A Pinterest Dinner

So, last night was supposed to be felt night. I had big plans for my felt food collection. I was going to add lots of pieces for upcoming birthdays. But I decided I wanted some recipes from Pinterest for dinner. I had left some chicken tenders in the fridge to thaw, so I needed a chicken inspiration. Off I went to look at my boards. I hit pay dirt. Chicken rolls with asparagus, southwestern stuffed sweet potatoes, and roasted garlic-Parmesan cauliflower. If any of that sounds like it would tempt you, please follow the links to the recipes. (The southwestern sweet potatoes come from one of my favorite recipe blogs, Pennies on a Platter.)

Unfortunately, the cauliflower was the easiest of all the recipes, in that it required no pre-cooking. I ended up spending a little over 2 hours in the kitchen working on dinner. Now, don't get me wrong, it was all delicious and worth it. But 2 hours for a regular dinner, for just me and the hubs? Bit ridiculous. Especially when I have school work that needs to be dealt with before I can move on the fun crafty part of the evening.

But here are the pics of my 2 hour dinner (not counting the time it took the sweet potatoes to cook in the oven!)

I used shredded pepper jack cheese in the chicken rolls, to give it a kick. Delicious!

Ran into some problems with this recipe, however. First, I cut into my sweet potatoes to discover they are white sweet potatoes. Which, as research turned up, are actually "real" sweet potatoes, they just have a milder flavor. Then, I went to get the black beans from the pantry...and there were no black beans. I always have black beans. They are a staple in my cooking. How in the world I ended up with no black beans is a mystery. So, my only options were to venture back out into the cold night to buy black beans, or improvise. Let me just be the one to tell you....black-eyed peas do NOT substitute well for black beans. To start with, they required way more salt than I would normally add, and they lack flavor (which is why most people cook black-eyed peas with a ham hock!)

Even if you are not a cauliflower lover, I suggest you try this! This bowl was heaping with roasted veggies, but by the time I actually finished cooking the meal, this is all that was left! They are THAT good. I could make and eat them everyday. And I just might.

So, after all that work, I never did get to work on the felt food. 

A Pinterest.....??? Never Again

It has been such a busy last two months of school, and I have worked most of the available days each month, I have not been a creative crafty person at all. But I have spent loads of time on Pinterest, planning on what I would do once I had time to call my own again. (I did enjoy my year of substituting. The kids were great, and even though I worked mainly in 3 schools, those 3 schools kept me busy!)

But now school is out. Time is mine again. So it's time to play. So last night I decided to play. I found a cute pin on rag curls.

(I'm not sure how best to link with Pinterest involved. If you click on the link, it will take you to the original blog post, not to Pinterest. I welcome any suggestions on how to do this in the future, because I am sure I am going to post more on my pinned ideas.)

You see how soft and perfect her curls turned out? That is what I wanted. This is what I got.



The money you see in the mirror is from our Financial Peace University. It's fake, but it reminds us to always have an emergency fund.

Early morning, and my scarf stayed in place all night! I thought it would be odd sleeping in the scarf with the rags all wrapped around my head strangely, but it wasn't.

The tied rags. I thought I'd go for the lower curls, like she did in the picture.



Ummmm....why are my curls not pretty, loose and perfect spirally like hers were?! (BTW, this is not the first time I've tried rag curls. It is also not the first time I've gotten exactly this result with them either. But I thought she was on to something with her method!)  You can see it in my face, this is not what I was expecting.



 All the rags unrolled. From the piece that is not curled, you can see just how long my hair has gotten. It's almost to my natural waist. So the rags did make curls, just TIGHT ones. But this is still not as simple and pretty as hers were. And now what am I supposed to do with them?  Well, I can tell you this....the answer is NOT finger comb them.....

POOF!

So, I'm not sure what to call this. It's not really a Pinterest Fail, because I did get curls. Just not the curls I wanted. I think it's the start of a whole new category: Pinterest Never Again.

Which now that I write it makes it sound like I'm not going to play on Pinterest again, which is not the case, so maybe it's more a Pinterest Flop. Either way, rag curls and my hair are a no-no.