I'll Just Check my Twitter Really Quick...

Insert Facebook, email, Pinterest, or any social media for Twitter in the title and I'm sure you know where this is going. Is there really a "real quick". Not so much. This works out okay sometimes...but when you login to pass the time while your food is cooking, it rarely works out well. Speaking of which...I better go check my No-Flip-Oven-Pancake. Be right back. 

Om nom nom. Good stuff. Aren't you glad you can just read that pause really fast and you didn't have to wait and watch me run off in my ever so attractive yoga capris (I've never been one to look cute in yoga pants...especially now at 6 months pregnant) and wait for me to come back with my plate? I know you're grateful. 10 points to blogland! 

Anyway...

Today's Pinstrosity is brought to you by the line, "I'll just check [insert social media of choice here] really quick." This is something I've totally done before and I know there are others out there who have done this same thing. For those of you who have never experienced this, I'll go over the steps of how Twitter/Facebook/Pinterest/Email/Etc. can "cause" a Pinstrosity. 

Step 1

Find awesome pin on Pinterest:

http://myhoneysplace.com/edible-glitter-printabe-recipe/

Step 2:

Spend 2 hours on Pinterest looking for things to put your edible glitter on so that you have an "excuse" to make edible glitter. 

Step 3:

Decide that edible glitter is awesome enough by itself and it doesn't need anything to go with it's fabulousness.

Step 4:

Gather supplies (praying you have what you need so you don't have to go to the store or try to improvise). 

Step 5: 

Whip up the recipe, pop it in the oven. 

Step 6:

"I'll just check Facebook while I'm waiting." 

Step 7:

Smell burning sugar and realize you've been on Facebook too long. 

Step 8:

Fight your way through the fog of smoke coming from your oven while listening to your smoke detector singing the song of dinnertime. 

Step 9:

Pull out some substance from your oven that your sure you can build a nuclear shelter with. 

Step 10: 

Go back to Facebook and update your status to "Just burned the edible glitter. On the bright side...I can now survive a nuclear bomb with the substance I just created." 

If this doesn't sounds remotely familiar to any of you, then you can't join our club. Okay, you can still join. We always need minions. (just kidding)  But really...haven't many of us done something similar to this? 

Poor Reilly did, but she was brave and awesome and sent us in her story to share with you all. Here's how her experience went: "Well, I don't really even know why I tried this one. Quite frankly, I should've been suspicious of the recipe from the beginning; but what 16-year-old like myself doesn't want EDIBLE FREAKIN GLITTER?! So one day I was experimenting with a few Pinterest recipes and I decided to try this one. I mixed up the sugar, food coloring, and popped it in the oven. About 6 minutes later, as I was studiously checking my Twitter, I began to smell this overwhelming, sweet, burning smell. I glanced up only to find my entire kitchen engulfed in flames. I removed the previously sugar substance from the oven, which had by this point turned into a goopy, black tar-like substance."

 "After it cooled I tried to throw it away and it had hardened into what was now like a giant piece of burnt sugar bark. It was the most foul smelling and looking creation ever to come out of my oven, and it was a complete Pinstrosity." 

Poor Reilly and her edible glitter/bomb shelter. With the help of social media or not, we haven't actually seen a successful story of this edible glitter pin. We did a previous post on it a while back with two pinners attempts. They ended up with colored sugar, but it definitely didn't look glittery. Has anyone successfully made edible glitter at home? If I were feeling super productive today (hey, I actually cooked me breakfast...that's a first in weeks) I'd start testing it all out. But...I'm not feeling that productive (maybe I need to reread my productivity post from last week), and we used up most of the sugar yesterday to make hummingbird food (these guys are going through a ton!!). So today you just get my wit and lack of wisdom on the matter. But seriously, if you know how to make this work let us know. Maybe we'll do a "Here's How Not To Have an Edible Glitter Pinstrosity" and feature you and your awesomeness. Let us know. 

Happy Friday everyone! The end of the week is near!!

10 (or more) Thoughts on Hair Chalking

**As with ANY hair tutorial, I have to emphasize that all hair is different, it all reacts different, and depending on what products you are using you will get different results. This is a general post to help with some general do's and don'ts.**

 

So if I was a blonde at this moment I would head right over to my bathroom and try this out, however currently I am a vibrant red head so that wouldn't quite work as well ( give it two weeks though and my hair will be completely different, so goes the life of a hairdresser).

