I’m Hooked!

I used to subscribe to a lot of magazines. They would often pile up and to reduce the piles I would take a stack of them with me on a business trip to read on the plane, I’d take the months-old magazines to read on vacation, or I’d spend a weekend flipping through them. Sometimes I would see an interesting story or article, a recipe, or a picture that I wanted to save, so I would rip the page out of the magazine and file it away. I have a few binders and a few drawers full of the pages I ripped out, but I never look at them. I don’t even remember what the recipes, pictures, or stories are about, but I keep thinking someday I’ll need them for something (did the word “hoarder” just come to mind?!?).  If I had bulletin boards all over the walls of my house, I could have categorized the bulletin boards and tacked the pages to the appropriately categorized bulletin boards and look at the pages whenever I wanted. Ahh, but that would be unsightly.

This is what my coffee table used to look like . . . .

For a couple of years I’d been seeing Pinterest posts showing up on Facebook and heard people talking about Pinterest. Several months ago I quickly scanned the Pinterest site, but did catch on to what the hype was all about. Just recently, however, I finally took the time to really take a look at Pinterest to comprehend how useful it really is and now I’m hooked. With Pinterest I don’t need to spend money on magazines or spend hours flipping through them to find something of interest. I don’t need to tear out the pages and file them away–I now have bulletin boards out in cyberspace and I have access to millions of photos, recipes, stories, and ideas to pin onto my boards!

After I was granted my Pinterest account I created cyber bulletin boards categorized according to my interests that I could assign a name and category to (nudity and porn are not permitted, so don’t get any funny ideas). On each of my categorized bulletin boards I have a collection of photos. If I need a recipe for a potluck, an idea for a gift, or I wonder what I can do with an old rake or a canning jar, I go to my Pinterest boards. When I see an article, picture, or recipe on-line that I want to save, I can “pin” it to the appropriate bulletin board. If I don’t already have a board set up for a pin, I can create a new board on the fly to pin it to.  Once pinned, I can later click on the pin to go back to website where I found the pin to see the full article, recipe, story about the photo, etc.

Samples of some of my Pinterest Boards

I have made some excellent dishes from recipes I found on Pinterest. A few weeks ago my sister Nancy was on vacation and had me pick up her CSA box, which among a lot of other fruits and veggies included a head of cabbage and a lemon. I had no brilliant ideas as to what to do with the cabbage, so I quickly found a recipe on Pinterest and my family and I enjoyed a delicious cooked cabbage about an hour later. I’ve included the recipe at the end of this post.

Brides to be and people planning parties frequently use Pinterest to compile ideas for their events. There’s a plethora of great ideas at their fingertips. I could also see it used by someone planning on remodeling or redecorating their home and by someone trying to update their wardrobe. I often see pins with great looking outfits, including shoes and accessories. 

If pinning on Pinterest sounds like something you might be interested in, here are some ways to build up your boards:

– Add the “Pin It” button to your browser so you can pin images from any website. You will find this under “Add” on the Pinterest site.

– Follow your friends or other people’s boards and repin their pins.  To follow my boards, go to this website and click “Follow”: http://pinterest.com/merrycarter1/

– There is a public place where you can see what other people are pinning and pin from there to your bulletin boards. On your Pinterest site, click on “Everything” to see what people are pinning or “Categories” to narrow down the types of pins you would like to see.

– When you pin from the public places (e.g., “Everything”) you can see and follow the boards that belong to the people who’s pins you have pinned.

– You can also search for specific pins by using the search function and pinning pins found onto your boards.

– You can upload your own photos onto your bulletin boards by clicking on “Add” and then “Upload a Pin.”

If you don’t have a Pinterest account now, you will need to request an invite. You can ask a friend already on Pinterest to invite you or you can request an invite from the Pinterest site. It can take a few days to receive an email letting you know that you have an account.  Pinterest requires invites to keep the site running quickly and smoothly. The by-invitation-only method allows Pinterest to control the volume of new users, so that their servers are not overwhelmed by spikes in traffic.

I think the by-invitation-only method also helps cut down on spammers and the spread of malware. You should, however, still be careful. On a few occasions when I thought I was going to a website to see a recipe or a story, I was redirected to another site that had nothing to do with the pin I clicked on. If this should happen to you, do not click anything on that site. Close that tab and don’t go back to that site.

As I mentioned earlier, here is the cabbage recipe that my family and I enjoyed.

Grilled / Baked Cabbage

Ingredients

• 1 head of cabbage, cleaned and cut into quarters
• 1 teaspoon olive oil
• 2 tablespoons real bacon bits
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper

Instructions

Preheat oven or grill to 425 degrees F. Place each cabbage quarter on a piece of foil large enough to wrap it in. In a small bowl, mix all other ingredients together to make a marinade.  Spoon about two tablespoons of the marinade over each cabbage quarter. Make sure you get the marinade into the nooks and crannies.  Wrap each cabbage quarter with the foil taking care to keep the marinade on the cabbage and in the foil wrap. Bake or grill for 25 to 30 minutes, until the cabbage has softened to the way you like it. The original website for this recipe has step-by-step photos in case you need them:  http://greenlitebites.com/2010/06/28/roasted-grilled-cabbage/

Happy pinning!

~merry~