Share your 3D modeling thoughts and renders

So I 3D modelled two icons (well, illustrations rather) for the communities that I created on kbin: Industrial Design and Jewelry Design. These icons are meant to reimagine kbin’s logo in a way that's relevant to each community.

Btw, as a feature request, I think it might be cool to separate the banner on a magazine's page from the mini-icon that shows up in listings. Also, inline images should be a thing, I think.

Industrial Design: icon This icon is just an assortment of various gizmos and whatchamacallits that seemed to fit the shape. It was modelled in Rhino and rendered in Keyshot. The model uses curvature continuity, just like any self-respecting grown-up model would. Ghosted view, plaster view

Jewelry Design: icon The Jewelry Design icon is designed as a hypothetically producible piece of jewelry, except that the corners — those tiny semi-spheres that hold the gems — are a bit larger to accommodate the icon's scale. The piece has a partially open back to allow for more light to reach the gems. That makes them look prettier both in renders and irl. Front view, back view

The model was created in Rhino and later welded and polished in ZBrush to make it appear closer to how it would look in real life. zBrush smoothing

I've been trying out blender, following along with the donut tutorial, but it feels like I am just copying and not learning much. I often get sidetracked and try to make something a bit different to the tutorial but its just so difficult and never works..

For example, I wanted to create a donut, but with no middle (like the donuts with filling inside). I spent so long trying to make the initial mesh and when I got something that looked correct, viewing it with textures showed a completely broken, and stretched out in places image.

Any ideas for getting over this learning curve? Is it just watching YouTube tutorials and following along until I randomly discover new info to use in other projects?