Pinterest

I remember when Pinterest first rose in popularity in the early 2010s. 

It seemed to be the fastest growing platform, as people right and left were signing up and sharing ideas. And what ideas! On Pinterest, you could cultivate inspiration for pretty much any topic you were interested in. 

Baking? Create a board for it!

Nail Art? I had it. 

Wedding boards? Another hugely popular board to have, where you could save ideas for their future dream wedding. Years later in the 2020s, it would be a trend to look back on your wedding pins to reminisce at what awfully bad taste we all had in the 2010s! (I distinctly remember seeing so many sparkly rhinestone belts for a wedding dress.. I feel like such a notion wouldn't be considered for half a moment today! Much like the converse shoe trend at weddings... do people still do that...?)

Like many other homeschoolers near me, I too hopped on the Pinterest train as a place to curate and express who I wanted to be (or pretended to be?) with the use of "aesthetic" boards. 

That was me, the aesthetic board girly. But, mine was more or less for a purpose, instead of just collecting a board of digital pretty pictures for the sake of it (not that there was anything wrong with that) - but I had multiple aesthetic/mood boards to cultivate inspiration for my stories. Specifically, I had a pirate story that I "worked on" for years. 

I say "worked on" in quotation marks, because there wasn't so much "AcTuaL wRiTinG" that took place as much as me getting inspiration for the story in the form of daydreaming about it, making notes about it, and collecting Pinterest pins about it.

The other major purpose I used Pinterest for was my crafts. I mainly did nail art, jewelry, and makeup. I would spend hours sometimes sitting on our living room computer scrolling nail art pins for ideas. And I actually did use the ideas! 

Much of content at our disposal nowadays, it seems, is largely for consuming, rather than cultivating actual inspiration and intrigue so that you are propelled to do the thing yourself. This is part of the magic of those old Pinterest days for me, at least when it came to the craft pins. I actually did the things I saw online, instead of just sitting as a passive consumer in need of some dopamine hits. 

It's hard for me to pinpoint exactly when and how I started to stop using Pinterest. I started working a part time job, and I remember looking at my boards during breaks... but honestly without an hour or more to devote to curating my feed and boards, my experience on the platform just wasn't as "good" anymore. 

Then of course the Pandemic hit in early 2020. And all I did was work! I worked from about 5am to 7pm most days, and even pulled a 90 hour work week at one point. I had a lot of fun, but in many ways it wasn't good for me. Life is about having balance. If you work too much, it's not good for you. Humans were designed with internal needs, built into cycles where needs productivity and rest shift. Overloading the whole system with work, just isn't going to yield very great results in the long run. My mental health took a huge toll that year, among other things. But that's neither here nor there. 

My point being, during the pandemic I didn't have time for Pinterest or ideas, or creating or inspiration.

And then after the Pandemic, or should I say towards the second half of it and through the end of it, I was tied up in a messy cocktail of falling in love, dealing with family drama, and finding my relationship with GOD again. 

And then.... I got married, and then I got pregnant, and then I had a baby... and now we are here!

Life is full of full-circle moments. The older I get (and I'm almost 27 now!), the more I'm understanding that life is full of cycles. In every area of life. At this point I am a full time, working stay-at-home mom. I've been doing it for a year now (since my maternity leave ended in late September 2023). And honestly? I'm still getting used to it. Learning how to prioritize. How to have that balance of rest and work. 

Which brings me to cooking (stay with me here). One of my favorite hobbies is cooking. I enjoy trying new things (HOOOWWW did I not discover curry until I was in my 20s???), but I also need to remain realistic for what I can accomplish with my job and place in life being what it is. In comes Pinterest! 

Of course I can't (and won't) spend HOURS on there scrolling through ideas and inspiration for recipes, BUT Pinterest has come full circle as a practical, usable tool for me to use in my daily life just like it used to be. 

Although, I just have one request, can we stop using ai images for recipes? It creeps me out. K thanks. 

To wrap up, I want to share a few of my favorite recipes that I've found and used on Pinterest the past couple of months. 

If you're interested, here is my food board to get your own creative juices flowing.

That's all I had for today - just some reminiscing of my Pinterest days the way they used to be, and contemplating how those things have changed and how things are now. As a homeschooler, Pinterest used to be pretty social, I remember commenting and messaging my online friends quite a bit. I think one of them I still have on Instagram. 

-Amaris ☆ //