Need help in choosing arts/crafts hobby

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Hi all,

Few days ago I realized that I need to find myself some hobby in art or maybe even craft field - I need it to have some meaningful relax after long workdays and life troubles. Until the last time my hobby was writing articles and stories but now as I made it basement for the startup business this is duty (however still very enjoyable but). Simultaneously I felt that I should do something with my own hands, maybe art or something nearby.

Until now I had just a little experience in any such fields - a bit of painting, clay modeling, plastic models assemblage - and probably no talents but I have an inspiration to learn something new. Right now I really don't know what to pick so maybe some folks here can help me with any ideas even if they sound wired? Because "common" ideas looks poorly for now. The most perfect if the results of selected art could be sold even on small price - I know myself and I like to create things but not to keep them, I love process. Like when I'm playing Minecraft I can spend enormous amount of time building fortresses with automated railroads, villages around, parks, farms and underground bases and then just leave it because I was never interested to play there, just to build.

I should add that one of my main interest is military history (right now - first half of XX century including both world wars), and I still remember with love the times when I was collecting small ww2 soldiers (20mm - by Revell and Italeri manufacturers mostly), tanks and artillery pieces for them - but there was little of art though, the only option in fact was painting them but I'm not big fan of this - I never felt desire to paint it to look like photo, just a basic and historically accurate color scheme.

I recommend crochet or knitting. Both are very relaxing and calming, and once you are comfortable you can listen to the radio or audiobook at the same time. You can sell the items you make, or give them as gifts. There are lots of videos on YouTube to get you going, and it's relatively inexpensive. Check out Ravelry.com

Calligraphy? If this appeals and you have talent for it, it's relatively easy to self-teach and you can make some money offering your services for wedding invitations etc that use calligraphers to make documents and invitations special and classy.

No. I had dysarthria when I was child and even despite now there are almost no speech problems it also affects writing so even just "relatively good handwriting" is impossible for me.

Do you have any interest in learning a musical instrument? I pretty much live for the time I get to spend in my studio. I also have wood carving on the bucket list; my hands are pretty shaky but for some reason when I'm focused on some form of creative endeavour it isn't so much of an issue.

Well, I have no prejudice against musical instrument - and completely no experience or knowledge in this area. However this is interesting suggestion, and I wonder how I missed until now. And what do you play?

Going off your original mention of WW2 figures and Minecraft, have you considered miniature scene creating? Miniature battles are fun to make. Sculpting landscape is a great way to get into sculpture as well.

This of course lends itself to model trains, cities, towns, etc. Its a great hobby.

Also– Legos.

One of my hobbies is making chutneys - my favourite is a peach chutney and an easy way of making this is to start with tinned peaches in syrup - saves all that peeling, stoning and mess! And you can make them in the microwave, which makes for easy cleaning up!

Miniature scenes were the first thing I thought about This may sound strange but I completely dislike scenes or dioramas - yes, they can look beautiful but seem to be lifeless. When all pieces - figures, tanks, buildings, trees - are separated they can be moved, played, used for some wargame, for creativity maybe but when it's all glued together it becomes just a solid object useful only for looking on it. I'm too emotional of course but I almost physically feel that's unright way So here I have to reject but it was anyway good suggestion, thanks.

Oh, I remember Lego very wll, I had plenty of it while was in primary school. That looks for me more interesting - not long ago I've seen photos of ww2 tanks made of lego pieces and this was awesome. I'll think more about this - it may be interesting idea. And lego models could always be rebuilt and modified, that's also great.

I started with a couple of years of piano lessons as a child, my uncle gave me his old guitar (which had one string,) at around the same time and I was lucky enough to have a friend who lived nearby who taught me to play the drums. When I was about 15 I found out about synthesisers and music creation software. I mainly wrote electronic music for about 10 years, but have slowly been drawn back to playing instruments, combining that with using production software (Ableton Live,) and slowly figuring out what I want to do musically.

At the moment I have the drums, digital piano, electric and bass guitar, semi-acoustic and nylon acoustic guitar, tabla, melodica, glockenspiel, djembe, cello and assorted other percussion instruments. I bought a flute the other week but it appears to need a good service before I can play it.

Even if you're not too keen on learning an instrument, learning about synthesisers is a great way to learn about playing with sound.

UPD: Looked throught prices for lego pieces - they are huge! Not sure if I'll afford it together with paying for college education. So I definitely need some other hobby, less expensive.

How about match-sticks and wood glue? Cheaper than Lego. I have seen some really complex working models made from match-sticks, and match-stick architecture. e.g. google 'matchtecture kits' A bag of 2000 sticks is quite affordable at about £1.50 ($2). Very relaxing! <- it takes time and care

Personally I often use meccano for engineering 'things that work', but this is expensive initially although it is re-usable, I use it sometimes for rapid 'invention' building in my work. The older style 'original' meccano is ideal for experiments and with total freedom to build what you like!

In my spare time I build 'OO' railways, a never ending hobby! Do not start this or you will be modelling for years and years my layout is now 16 feet x 12feet!! and still growing!

Sounds interesting, I'll google more about matchsticks.

And I had in childhood constructor like meccano - its copies were popular as well in ussr and then in russia in 1990s.

Railways Now I won't but it's great hobby! In school we together with friend were modeling trains of cardboard and paper - its not the same but in the stores we saw real models and were really inspired.

I recommend the wonderful world of Photoshop, you can download trial versions for a couple of months. And i recommend www.phlearn.com if you want to learn about it. Whatever your visual interest there are directions it can be taken in using Photoshop, and even some opportunity for sales. Redbubble is one of those sites which makes small scale selling easy.

Oh no, thanks I now have too much working in front of computer (9-10 hours daily), sometimes exactly with Photoshop.

How about assembling jigsaw puzzles of fine art.

Eurographics The Artist's Garden by Claude Monet 1000-Piece Puzzle