 

 I'm sure you all have seen the Hair Chalking Pins on Pinterest, and well I too have wondered if they really work.

 

Tonya sent us her and her daughters attempt at this pin, check it out!

 

The Original

http://media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/originals/0f/19/c1/0f19c1a0564f3bf1a2d81906ccaf0ae2.jpg

 

This pin uses chalk and wet hair to put a kind of stain on the hair of vibrant fun colors. Lets see how it worked for Tonya:

 

The Pinstrosity

(Super Fun Graphic By the Way)

 

I love that she put this all together just like you see it on Pinterest.

 

 

1.So here are a few of my thoughts on this, first off the original says to take a section of already styled hair and get part of it wet. That makes no sense, the girls in those pictures would have to have gone through and blow dried each piece and then styled it, after styling all the rest of their hair, you might as well do this with all of your hair wet. Seeing the results of Tonya's experience I don't feel like bleeding will be an issue.

 

2.Another thing to consider about this from the get go is that it IS NOT PERMANENT. This is not "dying" your hair, it is a stain. Like when you drink red Kool-aide, your lips are pink or red for a bit but not forever, in fact if you get your lips super wet after that it tends to fade off into oblivion. Some people have said this stayed for a day, while others a week or more. Like I stated before, it all depends on the product and the hair.

 

3.So the directions say to wet hair, wear gloves (you don't have to do this, it is after all just chalk), and then go through and color the piece of hair to the desired shade. Keep in mind here wet chalk always looks darker then when it is dry. Then you dry the pieces of hair and hit it with a heat tool to lock in the color. Some people suggest twisting the hair while chalking, others don't. Play around and see what works best for you.

 

Again keep in mind, this isn't permanent. By "hitting it with heat" you aren't magically coloring your hair, this is simply allowing the chalk to stain a little more.

 

4.Now looking through everything I see that Tonya wet the hair, then wet the chalk, I don't see that step on the original, and I don't feel that that will do anything to help this process along really. It might not even make a difference so take that to mind when doing this as well. I have seen some tutorials use soft chalks with great success, so that might also be an option.

 

5.Tonya used a heat protectant on the hair before hitting it with any hot tool, I would like to suggest you do this as well. High heat is damaging to hair and this will prevent any damage from happening. I don't think this should have any adverse affects on the coloring either.

 

She used a wet-to-straight flat iron. I wouldn't suggest that simply because they get REALLY hot and your hair really doesn't need that much applied heat. This is a personal opinion, I AM NOT saying that if you use a wet-to-straight that you are a bad hair person or that your hair will be super damaged. I have used one before and I really didn't enjoy the process or results so this is merely a personal preference. I would suggest using a heat protectant spray, then blow drying ( or air drying if you are patient enough), then using a hot tool to "lock" in the color.

 

6.I have also read that using hair spray then a  hot tool can help the color stick around as well. Now bare in mind I haven't tried this, but I have done a some research here and there and these are all just suggestions.

 

7.Another suggestion: This is for girls who have bleach blonde hair this can stain for a REALLY long time, if you are ok with that go for it, if not be warned! Your hair is more porous from lightening and can tend to pick up colors really easy. You probably already know this if you go to the pool a lot (green tint anyone? Be cautious Gwen Stefani's of the world! Even the one day color spray (think Halloween) can have BAD affects on your light locks!

 

8.Tonya stated that the hair had a stiff icky texture, I would venture to say that sounds about right. If we look at it really we are ironing chalk into the hair. Don't expect your hair to feel silky smooth, but it also won't be sticking straight up either. It will feel different, but its not forever and if you can handle parts of your hair feeling a little stiff for a bit of colors sake then I say go for it.

 

9.Here is where I think Tonya ran into trouble: brushing. While going through and doing some research a lot of places said to get rid of the color before trying to wash it out they brushed it really good. So there you have it, if it is intensely tangled LIGHTLY comb through it with a pick or your fingers but be gentle and don't over do it. Tonya brushed her daughters hair after all the steps and the color all but disappeared....just a heads up! Its a bummer too because I wouldn't think that that would make all the difference, and if the hair was tangly I too would think " Well let's just brush it real quick and then we'll be done!" but now we know. Thanks for testing that one out for us Tonya (and daughter), and I'm sorry it didn't work for you because that color was just fabulous!

