This Christmas, two books from the D.I.Y series edited by Ellen Lupton found their way into my household: The D.I.Y Deck and D.I.Y. Kids. Both were published in 2007 and were designed to follow up on the successful initial book of the series D.I.Y. Design It Yourself published in 2006.

Design and Layout
The design of the D.I.Y Deck is interesting because it is a collection of 25 cards reminiscent of recipe cards with each featuring a particular project. The card set is subdivided into the categories Invitations, Housewares, Totes, Stickers, Shirts, and Gifts. Handling the cards is kind of fun; you can sit on the floor and spread them around to sort through projects you might want to attempt. Some of the cards have more than one page, though, which makes it easy to miss the flip side pictures. All the projects are rated by cost and time required to complete them.

D.I.Y. Kids follows the traditional book layout. Its main categories are Graphics, Toys, Home, and Fashion. Within these areas you find a wealth of cool ideas, and suggestions. Pop-up cards, book art, book plates, doll clothes, stuffed animals, architectural models, magnetic games, decoupage purses, fashion design, reverse applique, graffiti furniture,... you get the idea. I don't know if it's because this book is marketed towards kids instead of stodgy grown ups, but the projects and ideas are a lot more inspiring than those of the adult D.I.Y. Deck. As with the adult set, for each project D.I.Y. Kids includes an estimate of the cost and time required to complete a project and how much help and mess may be involved in creating a masterpiece.

The Craft-Off
For this review Liz (7) and I teamed up to test the "books" in a craft-off. Liz followed the instructions for pixel icons in the D.I.Y. Kids book, while I sorted through the Deck to decide on a project that could incorporate her work. Judging by the proliferation of pixel icons on my desktop, the instructions in the Kids book were very clear. If anyone is in the market for 1 inch stickers of bunnies, let me know. The instructions for the clock re-design were also straightforward. Hints like "the clock has to be made from two distinct pieces of plastic" and "keep the clock hands in order to make it easier to reassemble the clock" may seem obvious, but were very much appreciated.

Here is the merger of our efforts. My husband brought this kitchen clock into our marriage. I hope he appreciates the re-design.

In the final analysis. D.I.Y. Kids is the better value with more interesting, creative ideas that easily translate into a D.I.Y. adult world.

Simone
groundsel.etsy.com