I made a barrel! I was following a tutorial (I love when they're videos!), which was mainly about texturing, but I didn't make it as far as the texturing. A general rule when doing a Blender tutorial is that you eventually reach the point where you got lost 5 steps behind and what you're doing no longer works, and there's no way back to where you took a wrong turn, so that's where you end up. I learned some things about making a barrel, and discovered my own things about lighting to actually get bright colors to happen. So it's sort of a barrel!
I'm not saying it's art, but hey, using this software is like pulling teeth. And, indeed, takes as much dedication as dental school. I've so far spent a whole 2 hours back at it, and I have a mushroom (not pictured) and a barrel to show for it. But is our self learning? Perhaps so.