 

10.I need to also add that blues and greens are hard tones to keep and it may take more "chalking" then you anticipated to get your hair to the desired shade.

 

So there you have it, my ten thoughts on Hair Chalking.

Try it out, try different colors, brands, methods and let us know! Anyone have any experience with this?! I am writing this from a  hairdressers experience and expertise but if you have done this before and have some fun pointers we would love to hear them!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Sponge Spillage

I had a lovely Birthday yesterday. And thanks to Em for the sweet post yesterday. I got projects planned, some of the house clean, made 2 cheesecakes (tried to make one a prickly pear cheesecake...it tasted yummy but didn't set up so it was cheesecake soup), and then Cameron and I spent the evening out at my Aunts house with her family, my cousin and his family, and my sister and her family. It was such a fun way to spend the day. Nothing huge and fancy, but it was perfect. I even got to have leftover cheesecake for breakfast this morning (that may be my favorite part of making cheesecake...eating it for breakfast the next day). 

Speaking of cake...I opened up the email this morning and read over some of our recent submissions and I found a great cake related one for you today. Today's submission comes from Cathy in the UK. She started her email off like this: "My name is Cathy, I'm from the UK and my brother first pointed me to Pinstrosity last year. I love the site and oddly enough seeing so many projects go wrong has encouraged me to try out some crafty things myself. Since following Pinstrosity I have learnt how to sew, visited craft fairs and tried out more recipes (including the cookie bowls that you tested out, thanks to your instructions they turned out perfectly!)." I can't tell you how happy that made me! She gets the point of Pinstrosity! YYEEEAAAA!! Okay, carrying on with her story.  "In fact so many of my projects have turned out well, I was disappointed that I didn't have a Pinstrosity to submit....until yesterday. "

That day she found the following pin and was inspired to get baking:

The Original Pin

http://media-cache-ec0.pinimg.com/736x/48/9a/44/489a44491418042448850a9434cce0cc.jpg

As this photo didn't link to an actual recipe, Cathy looked around and found a great recipe on the BBC website that she used:

http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/532634/grannys-victoria-sponge

This is a Victoria Sponge Cake (it looks HEAVENLY!). Cathy says, "It's a staple British cake recipe and is meant to be very easy."

She whipped it all up and "It was all going so well. I thought I had made a pretty good looking (if slightly messy cake)."

https://redrosestyle.wordpress.com/2013/08/04/cathys-kitchen-victoria-sponge/

"I went to get my husband Rob to show him and by the time I got back, disaster had struck!"

The Pinstrosity

https://redrosestyle.wordpress.com/2013/08/04/cathys-kitchen-victoria-sponge/

"I had not waited long enough for the cake to cool down, which the instructions told me to do. Oops! So now the cake was very very messy! But it didn't stop me sharing the cake with my family, and it didn't stop my family from eating it all up! And despite the spillage, it still tasted great and I can recommend the recipe, you just have to follow it exactly!"

I think this is a boo boo many of us cake newbies make at least once. I know I have...a few times. You think, "Oh, it's cool enough!" only to have your icing or filling to start running and oozing. Luckily, as Cathy pointed out though, it still tastes great even if it doesn't look magazine perfect. As my cousin Missy (who ran a cookie bakery for a while) says, "Taste before beauty!". 

Thank you Cathy for sharing your story and photos (and the recipe! I definitely need to try this one out). Happy Wednesday everyone, I hope it's fantastic. 

Our Dearest Marquette's Birthday!!!!

That's right folks, it's our dearest Marquette's birthday is today the 6th of August! This beautiful lady is one of my favorite people in the whole entire world, so show her some love!!!!

 

I am so grateful for such a wonderful, kind, smart, hilarious, kindred sprit, cousin, co-creator of blogs, crafty, and best friend like her!!

 

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MARQUETTE!!!!
Love ya! ;)

 

 

Love, Em

It's Monday, Don't Forget to Be Awesome!

http://pinterest.com/pin/104990235036096201/

So I thought I'd see what I can do to remedy that. Well, except for those of you that live in time zones much earlier than mine...I guess 11:24 is already past for you. But, hey! You're closer to being done with your Monday than those on this end of the world. 

