Pinterest.  Do I love it?  Do I hate it?  I just can’t decide.

Before Pinterest, I stuffed my kids’ backpacks with classroom donations like Kleenex boxes and Clorox wipes every August.  I know how much teachers appreciate little gestures like this, and it always made me feel warm and fuzzy inside.

Then I joined Pinterest…

I truly had no idea that some families assemble “Back-to-School-Cakes” for their children’s teachers.  How intimidatingly fabulous is this:

 

One of my real life friends made the school supply cake on the right.  (There goes my fantasy that Pinterest was created by evil people whose goal is to make profoundly ordinary mothers feel inferior.)

In Pinterestville, a child’s chore chart doubles as household art:

There is pretty much no chance of me doing a project like this.  Ever.   For proof, just take a look at this photo that has been displayed in my living room for the past 11 months:

Lovely?  Yes.  The problem?  I have no idea who those lovely people are.  They came with the frame that I bought in Maui last November, and I have yet to fill it with an actual  family photograph.

I clearly do not live in Pinterestville.  Pinterestville scares me.  It is a place that is craftier, yummier, cooler, healthier, trendier and just plain everything-er than me.

But here’s the deal:  Pinterest is full of incredible ideas.  And it wasn’t created by evil people who want to make you feel inferior, but instead by craft nuts and cooking pros who are willing to share – for free – their amazing ideas.

I believe the secret to success in Pinterestville is this:  pick one or two ideas you can do, and ignore the 50 million you can’t do.  This is the only way to survive, unless you are a direct descendant of Martha Stewart.

Thanks to Pinterest, I found the I Heart Crafty Things blog last weekend.  The kids and I tackled her Haunted House project.  They turned out Spooktacular!

 

(Shhhhhhhhh.  Here’s the thing:  Adult scissor skills are highly coveted by children.  Your kids will idolize your ability to cut out something like this, and all your Pinterest insecurity will instantly melt away.)

Recently Pinterest helped me score big points at work as well.  The JROTC set up the library for parent conferences – a monumental job that meant rearranging every piece of furniture in our library.  I turned to Pinterest for thank you gift ideas.  Here is my version of popcorn stuffed gloves with candy corn nails:

 

The tag said, “Thanks for giving us a hand in the library!”  The kids absolutely loved them:

(I want to acknowledge Subway for donating gloves to this project.  I couldn’t find clear, latex-free gloves anywhere.  I was ready to give up when I drove past a local Subway, and visualized all the sanitary turkey subs they’ve made for me.  I let the manager know I had an odd request:  could I buy some of her gloves for the JROTC group at my school?  She refused my money and insisted on donating gloves to the cause.  Thank you, Subway!)

Once I finally had all the supplies, Maggie and I spent the entire night making 60 of these hands together.  Clark and Sam were at football practice, and she was 100% devoted to this project.  Honestly, I couldn’t have done it without her.  She popped 13 bowls of popcorn, punched holes in the tags, and guided the candy corn fingernails to the bottom of each finger.

It turns out that Pinterestville is a pretty nice place after all.  I’m not cut out to live there full-time, but I do enjoy visiting when my kids are along for the ride.

Maybe Pinterestville isn’t so different from real life after all.