Pinterest Turned My Daughter Into A Salad

Everyone thinks that Pinterest is just this amazing place where people go to get ideas for awesome gifts, crafts, and recipes. 

But there is a dark side.

For instance:

I got caught up in the whole, "Make shit at home and save thousands of dollars each year!" craze.  Laundry soap (but I couldn't get the kids to grate bars of soap, so that one was a fail), jar labels for bulk items (I got too fancy and they faded from the sunshine coming through the kitchen window---stupid sunshine), copycat handsoap (I got the measurements wrong and there was a microwave catastrophe that my husband can't seem to LET GO). 

So everyone was concerned when I said that I wanted to make my own shaving cream.  But, I was out, and the man stuff is too minty for my delicate ladyparts.  And, I had a shelf full of extra toiletries that had failed me in one way or another.  So off to the pantry I went.

I found this pin:

LINK

Basically, you add a bunch of stuff like lotion, conditioner, soap, and oil to an old container.  I'm sure there are specific measurements, but really, it's just a way to get goop on my legs so that I can shave months' worth of hair from them---does it really matter?

And I didn't have baby oil, because it is an EVIL petrochemical, so I used some grapeseed oil from when I tried to make salt scrubs last year.  The grapeseed oil smells very salad-y.  But it's for shaving my legs, and it was being mixed with 5 other scent-y things, so whatev.

BUT THEY FORGOT THE LAST STEP.  

The last step would be "Label it, so when your 8-year-old uses your shower because the teenage made their gross, she will know it is NOT CONDITIONER".

Instead, Princess came out, and I remarked, did you brush your hair out---as I ran my fingers through it, pulling tangles apart.  

She said, "Yeah, but it was crappy conditioner.  It smells like salad.  And it doesn't work very well".  

Now, Princess has a history of having issues with hair product.  The last time she really read a bottle label, she came running out of the shower, concerned about whether she should be using product for "fine" or "coarse" hair.  I assured her it was all marketing, and it was all pretty much the same.  So her hair product discrimination skills are low. 

I leaned in, took a whiff.  It smelled suspiciously like a mess of competing fruity scents, with an undercurrent of salad.  Very MUCH like my homemade shaving cream.  

Fuck you, Pinterest.

Ooooh, Shiny!

You know when you get something new and you're all, "This is the greatest thing ever, OMGOMGOMGOMG how did I ever live without it?"  That's how I felt when I really began to understand all the ins and outs of the internet.  Way back in the early 90's.  Back when I could chat on AOL.

After a while though, the seedy underside became apparent, just like with all shiny new things. It's like finding out refills for the EZ Bake are five bucks each, and only available at the scummy Toys R Us two towns over. Reports came out about how easy it is for children to access porn.  Then, we all had to go find out how easy it was.  Once we found it, we would click "download", step outside for a smoke (because smoking inside is gross), come back in to a screen that looked a bit like the screen from that game show Catch Phrase, where little bits are revealed and you have to try to guess what the picture clue is, but it's porn, so you go back out to pop another beer and have another smoke, wondering aloud if the flesh bits you saw were arms, legs or inner thighs.  20 minutes later, dinner was burning, and you would never ever get that image off your retinas. I'm not even going to tell you the horrific things I learned from 1990s internet porn.  Suffice it to say, things have gotten even worse.  For instance, my son, giggling, told me what a rim job was (thank you, Urban Dictionary). 


Now, however, my faith in humanity has been almost fully restored, through the realization of several things.

1.  My top 2 girl crushes have been featured on Babble.com's Top 100 Mom Blogs:
Here is The Bloggess, #2, and #1 for Funniest  and Here is #43, Elizabeth at Flourish in Progress

2.  Pinterest has everything.  Everything? EVERYTHING.  Evidenced here:

Recipe for Moonshine


Crocheted Leprechaun vomiting shamrocks

Disembodied Barbie Bodyparts-into-jewelry

All manner of spoons that are badass

...I could go on.  And on and on and on, as evidenced by my therapy bills and my cramps in my fingers from typing/searching/surfing too much. 

3.  The "Popcorn" button on my microwave creates foul, preservative-enhanced, puffed-up fattening popcorn, popped to butter-flavor-y perfection.  Every. Fucking. Time.  Which is awesome on "Fend for yourself" night.  Which is tonight.

Thank you, internet. Much of the above makes up for me knowing there is midget clown porn.

I Thought the Apocalypse Was Coming...

I just got a text from my brother. He's my younger brother who spent the first part of his life getting free meals at school from cute girls.  This has not changed much, except the cute girl buying his lunch is usually me.  I really would love to marry him off, but he has a thing for skanks, and I'm sick of my kids asking, "Why does Uncle M have so many girlfriends" or, "I didn't know they could make tattoos that big", or, "Don't they have dentists near her house?".  Seriously, I could go on for days.  Days, people.  One of the first girls he brought home waited for my mother to have a mouthful of mashed potatoes to tell us she used to work on the phone.  I asked, "Like at a call center?" and she's all, "Kinda.  It was phone sex."  Things have been pretty much going downhill since then.

The thing is, he's really awesome.  He's good-looking, gainfully employed full time, AND loves kids.  It's like an awesome dude trifecta. He has a horrifying sense of humor, which is definitely in the "Pro" column, and he fixes stuff like a champ.  And, he has no gang affiliations (that I know of). One of his few downsides would be his appreciation for classic rock. Some might find this a "pro", too though.

