; some projects even have step-by-step photos to supplement the instructions. Those are always handy.

Within each project, Mark has included a list of needed materials (most should be very easy to find and many crafters will also have these items on hand already) and instructions on how to complete the project. While a few of the crafts were a little short on instruction, a crafter should be able to figure out how to complete the project without too much trouble.

You don’t have to get further than page 8 to realize Mark has a wonderful sense of humour and that this book is going to be fun. On that particular page called “Kid Art”, the list of supplies includes: “Kids, preferably nieces and nephews. If you don’t have your own, borrow some!” and “premade cookie dough”. The first instruction is “Put the cookies in the oven”. [Hey Mark. Wanna come to my house to play? I didn’t have a cool uncle who baked me cookies.] For even more fun, the chapter names are hilarious! They include: “I made this for you…so you better love it!”, “I’ve been Felt up” and “More stuff to dust” just to name a few.

I was pleasantly surprised to see a few Popsicle stick projects in the book. These types of crafts were popular when I was a kid. I didn’t realize they came back into fashion, but they really fit in with the other projects in the book. Awesome.

My favourite thing about the book is the number of ideas I had by looking at Mark’s projects. As I flipped through the book, I thought of at least a dozen other projects to create using his ideas as stepping off points. I’ll be sure to give him full credit when someone asks me “Where did you get that idea from?”

My husband may even be interested in a few of these projects. He’s not a ‘crafty’ person per se, but he is handy when he wants to be. The “Copper-Tube Lantern”, “Copper-Tube Candelabra” and “Wood Scrap Book Mirror” are right up his alley. I might be able to turn him into a crafter yet. (Ok, I’m not going to hold my breath, but a girl can dream, can’t she?) And, oh, my sister is going to love the outdoor chandelier. It’s going to fit with her backyard décor perfectly.

I laughed out loud when I saw a “coffeepot” in the list of supplies. Step one in any of my projects is: Make coffee. I’m glad Mark and I agree that coffee is a much-needed item in crafting. I don’t know what I’d do without it.

This book will be used and treasured for many years to come.

Highly recommend and a must have for cool crafters.