Pinteresting: Friendship Bracelet Earbuds

Several weeks ago I posted that I was in the process of surrounding my earbud cords in friendship-braceleted-embroidery floss- goodness. And I never followed up on how it went.

Here's a link to a tutorial for the friendship bracelet technique: How to make the Chinese Staircase Bracelet. You'll do it the same way with your cord.  Just make sure you include your cord with the other strands not being used to make knots.

I bought my embroidery floss at Jo-Ann's. I bought 5 different colors and spent around two bucks (it was a while ago so I don't remover exactly how much I spent, but the stuff is pretty cheap).

I used most of the floss, but I did have a little left over, so you could maybe get away with only four skeins (is that what you call a unit of embroidery floss? I have no idea, but it makes me sound like I know what I'm talking about :)

Each color of floss is made up of six strands.  I started out using all six strands of the floss. I tied a knot at the end and made my braid/knots over the tail. I alternated colors at random, pretty much whenever I felt like it.

I used rubber band to hold together the colors I wasn't working with at the time. I used a safety pin to hold it to the floor or my jeans or the couch. The safety pin is crucial; you can't tie the knots without one end tethered.

When I got to the fork in the cord, I separated each color in half so there were three strands of each color for both cords.  I wound the floss around these handy little spools I printed from Wild Olive.

I continued to the ends, tied a knot at each end and sealed each knot with some clear fingernail polish.

The whole project took me a few days. I worked on it while watching tv in the evenings and on a longish car ride.

Overall I'm pleased with the results.

The Pros:

They're obviously much cuter now :) and it was very effective in keeping the cords tangle-free.


The Cons:

The cords are a bit bulky now. They take up a lot more space than before and they're a bit heavier. I haven't actually used them much, but I imagine the weight might be inconvenient while on a run or if you're moving around a lot.

I'd call it a success.  Hopefully this is helpful.  I'd love to hear how it goes if you try it out!

Isn’t That Pinteresting?

 
I love Pinterest. Especially now that I have an iPod. I can hang out on Pinterest (almost) guilt free because I don't have to spend lots of time glued to the computer paying zero attention to anything else. Now it counts as multitasking :).

The problem with Pinterest is that sometimes you see things that just seem too good to be true. And sometimes they really are too good to be true.

So I thought I'd do a bit of a blog series.... Whenever I try something I found on Pinterest, I'll blog about it and let you know how it goes: What went well and what didn't go so great, how long it took, how much money I spent, what I changed, that sort of thing.

If you'd like, you can follow me on Pinterest by clicking this handy little button: 


 
And you can follow all my Pinterest Adventures here:

Strawberry Jam

 
So this one time, when we were younger, my little brother made some brownies. From scratch. He was like ten-years-old. We were all pretty impressed that he was baking, and eagerly anticipating a sweet treat.

I cut myself a brownie and took a bite. It was sweet and chocolaty.

And then I noticed something strange....

They seemed a lot chewier than normal. But not the brownie kind of chewy. It was like there were tiny little sugary worms living inside those brownies. We quickly deduced that he had use powdered sugar instead of flour. Hence the sweetness. But who knew all that sugar would take on such a strange texture. They tasted fine, they were actually really sweet (duh!), but the texture was just too much to handle.
 

You may be wondering why in the world this has to do with strawberry jam.... Don't worry, I'll circle back:)  
 

I bought two pounds of strawberries for two bucks at Sam's club the other day. That’s a steal. So I figured it was time to make some strawberry jam.

I love strawberry jam. But only freezer jam. That cooked stuff is ga-ross. Growing up, there was ALWAYS strawberry jam in the freezer. I love to eat it with butter, not peanut butter, just butter and jam. I like it on toast, rolls, pancakes, french toast, bagels, you name it. It's delicious.

So yesterday, after waiting a few days to gather the courage, I decided to tackle the jam project.

I started cutting and mashing strawberries, feeling nostalgic, writing my lovely little blog post in my head. "How domestic am I?" I thought to myself. I took a minute to take a picture and brag on facebook:


I even started contemplating making a batch of bread and putting some jam in baby food jars to take to some friends. I don't bake bread. So that's a big deal.

The only tricky part of this whole endeavor is the timing. The mashed strawberries and sugar are supposed to sit for 10 minutes. When that 10 minutes is over, you're supposed to add the pectin and water that has been boiling "hard" for one minute.

I got a little anxious and started the pectin and water too early. I wasn't entirely sure how long it would take to come to a "hard boil" so I started it about 3 minutes in to the berry and sugar's 10 minutes. 

So... it boiled much, much faster than I anticipated. Worried that my berries and sugar weren't ready, I took the pectin off the stove just as it was starting to boil. I waited a few minutes and put it back on and finished making the jam. 



As I was filling jars, I snuck a little taste. It tasted delicious. 

And then I noticed something strange....

A gross, slimy, chewy little worm, so much like the ones in my brother's brownies.
 
Bah. 

I was so looking forward to some butter and jam on a piece of toast. But my jam is gross. It almost makes me gag. I've tasted it several times, just to make sure it really is gross. It really is gross. I'm so bummed. I still haven't thrown it out.


So all that time and and effort and daydreaming about delicious strawberry jam... and all I got was a big mess in my kitchen (I swear it looked much worse in person, I don't think the picture does it justice!). 

It's a good thing those strawberries were cheap!

Shop Anniversary

The Shop has been open for ONE YEAR today!

Use Coupon Code YEAR1 for 15% off your entire purchase!

Offer is good TODAY only!

Update

I thought I'd update the few of you who still visit this little blog from time to time....

This little girl:

Has been completely out of her harness for almost a month now. Her x-ray looked really good and we expect everything to be fine from here on out. She goes back for another x-ray in October just to make sure everything still looks good. She's started crawling the last couple of days and she's getting really fast. Look out world! Her big sister is already going crazy trying to keep her puzzles away from this slobber monster.

And this little girl:

Keeps falling asleep while she watches a movie during little sister's afternoon nap.  Poor girl must be worn out.  We went for a walk today and she kept telling me she was lonely.  When I asked her what she thought lonely meant, she said "I just need to go home and lay on the couch..."  hehe, apparently "lonely" is code for "tired," (not that that's something she would ever admit :)

She's also very excited for mom to teach her how to swim. Hopefully it will get a little warmer so we can get it done before we go visit grandmas.

Mr. Domestic has been done with school for about a month, and is officially enrolled in med school.  We're so proud of all his hard work!

Meanwhile I have all sorts of projects and blog posts on my to do list... in fact I'm constantly blogging in my head, it just never seems to make it to the computer, haha.  No guarantees on whether anything is going to come of those posts and projects swimming around up there....

Black and White and Yellow All Over

Custom order In progress. One of my favorites yet!

Big Green Monster

I'm currently knee-deep in a project involving this great big dresser and some very green paint. I'm excited (and nervous!) to see how it turns out!