So today I give you 10 pins and photos which my odd sense of humor found funny to help get you through your day. 

Found this one on Facebook. 

I don't know how true this story is, but it's funny:

http://themetapicture.com/english-is-not-that-easy/

And because it's Shark Week:

http://themetapicture.com/

And this teacher is awesome:

http://fangirlsjustwannahavefun.tumblr.com/image/52436026604

http://www.someecards.com/usercards/viewcard/MjAxMi1lNDRiMjkyN2U4NWJkNmZm

And then this one made me snort while I was laughing...I love it. 

http://www.flickr.com/photos/montine/2311288263/

http://www.someecards.com/usercards/newest

http://themetapicture.com/a-mother-goose-and-her-ryan-goslings/

http://themetapicture.com/human-nature-summed-up/

http://pinterest.com/pin/208573026465554493/

Show and Tell Saturday: Productivity

For today's Show and Tell Saturday post I have something slightly different from our normal Show and Tell posts for you. I don't have one big project that I did for this...it's a series of small projects, tips, and methods. Yesterday (Friday) was the first day I have had at home for a while with all my running around. The house was in desperate need of a slick up. There's organizing to do to get ready for Merle in 3 months. Dishes were stacked up. Now that the rains have finally come, the yard needs some care and the garden needs some de-weeding. There was a huge list of things that needed to be done, and I just didn't want to face it. There are projects I want to do, blankets I want to finish sewing/crocheting, meals I want to cook, books I want to read, and pictures I want to take. I couldn't justify blowing off the house and yard to do fun things, but I didn't want to spend my whole day cleaning either. So I decided to try out something I remember my mom doing with us as kids. She would set the timer for 15 minutes and we'd have to be busy working for the entire 15 minutes. After the 15 work minutes were up we got a reward 15-20 minutes. We could read, watch TV, play, or do whatever we wanted in that time. When the reward time was up, the timer was set again and we were all busy working for another 15 minutes. This seemed like something I could face. It would get me cleaning, but I could also do some of these smaller projects I want to do. I did this yesterday starting at 11 am and kept up until 5 (when I had to get ready to drive some of my girls from church to a big dance in the "neighboring" town). I'm still working on this today, but I thought I'd show you what I got done yesterday and how this worked. It really helped me to stay productive and motivated.

First, I started off with my Cleaning Soundtrack. This is a playlist I have on Windows Media Player that I only turn on when I'm cleaning. This helps me jump start my brain into cleaning mode. The songs are all upbeat and fun and help me to feel happier while I clean. You can find that list by clicking here. 

Once I got my music going I jumped in. I didn't set a specific time period for my reward times, but I tried to keep them around 15-20 minutes. Depending on what I did some were shorter and some were longer. I did keep my working minutes to 15 though. You really can get a lot more done in 15 minutes than you'd think. For example, here's how a portion of my day went:

15 Work Minutes: Cleaned off Kitchen counters and stacked dishes. Put all shoes by the front door in closet. Started a load of laundry. Cleaned off the table. Straightened bathroom counter. 

Reward Time: Recovered and decorated a small notebook I had laying around to be our Gift Log for Merle (we still haven't come up with a name for him, but we're not too worried...one will come. I think we'll call him Merle online though even after he's born).
Before:

The nice camera has a dead battery, so you get the not so nice camera photo...but you get the picture.

After:

It's brown...not purplish-reddish-brown...and the stickers are a light blue. Again, cheapo camera. Next time I'll get a better point and shoot and not the cheapest one. 

Work of art? No. Functional and less girly? Yes. Now I have somewhere to keep track of things we receive for Merle and I can get Thank You cards lined up easier.

