How Pinteresting

I’m about to do it. I am wavering between shame and excitement.

I am going to join Pinterest. I think.

Like a bride before her wedding (wow well I can’t believe I went with that analogy, but ya know, ya work with what ya got), I’m wondering if this is a good idea. Or was that just me?

Background story- I quit Facebook because of… well… reasons. And many of my “friends” took to writing on it like a daily journal. There was too much awesome stuff they were doing which left me feeling inadequate, or there was too much personal stuff about illnesses and bodily fluids that left me panicky about the contagion I might catch via interwebz.

Fast forward to the present, where I am happily social-media free (except for twitter but that barely counts, since I don’t really post and follow few enough people to be irrelevant). In my very limited knowledge of Pinterest, it isn’t social media. It’s a site where people put pictures, recipes, inspiration, etc and other people “pin” it to their boards that are named various things, such as “My Future Wedding” or “Healthy Crap for my Family”. Anyone living within the regions impacted by the so-called “Polar Vortex” is feeling like I’m feeling right now- GTFO. Now I’m not one to shy away from bundling my children up when it seems ridiculously cold and schlepping them outside to play and get fresh air. But today for example- it’s -6 with windchill to -20. I’m pretty sure Child Protective Services is just driving around writing up citations for every child playing outside in this. It’s stupid cold. I can rationalize anything to about 10 degrees. Under that it’s game over.

So basically here I am with loads of indoor time on my hands, and not a lot of projects. Sure, I have crayons and markers and coloring books and paints, but as I mentioned previously, my boys can sit still and focus on that for all of 5 minutes. We did homemade playdough one day, and that was a hit for about 2 days and then my eldest decided it was “germy”. Ah so sweet to see mom’s neuroses rubbing off at such a young age. I need stuff to do, new, novel stuff to do, that will occupy time, and be pretty cheap to make/do (did I mention I just quit my job? Yep, so we be po’ folk ‘til I find a new one). It wouldn’t hurt to have recipes too, as my stand-bys are getting a little tired.

Here’s where I need help. Who is on Pinterest? What do I need to do? Have any good activity or recipe pins or boards? Am I just signing myself up for a giant time suck? Would it be easier to wade through the internet than use Pinterest?

HELP!

PS I totally stole the post title from my bff, so I'm totally unoriginal. Thanks bff.