Wednesday, May 29, 2013

It's A Movement!




One of my favorite blogs ever is Pintester, where the intrepid Pintester (Sonja Foust) tries out various pins from Pinterest.  She is hilarious!  I found out that she is looking to start a movement to get as many people as she can to try a pin they've been meaning to try and link them all together on her blog.  Honestly, it sounds like she might be leaving for vacation (totally allowed, BTW) and is looking to make sure she's got some interesting posts for a while...

But I digress. As luck would have it, I have a Pinterest board called "Gotta Try This," so I thought Sonja's idea was a perfect way for me to actually try one of those pins (confession: in the 3 years I've had a Pinterest account, not once have I actually attempted one of the "Gotta Try This" pins).  I also have a board called "Cool Ideas I Will Never Do," but all of those things are way more complicated, and, frankly, I didn't want to come off as being a liar.

Of course, even though I've had a week to think about it, I only started working on this the day before we are all supposed to post, so I had to choose a pin that didn't require extra shopping.  Since I'm not crafty at all, that posed quite a restriction.  You will be pleased to know that I had, in fact, all the necessary items to attempt this:

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The original post was from Thrifty Decor Chick, but the picture didn't link to any sort of instructions.  So, not wanting to go in blind, I googled "apple candles" and found instructions here.
It didn't seem too hard.  I just happened to have 3 apples left in the house, and three votives (I have a ton of votives, because you can't just buy, say 3 or 4; they always seem to come in these huge packs of 50, which lasts me approximately 10 years -- more, because we're still counting - and I still have 20 left from my pack).

Sorry, more digressing.  Anywho, so I gathered my supplies:



I would advise using bigger apples, because these didn't have a lot of room around the top once the holes were cut for the candles, but these were literally the last three apples in the house, so I did not have much of a choice. None at all, truth be told.


 Now, the directions said to mark the circle using a pen, and then cut out the circle, but I couldn't find a pen that worked, plus that seems like an unnecessary extra step, so I just held the votive in place and lightly scored across the top to give me a guide. This method could have ended with me driving, one-handed, to the ER, but all was well.  I'm used to using kitchen knives, so I wasn't worried, but if we were using, say, a craft knife of box cutter, I might have been in trouble (side note: my first ER trip ever happened only 2 years ago, at 44 years old, and involved a box cutter, which I am no longer allowed to use without supervision...also, no one will ask me to make decorations for their class party ever again).

After I cut around the guide marks a little deeper, I cut across the top, making an X to make it easier to pry the pieces out from the top.



Then, you cut away more of the insides so that the votive will fit into the apple.  I think the instructions said you should use a spoon to scrape out the insides, which might have worked better, but that would have entailed messing up another utensil and the kids were going to be home from school soon, so I couldn't be bothered with grabbing another thing when I had a perfectly good knife in my hand.






Here's the finished product.  I know, it's a little lopsided, but if you turn your head the opposite way, it looks great, so just go with that.





Original pin:                                                      Nailed it (to use Pintester's vernacular):

  

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Conclusion: Although it was relatively easy to do, frankly, I thought it was a waste of some tasty apples.

One final note: you might want to use an apple that doesn't turn brown very quickly, because, about 5 minutes after I took the final picture, you could see a ring of brown starting to form around the holes where the candles were.  Maybe you could rub lemon juice on the inside. Or do a better job of cutting than I did...


9 comments:

  1. See, I would do this and then my husband would ask me why I was hurting apples when no one comes over to enjoy decorative fussy things.
    And I'll have you know, you had the same LPP* as Sonja! I'll totally come back to see future pintesting.

    *laughs per post

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  2. You know I nearly bought a little gadget thing that cuts out candle sized holes in fruit and vegetables...I'm so glad I didn't, your knife approach worked perfectly well. Love it!

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  3. Thanks, Ladies! Getting as many laughs as Sonja is high praise indeed, Jodee! Most of my blog posts are about food and cooking, but I do throw a couple of crafty things in once in a while. But because I'm not a very crafty person (I am cheap, though), my attempts at crafting are usually pretty funny. :-)

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  4. I tried this with small pumpkins in the fall. I cut off the stems and then used a drill to make a candle size hole. It worked pretty well. It's too bad the apples turned brown.

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  5. I bet apple juice or petroleum jelly would work!

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  6. Love 'em. Although I would have totally eaten them before I was done with the project. ;) Glad you didn't chop off a finger or anything!

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  7. Natalie, I've seen the pumpkin idea, too. Maybe do a mix of mini-pumpkins and apples for a fun fall decoration. And I'll bet that the petroleum jelly might work, too. Always worth a shot!

    Sonja, as soon as I took the last picture, I took the candle out of one and ate the apple. True story.

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  8. I've seen that pin, but apples don't last anywhere near long enough around here for me to even think of trying it. Also, I would have cut myself.

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  9. I, too, have gone to the ER because of an freaking box cutter in the last few years... It is you lose all your hipster points when you go to the manager at your cool record store job and tell them you lopped off a bit of your finger. Good times.

    (I like this project, but I too, would have eaten the apples.)

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