15 Work Minutes: Switched Laundry. Folded huge pile of clothes at the foot of the bed. 

Okay, I can't resist doing a small infomercial here (of my own free will and volition...not sponsored in any way shape or form). I bought a new laundry hamper a few months ago and it has made laundry so much easier. That sounds dumb, I know. Before we just had one large plastic hamper that we stuffed everything into/around. When laundry time came we had to pull everything out of the hamper and sort it into piles (whites/colors/jeans/towels) and then those dirty piles sat around for a while until they got done. In the process of hauling out dirty piles and bringing in clean piles sometimes piles got mixed up and we'd have clean and dirty clothes all together again and we'd have to sort it out (smell checks, ew). While perusing Walmart one day I found this hamper and bought it (I think I bought it for around $25...which seemed crazy at the time, but it's totally worth it in my books):

http://www.walmart.com/ip/Better-Homes-and-Gardens-4-Bin-Laundry-Sorter/22002730

Now at the end of the day our clothes go into the designated bag (we do jeans, whites, colors, and towels). The bags looked small at first, but they hold just the right amount for a load of laundry. The bags come off the frame easy so I just haul it down the hall, dump it in the washer, and haul the empty bag back. No sorting through stinky clothes. No piles of dirty clothes on the floor. Easy hauling. And it makes it so easy to see when it's time to do a load (since we fill up some bags faster than others). I feel a little dumb for being so excited about a laundry hamper, but this one has helped us out a ton! Okay, infomercial done. 

Reward Time: Did a round on a blanket I'm crocheting:

15 Work Minutes: Restarted the dryer (ours takes two cycles to dry a load). Edited pictures (I really hate editing pictures, so I knew I wouldn't choose to do that during my reward minutes so I did it during my work minutes).

Reward Time: Started this post.

15 Work Minutes: Switched laundry. Folded Laundry. Put away laundry.

Reward Time: Typed up my Cleaning Soundtrack and started linking songs to the Amazon MP3 database.

30 Work Minutes: (I found that as I went along I wanted the 15 minutes of work time to last longer. So I gave myself a double work period before a break)  2 sink-fulls of dishes. Put away laundry. Sorted through my closet and dresser to pull out my "normal" clothes and replace with "maternity" clothes. I don't have room for 2 different wardrobes to hang up at the same time, so I came up with a method that is working so far. I have a box in the corner of our room behind the recliner where I put my normal clothes when they quit fitting or when I want to put a favorite article away so I'm sure I'm not tempted to wear it too long and stretch it out. This way I clear out space in my closet and drawers for the maternity clothes, and then I'm not staring at my normal clothes and wishing I could still wear them. Out of sight, somewhat out of mind? That's the idea at least. Then when I'm ready to pull the box back out it'll be like Christmas in (insert month I fit back in them here). Luckily right when we found out I was pregnant I went through my wardrobe and cleared out the items I hadn't worn in a while and didn't want, so I'm not storing a bunch of things I'll never wear again in that box.

Reward Time: Ate a handful of White Chocolate Chips from the bag in the freezer...sssshhhhhhh, don't tell I snitched some (it's reward time, right?!) while I went through this past year's projects and photos to start picking out County Fair possibilities (yet another use for Pinterest! I can pin all my favorites and have them all in one place to go through for later when it comes time to narrow them down to the ones I want to enter). If you've never participated in your county's County Fair, you should! It's never too late. Don't enter with the point of trying to win. Just enter to enter! Enter to give you motivation to make/bake something. It's a lot of fun and such a good American Tradition! 

15 Work Minutes: I worked on our bathroom, and tested this pin:

 I'm not going to lie...I didn't think it'd work, sounded fishy to me. I was pretty sure it wasn't going to scour off the hard water ring magically, and I half expected a toilet volcano of foam. But it sounded like a simple one to try. If it worked, great! If it didn't, Pinstrosity fodder!

Well, I could show you before and after pictures...but I won't. I'll post my face all over with goofy expressions or double chins...but posting a picture of my toilet just seems like crossing some sort of social line that I'm not ready for (and it's not even a disgusting toilet). So I found someone else who posted a picture of their toilet and its hard water ring. This is pretty much what my toilet looked like before AND after the "treatment":

http://heathersdrivelandwhatnot.blogspot.com/2010/06/wfmw-getting-rid-of-those-horrid-hard.html

I didn't have the toilet volcano like I worried about...but it didn't do anything about the hard water ring at the same time (and I tried scrubbing it with the brush again after the bubbles died down). So don't bother with that pin, it's a dud. I knew it was too easy. But now my toilet is super clean...bacterially speaking at least. I'm gonna just have to buckle down and get a pumice stone or a drywall screen (as the site hosting the above toilet picture suggests and shows). I'm calling it a GCT Level 4 as it didn't do what the pin said it would at all, but it wasn't a disaster...just a pin that doesn't work.

