Battery Storage in a Tackle Box: 4/5

Excellent idea. I don't know how you store your batteries, but ours were floating around the infamous junk drawer. Finding them was a pain. Truth be told, we usually bought new batteries instead of trying to find what we needed. Now they are nicely contained in one place. These are the simple things that take five minutes to do, but you can feel like you really accomplished something important!

See what a mess the drawer is? But the batteries are organized. By the way, if you want to rob my house and steal my checks, don't bother trying. Those may be check boxes but they don't have my actual checks in them. Sorry.

Peanut Butter and Oat Energy Bites: 5/5

These little balls, on the other hand, are incredible. I just made another double batch after gobbling down the first batch last week. I did make a couple of changes, more out of a desire to avoid making an extra trip to the store than wanting to change the recipe. I used crunchy peanut butter instead of smooth. I'm certain the smooth would have been just as delicious, but I certainly didn't mind the crunch. The other ingredient my pantry lacked was the sunflower seeds. I just used some finely chopped walnuts. I loved the walnuts but, again, think the sunflower seeds would be good too. Maybe even better! Aside from being most delicious and super fast/easy to whip up, I also felt like I was eating something reasonably healthy. AND I really did feel satiated with just one. Unlike the cupcake I just finished and wanted to immediately eat another. But that's a post for another day.

Raw Cookie Dough Bites: 2/5

It sounds like a good idea, right? Healthy alternative to real cookie dough. I really should've known. If it sounds too good to be true, of course it is too good to be true. It's not that these were awful, but they did not taste like cookie dough. They tasted like nuts, oats, and honey in ball form. Except for the ball part. They were too crumbly for me to make balls. Instead I made a giant log. That's my laziness. I should've just added more honey, but by then I was too disenchanted. If you'd like a healthy snack, go for these with the extra honey! They did taste good. But if you think you're going to get cookie dough without butter or real sugar, you're as naive as I was.

Photograph courtesy of adashofcompassion.com

Buttermilk Pancake Mix: 4/5

For Christmas this year I bought my mom a bottle of maple syrup. To go with it, I wanted to give her some homemade pancake mix. Because this was intended to make her breakfast delicious and simple, I didn't want her to have to add too many extra ingredients. This is what I found. The mix was super easy to make (no surprise there) and called for ingredients I had in my pantry. I ended up with enough mix left over to make myself a few pancakes and was quite pleased! The pancakes were super fluffy and all I had to add was water, an egg, and oil. I will definitely make these again for both myself and gift-giving.

Photograph courtesy of Mennonite Girls Can Cook

Easy Double Flannel Blanket: 3/5

I wanted to make a flannel blanket for my little Angela Rose out of this beautiful rose print I found. I went in search of a good tutorial. Because I had just finished my sewing class and felt way overly confident, I decided to make the self-bound version. Ha. Making a self-bound blanket was not-so-easy. Mitering the corners turned out to be tricky, and I had to reread the tutorial multiple times. I still never quite understood the instructions but somehow got mine to work well enough. For my first blanket I was pleased. Angela seems to like it just fine. I would not, however, have felt proud enough to give the blanket to somebody outside of the family. If I make another, I will either find a different self-bound tutorial or else just stick to the more basic version.

Whole Wheat Blackberry Ricotta Scones: 4/5

Technically I pinned a recipe for whole wheat raspberry scones. But I had blackberries. So. Blackberry scones it was. I actually LOVED these. They were flavorful, creamy, and moist. By far the best scones I've ever eaten! You could definitely taste the wheat though. It gave them an ever so slight bitter note, and it was not a hit with the husband. Too bad. They were reasonably simple to make, but not simple enough that I'd make them just for myself to eat. Not very often anyway.

Photograph courtesy of Smitten Kitchen

How This Blog Will Work

When I first signed up for Pinterest I gave myself some guidelines. Otherwise, I knew it would quickly consume my life. For example, I don't follow everyone. I also don't follow every interest of those I do follow. I mean, if I don't macrome then why would I want to look at macrome projects? Which brings me to another point. I only pin things I actually intend to do or use. This may look impressive, but I know I will not be attempting it. Ever. Of course I have a long back log of all the projects/tasks/new meals I intend to accomplish. I'm only human. But I intend to keep working on that list. Sometimes it goes swimmingly. But other times it is epic failure.

So here's the deal:

• I will try to post as many pictures of my "finished products" as I can. I'm not a professional photographer. I'm not an amateur photographer. In fact, I'm a lousy one. Until photography becomes one of my pinning interests, you'll have to bear with me. Please accept my apologies in advance. If the finished product basically looks like the pin, I may skip the photo altogether.

• Each project will be rated on how well it worked as follows:

1/5: Project tanked; my life was made harder by it. 

2/5: Project was unsuccessful but not necessarily a disaster.

3/5: Project had mediocre success.

4/5: Project success; I was pleased with the results.

5/5: Score! This project was life changing.

• I will be candid about what in the process went well and what didn't. If I would do something differently next time, I'll mention that too.

•  Please keep in mind that my criticisms are not necessarily directed at the original creator. Most of the time, the problem lies in my execution (or the executioner, ahem).

• Lastly, I welcome any and all feedback (as long as you don't use profanity!). Please give us your own results, recommendations, tips or general comments.

Now let's get to work on those pins!