Saturday, January 30, 2016

52 Pins in 52 Weeks - January Edition


I love Pinterest.  I love pinning recipes from my favorite food blogs or scrolling down the Everything section to see what everyone else has been pinning.  I love the idea of all the crafts and recipes and everything else right there at my fingertips.
Right now I have around 9,600 pins in 60 boards.  I do use Pinterest a pretty good bit but tend to stick to the boards regarding Dinner and let other delicious looking recipes or fun crafts languish unused and ignored.  This year I'm trying to get more use out of Pinterest so at the beginning of the year I created my 52 Pins in 52 Weeks Board as well as a Results Board to keep track of it.

Week 1

The PinForgotten Laundry from A Slob Comes Clean
Reason Picked:  I have a fuzzy sock obsession and some had stayed in the washing machine a bit too long and I just couldn't get rid of the stale scent.
The Basic Idea:  Add vinegar to the machine when I was them
The Results: At first I was a bit underwhelmed because while the smell was better it wasn't entirely gone BUT it did disappear completely the next time I washed the socks.  I had washed them multiple times before and the scent hadn't budged so I'm calling this a success!  Not to mention it's super easy and I always have vinegar on hand.

Week 2:

The PinHow to Polish a Stainless Steel Sink with Flour from The Kitchen
Reason Picked: I wanted my sink to be shinier
The Basic Idea: Pour a little bit of flour into the sink and buff the stainless steel surface
The Results  Maybe my sink wasn't dirty enough but I really couldn't tell a difference except for the fact I had flour gummed up in the drain.


Week 3:

The Pin:Cream Cheese Filled Crumb Muffins from Lauren's Latest
Reason Picked:  I love all things cream cheese
The Basic Idea: This is a cinnamon muffin with a cheese cake type cream cheese filling with a delicious crumb topping
The Results:  So so so so good!  They're a little tricky as you have to make the batter, the filling and the topping but the results are worth it.  I used 2 heaping tablespoons of batter for the first layer and I think next time I would use less because I barely had enough batter to cover the filling.  It still tasted amazing but wasn't quite as pretty.

Week 4:

The PinHoney Mustard Pork Scallopini from Full Bellies, Happy Kids
Reason Picked: I like pork dishes but for some reason I hadn't tried this one yet
The Basic Idea: A thinly pounded pork loin brushed with honey mustard, breaded and lightly panned fried.
The Results:  Meh not great.  I didn't love the flavor and most of the breading slid off even after I increased the amount of oil in the pan.  I've made other pork scallopini dishes that were more successful so I'll stick with those.


Week 5:

The PinCopycat Zax Sauce from Domestic Superhero
Reason Picked: I've been craving Zax sauce but am trying to cut down on eating out which means no Zaxbys.
The Basic Idea: If you're very unlucky and have never eaten at Zaxbys Zax sauce is this tasty peppery sauce that they give you to dunk the chicken in.  It also works for french fries, bread, and probably the napkins as well.
The Results:  It was good though I'm not sure it's quite as good as Zax sauce.  It also comes together really easily and contained ingredients that I always have on hand.  I'll definitely be making this sauce anytime I'm making my own chicken fingers.

I'm linking up with Weekend Cooking hosted by Beth Fish Reads

31 comments:

  1. I love that you are doing this!! I also have so many pins and hardly do any of them . There are some recipe ones I have tried and some cleaning solutions ones. I have to check out that first one you have!

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    1. I'm pretty good with using regular recipes but I have so many pins that I've just ignored. It's fun to make myself expand what I do a bit.

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  2. Good for you sticking with your 52 pin plans in 52 weeks! I like some of the suggestions and will try the one for the washing machine. Oh, the muffins are a must for me, I also love cream cheese!

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    1. The muffins were amazing! I highly recommend it and the vinegar pin was easy and effective which is always a plus!

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  3. I would have tried that Honey Mustard Pork Scallopini, too... too bad the flavor wasn't all that great.

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    1. I was definitely disappointed with the pork dish. There were several issues with it which made the dish just not work.