So there you have it. My super exciting day yesterday. I'm sure you're all jealous of how much fun I had. Okay, I know...it really wasn't a bad day, and I did get a lot done. Hopefully today will be just as productive (or more so) than yesterday. What do you do to get motivated to stay busy during the day?

Inspiration for the "Non-Crafters"

We get so many emails from people with this line: "Let me start off by saying I'm not crafty" which is often followed by this line, "I don't know what else I was expecting." On one hand it makes me chuckle...we've all felt like that about something in our life. On the other hand it makes me want to hug them and tell them to keep trying and not to give up and other sappy cliche lines. I've been trying to think of a way to do a "motivational" post, but I just wasn't motivated too yet. Today I read an email that was perfect. It made me want to get my act together, pull on my big girl panties, and finish these projects I've kicked and thrown into a box so I could ignore their less-than-perfectness (there are 2 or 3 quilts in there, paintings, Christmas projects, etc.). I just wish I could jump on these projects now while I'm feeling enthused...but responsibility takes over and I really should show up to my doctor's appointment and work today (who said growing up was a good idea?). So I'll just have to re-read her email on Saturday when I'm home again. But in the meantime I'll share Mohria's story with you and maybe it'll hit a few of you like it hit me. Take it away Mohria:

Hi Pinstrosisters!

I'm a long-time follower of your blog, but just haven't worked up the courage to submit anything, until I saw your "calling all pinners" post.  I'm not what one would call, "crafty."  Most of the things I pin are just stared at wistfully, hoping the creative-fairy will have mercy on me and wave her magic wand to give me even half of the craftiness I see in these pins . . . Sigh . . . 

But I digress.  

My first Pinterest project that wasn't a recipe turned out surprisingly well.

We recently gave our bathroom a MUCH needed update.  We bought our house when I was 7 months pregnant with my son and it needed a LOT of work.  Needless to say, the bathrooms were functional and so they took were low priority.  6 years and another baby later, we had finally scraped together enough fundage to remodel our horribly out-of-date bathroom. How out of date you ask?  Well, so much so, that I have no "before" pictures to share with you.  Only one pic early on in the destruction process (check out the flooring, can you blame me?)

So when the remodel became a reality, I naturally spent WAY too much time on Pinterest searching for inspiration.  I finally found it in the two pins below:

http://www.remodelaholic.com/2012/03/bathroom-renovation-adding-character/

The idea of this pin is to put decorative tile above the shower - cool idea, right?? It turned out FABULOUS.  My only regret was letting the grout sit too long before wiping the tile down.  

My other inspiring pin is the clever built-in storage unit for bathroom cleaning items.  Those always GROSS me out!

http://www.remodelista.com/products/hy-dit-toilet-plunger-storage-cabinet

It was a last minute find and since my parents were only here temporarily to help me with this project, time was of the essence.  After some investigation, we learned that the specific unit in this pin had to be ordered online.  "Ain't nobody got time for that!"

So we built our own.  

I'm a mom of two, so my time in the bathroom is sometimes as close to a vacation as I can get.  So my design was inspired by the most relaxing vacation getaway our family of four has experienced.  Tybee Island, Georgia.  The pictures above the toilet are from when we wrote our kids' names in the sand next to their tiny footprints, and the lighthouse on the Tybee lighthouse.  (What do you think, do the tiles above the shower look like pixelated ocean waves?  Well, if you squint . . . and tilt your head ...a little)

Enjoy.  I know pin-wins aren't used as often as the Pinstrosities, but it's fun to share, anyway.  Hopefully I can help inspire other "non-crafters" that beautiful things are indeed possible.  The hardest step is the first one:  actually trying.  :)

                                                                            -Mohria

I love it. That took a lot of guts to jump into a project that big and it turned out beautifully. Don't let your fears or self-perceived limitations hold you back from trying. You may be surprised at how good things actually turn out! Thank you Mohria for the wonderful story. Your bathroom looks beautiful! Looks like somewhere you could just sit a while and relax. Well done!