My Hideous Skyrim Helmet: Part 1

I have been saving a massive cardboard box in my attic for nearly a year. It is enormous*, large enough to contain me. I am about 5 feet worth of person.

For nearly a year, I have defended its presence, drowning out my husband's protestations against "clutter" with my insistence that, just as Michelangelo sensed the beauty hidden within a block of marble, I too would one day discover the hidden universal purpose of my cardboard box.

I would bring out the essential cardboard box-ness of the cardboard box.  

Within this bold declaration, I would inevitably close the attic door and completely forget about its very existence.

So a few weekends ago - surprised (as usual) to find it, slumped in a corner, I resolved to do something with it. Anything.

Out of sheer laziness, I resorted to Pinterest. My heart told me this would be a pointless endeavor, and after several variant, progressively specific searches...

cardboard + craft

cardboard + craft + no jesus

cardboard + craft + no jesus + no children + adult = this is not happening

this is tempting but also not happening

... I accepted that Pinterest has little to offer the artistic cardboard crafter. I mean, yes. I found a few amazing pieces - dresses, dinosaur heads, weapons, etc. - but anything remotely cool looked, to my disappointment, like real work. The kind involving skill.

{I should mention that I broke my wrist last month. Why I was compelled to try to craft something out of stiff, difficult-to-cut corrugated cardboard with only one hand on a Saturday afternoon, I have no idea. There are 11 entire other months this year in which I could have elected to do this! Why such poor timing? Why, cruel muse of cardboardery!!!!}

But I found one exception, thanks to the plethora of Cosplay bloggers, who have flooded social media with helpfully unhelpful tutorials, raising one's expectations that you, mortal, can readily mimic their mastery of Worbla.**

Behold: Skyrim Iron Helmet, presented by ByGoneEra!

Easy, right? Right?


*Some would point out that 5 feet does not make for an enormous person, but I believe it unequivocally makes for an enormous box.
** Foreshadowing.