Honestly, this is how most home projects go. We overthink the "right" way and end up making extra work for ourselves. Sometimes just getting it done is the better method.

Oh man, that's the worst. I mean, a cheap putty knife is basically a metal spatula. It bends if you look at it wrong. I tried using one to scrape paint once and the corner dug right into the wood. For drywall, you really need that stiff blade to press the mud flat. It's like trying to spread cold butter with a piece of cardboard.

My roommate just throws them in frozen and they still turn out fine.

Just use a stud finder next time.

My friend Sam downloaded a free brush set that promised perfect cloud textures. It needed the blend mode set to "divide" on a bright orange background layer to look right, which was buried in a readme file from 2012. She wasted a whole afternoon on gray smudges before finding it.