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  4. I love this idea! It's a great way to try new things. That vinegar idea is brilliant. I am soo remembering that. Too bad that the flour thing didn't work.

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    1. I was definitely disappointed with the flour thing. It just kind of made a mess.

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  5. What an awesome idea to do 52 pins and then keep track of them. Sounds like you had mixed results this week, but I too love the vinegar idea. I may give those cream cheese muffins a try.

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    1. I figured I'd have mixed results so I was okay with that! The muffins are heavenly!

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  6. Interesting pins and great idea to do 52 pins. Those muffins sound good!

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    1. The muffins are amazing! Definitely recommend them!

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  7. I kind of gave up on Pinterest because I never followed up on anything. Maybe I need to try it again.

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    1. I use it a pretty good but for recipes but I do feel like I could use it more.

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  8. Good luck on 52 pins! I enjoy glancing at Pinterest once in a while, but I get overwhelmed by the endless scrolling when I visit someone's boards :) It sounds like fun for you to discover a new Pin a week though, like a scavenger hunt.
    Since I wasn't utilizing my Pinterest for what it was meant for, I joined Listography which isn't the same, but allows me to just make random lists and share them with people. It does have the capacity for including photos. Mine is still quite the work in progress.

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    1. I'll have to look into listography! I'm all about lists and I haven't looked at that.

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  9. Great work! I use Pinterest quite a bit. Cheers from Carole's Chatter

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  10. What a fun idea and a great way to make use out of what you pin. That vinegar idea does sound like a winner. ;-)

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    1. I've really enjoyed playing around on Pinterest lately. It's fun to try pins I've been skipping over for whatever reason.

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  11. This is a great idea, Katherine. I don't use Pinterest too much. It's always a problem of spending too much time there! I do want to use it more this year and work on organizing what boards I have. I've used both vinegar and baking soda (separately!) for my laundry with good results.

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    1. I've done the vinegar and then baking soda with towels and it worked wonderfully. I love Pinterest but it can be a little unwieldy.

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  12. On Pinterest, it's like a never ending black hole of fabulous ideas. Good for you for doing them!
    That's pretty handy with the socks. They always smell no matter what. Or maybe I just have smelly feet. Especially the socks I use to work out in...
    The muffins sound delicious. I will give tha recipe to my best friend. Haha!

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    1. The fuzzy socks just held the musty smell and I couldn't rid of it but the vinegar did the trick. The muffins are so good and if you can have someone make them for you even better!

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  13. Please do this again next year! I will be basically fully retired next year, except for the the floating PT job I have, and I will have more time and energy for this. I see that the Zax sauce has mayo in it and the taste difference might be restaurant mayo. I worked in a restaurant and the mayo from the supply store tasted better because it was fuller fat. I have always wanted to have it at home, but it comes in huge containers and mayo cannot be frozen. This feature is such a great idea!

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    1. That's interesting about the mayo. I can definitely see that being an issue. If I manage to stick to it this year I'll definitely plan on doing it again next year! It's really fun to go through all my boards and pick out the ones I wanted to try.

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  14. Sounds like you had pretty good success with those that you picked. I need to use pinterest more myself.

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  15. I try not to let myself go to pinterest. I have too many obsessions as it is. I have never heard of using flour to clean anything. I would have thought baking soda would work better. Vinegar can do so much in the house. I do love trying new recipes. Great post!

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  16. What a great challenge! I have so many Pinterest boards as well. From time to time I may look through them, but besides my book boards they just sit there. This is such a great motivation. I really enjoyed reading your post and finding out how each one turned out. Looking forward to your February edition.

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  17. I am loving Pinterest too, I think there are boards devoted to Pinterest fails usually that picture with the melted rainbow crayons! Well done though for trying it out, I find it such an inspiration on there and I am on it more for the foodie side rather than books.

    Good luck with your next test!

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  18. Oh man! You are SO good getting these done. I have doing my Passionately Pinterest meme on my 2016 goals list but so far I've been a total bum and not done a single one. *hangs head*

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