(I'm taking applications....if you are clean and respectable, love kids and have only a small amount of baggage, but dress like a hooker (or would be willing to try) we totally have to chat. You only have to pretend to be a skank long enough for him to fall for you-then you can reveal your wonderfulness to us all, thereby ensuring years of happiness for us all.  Big knockers would help, too.)

"Umm, you were going to tell us about the impending apocalypse...?"

Oh yes.  That. Where was I?  Oh yeah. Here is a text convo between me and my brother:

Uncle M: Hey, got any mason jars?
Me: Fresh out.  Why?
UM: Moonshine

(This is where I am sure the world is coming to an end.  Why, you ask? Because one of the signs of the apocalypse-I'm fairly certain-would be if my brother were to find Pinterest and get addicted, like I-and countless others-already have.  Pinterest is this amazing crack-like website where millions of women (and probably some men with a penchant for satchels murses) spend countless hours searching for ideas where almost everything in the world can be found, including recipes for tons of yummy seasonal snacks, homemade laundry detergent, table centerpieces, etcetera, all for pennies on the dollar.  And, about 75% of the recipes/crafts/ideas involve mason jars.  Which is why I am fresh out.)

Me: ahhh.  Nope, Sorry.
UM:Yeah, it tastes just like apple pie

(This is where I am torn between gathering more information, and running into the streets to avoid the impeding tsunami/asteroid/tornado of death. What are the chances he wants to make homemade moonshine WITHOUT the influence of Pinterest?)

Me: Sounds good!  Are you on Pinterest?
UM: No, why?
Me: :::deep sigh::: Cause that's the kind of crafty shit they would have there, "homemade apple pie moonshine" LOL
UM:Oh. No, my buddy makes it.


See?  The world is NOT coming to an end today.


All this, from a girl who put her panties on backwards, and took three trips to the potty to realize it.



Score today:
World: 1
Brother: 0 (sorry, Uncle M.  Just be glad it took this long to put you in my blog. I was running out of material, and, well, let's face it. You're nothing BUT material....)
Metrosexuals: 0
Skanks: 0 (good thing they can't read)
Me:1 billion for such an informative post about the apocalypse and Pinterest, as well as moonshine, minus 1 for the backwards panties

Tuesday Tutorial

Okay, crafty people!  I like to do crafty stuff. Well, it's more like, I like to think about doing crafty stuff, buy all the equipment, then get halfway through, run out of energy, then shove it aside to be trashed by me a few years later.
This time, however, was different.

I have found Pinterest. This is a website devoted to people that are crazy about finding crap online. You find the crap, "pin" the picture to a board, and you have it forever. It's like a cross between a visual Twitter (people can "follow" you) and a visual bookmark system. You can categorize things into categories, creating as many boards as you like. For instance, I have:

• Products I love
• Crafts I want to try
• Fall ideas
• Stuff I want-hint, hint, honey
• Sayings I like
• Ideas for the kids' school
• Ideas for my work

If I have not explained it to the point of you wanting to be all over it RIGHT NOW, I did a lousy job explaining it.  Anyways, I found some neat things I liked recently. Okay, A LOT of neat things. So I pinned the ones I liked, then fell ill with a crafty bug this weekend.

Here is the inspiration:

So I got a W. Then, I couldn't find twine, so a finally settled on Fall colored yarn. 
W's suck.  I had a hell of a time winding that yarn around, burning my damn fingers with the hot glue, you name it.  So I chilled for a bit, thinking.
I went to the craft store for the fabric for the rosettes. The rosettes I didn't know how to make. While there, I came upon the idea for ribbon, with buttons to cover the glue for the ribbon. Finally happy with the W. Then it was on to the rosettes.
I couldn't find a website I had patience for, so I gathered a couple ideas from a couple places, and figured I would wing it.
I had bought a "quilter's pack" or something-a group of 5 fabrics all with coordinating colors. I figured pattern didn't matter much, because they would be rosettes, not flat fabric. Then, I stripped the fabric by making notches, then ripping the fabric which gave it an unfinished look. The strips were about 1-1 1/2 inches wide, and there is a certain direction to rip in. I tried both, went with what is easier. Google it if you want a more precise description. Hell, Google a real crafter if you want a better description-you're the one taking advice from ME.

Here is a pic of the notches before I got to rip the fabric. Incidentally, ripping fabric makes a very satisfying sound.  It could become a positive aggression outlet....

Notice the fake acrylic nails-these will come in handy when the real gluing begins...

Then, a made a circle out of fabric, to glue the rosettes to. Later, I found that cardboard was better (crappy paperboard from the kids' cereal boxes will be fine-use different sized cups as templates.) And, you wastes less fabric. so I created strips, then scrunched up an end, glued it to the center of the fabric or cardboard circle, and twisted the fabric into a, a, a,   twisted strip of fabric. How else do I say that? My first one wasn't very twisted, and it turned out crappy. I fixed it a bit later....

Crappy first rosette.  I kept winding and gluing, winding and gluing, using my acrylic nails to hold crap in place while the 2000 degree glue dried.
I sat washing anti-depressants down with boxed wine, watching Monday Night Football while I made rosettes until I couldn't stand it any more.
As soon as my fingers were aching, I stopped. Then, I slapped those rosettes onto a grapevine wreath, along with the W and some ribbon to hang it. Glue is the secret to this craft, by the way.
Voila!

the crappy rosette is the bottom one, can't even tell, can ya?

I'm one crafty mo-fo, right?

I might add more rosettes later, when my fingers get their feeling back.  I probably won't, though.