Ah, Pinterest.

The eternal time-waster. The reason I feel the need to jump up and craft something out of mason jars. The main force behind my obsession with weddings. Also, the reason I often feel like the things I create aren’t really up to par.

Pinterest, in case you’re new here to the internet, is a website comprised of little ‘pins’ that you can save to your ‘boards’ as a way of easily finding them again later. What started out as me finding new outfit ideas or recipes quickly turned into an obsession that now spans 34 boards (plus 5 secret boards), 122 likes, and 4,113 pins. Four thousand pins. As in, four thousand things that I saw on the internet and decided I might want to reference back to. I pin absolutely everything, even things that have literally no relevancy to my life right now. I have an entire secret board dedicated to nursery decorations, though I am sitting here at 19, unmarried, and the thought of children 5 years into the future at minimum. But, obviously I need to pin all these ideas now, lest I forget. Or, you know, come up with some ideas of my own.

I love Pinterest, I really do. But its a complex love/hate relationship that has made me delete the app of my phone numerous times declaring, ‘That’s it! I’m done! That is the last “thinspiration” post I read about how nothing tastes better than thin!’ (Side note: Obviously people who believe that have never eaten bacon. Or pepperoni. Or McDonald’s at 2am after a night downtown. Just saying.) I honestly don’t even want to begin with the problem Pinterest has with these ‘fitness’ pages claiming that the way to lose 20 pounds is to drink nothing but dandelion water with cucumber for 5 days straight. Let me be perfectly clear on this one- in no way is that healthy, realistic, or ideal. Nothing can replace a balanced diet and regular exercise. But again, I’m just touching on this one. Maybe someday I’ll go full-on rant and let Thinspiration have its own post here. But, not today. Continue reading →