A couple months ago, @WTFPinterest (who runs a hilarious blog that you should totally go check out) sent me a tip that Huffington Post was saying that popsicle stick bracelets are one of the most popular pins ever to hit Pinterest. My very own sister had pointed the pin out to me even before that, so with two requests in the bag, I couldn’t very well ignore this project any longer. Except I did. For two months. But now I’m doing it, so quit nagging, ok?
Photos by Tara Nelson, Craft Affection
Know why I took so long to test this one? I didn’t have any popsicle sticks. No lie.
But I was foraging for food the other night in my freezer and found some fudgesicles. Some very old fudgesicles. I briefly considered eating one.
Very briefly.
But then I gave up and just put it down the sink. I did save the popsicle stick, though. Given my crafting history, I decided I’d better have two popsicle sticks, on the off chance that I messed one up– haha– so I fed the garbage disposal one more really old fudgesicle. And I knew just what to do with the popsicle sticks…
I boiled the shit out of them. I boiled those suckers on a double double toil and trouble rolling boil for fifteen full minutes.
So I expected them to be sort of pliable when I fished them out (with tongs, because I ain’t dumb– that shit was hot).
They were not very pliable. In fact, they very much resembled… popsicle sticks, in their pliability. Still, I managed to bend them very carefully and slowly into a semi-circular shape and stick them, as instructed, in a glass. And, since this is me we’re talking about, it was a Bailey’s high ball glass.
Then, also as instructed, I let them sit overnight. This tried my patience. You will note that my usual pintests are not over-nighters. I am not a patient woman. But for you, and to test the most popular pin ever on Pinterest, I managed.
I got home from work today all excited, thinking I’d never have to pay good money for a bracelet ever again. (And then I took my tongue out of my cheek and stopped being such a snarky bitch.)
Alas, it was not to be.
This resembles a bracelet sort of in the way my dog resembles a tabby cat.
Which is to say not at all.
All of my wishing could not make it work.
And, so, I did what any other crafter would do when faced with insurmountable odds and a failed craft. I quit and drank some damn wine.
They actually look more like my retainers than any bracelet I own. Hear that, Pinterest people? You can make your own retainers at home!
71 Comments
Yeah. Bracelets…not so much. I like your watch, though.
You are just the sweetest, Michelle. I love that out of that whole fucked up post, you still managed to find something to compliment. I bet you would be the greatest person to have around when I’m having a bad hair day.
Cool dog.
I’m sure I could find something witty to say about failed stick bracelets if I didn’t have such a bad head cold. I could be damn witty. How come the Pinterest ones are all pretty and shit? May be you just need a smaller glass and some pretty paper. Am I being a pain in the butt? I wish the damn cold medicine would kick in so I could pass out. I bet you wish that too…
I shouldn’t have read this before finishing my morning coffee. Liquid creamer added to coffee makes for very sticky keyboard keys when spewed from the lips. lol! Thanks for the morning chuckle!
You know, it would help if you followed all of the instructions and tips. If you do something half-assed it will turn out looking half-assed. Thanks for all the traffic to my blog though!
Thanks for stopping by, Tara. As always, offense is never meant to the original poster of Pinterest crafts. Obviously someone made them work. That someone is just not me. Ever. 😉
I don’t usually comment on blog posts, but Tara’s response is kind of bitchy. And that final line reeks of that old adage: Any attention is good attention.
Lol! No offense taken! You started my day off with a laugh! Thanks again!
I think the popsicle stick grill is genius. George Washington could have really used that technique.
i tried this about a year ago…hubs walked in and said ‘those boomerangs never gonna fly babe.’ yeah…
[…] tested one of the most popular tests on Pinterest, the popsicle stick bracelet. This won me a snarky comment from the original inventer of the popsicle stick bracelet, accusing […]
I’m with Jesse on this one. Popsicle stick bracelets…pffft…every teenage pop-tart wannabee has those. But a popsicle stick grill? Paint those babies gold, glue on a few Swarovskis, slap those things up on Etsy and wait for the money to roll in. (Although, it being Etsy, you need to photograph ’em against barnwood and call ’em Victorian Vintage Goth Steampunk.)
Awesome.
OMG, I thought you said Victorian Vintage oth SteamSPUNK…. oh geez – I laughed and laughed. Then laughed at myself some too…
Looking at the sticks in the glass… they don’t make a bracelet shape. Wouldn’t putting them in a smaller glass that forced them to dry in a tighter circle work better?
Not that I’ve tried it – just an idea.
mmmmyeah….I’m still ENRAGED with this one. The HOURS; DAYS EVEN, trying to make this fudging project work….I even wrote the lady twice asking her questions and seeking further enlightenment. She responded once. Didn’t help. My point: I’m glad I’m not the only one whose been victimized by this ruse.
ha ha ha ha OMG I make jewelry and saw this one and thought it was a GREAT idea. I KNEW they would not bend completely as shown. And I couldn’t find popsicle sticks either. This is hilarious. NOW I know not to even atempt it!
I tried this Pin as a trading item for my daughter’s Girl Scout Jamboree. I let them soak overnight and they were not even remotely pliable. I let them soak for another night and same issue. I forged ahead and tried to force them into small glasses (they had to fit on small wrists after all). I broke a lot of sticks, cursed a lot, and got laughed at by my husband and kids. I let the 10 I managed to wrestle into the glasses sit to dry overnight (seriously, I’m not usually this patient especially for something that looks like it’s failing…. I must really like those rugrats). Mine came out in the same shape as yours. Moral of my story: even if you don’t half ass it, it’s still a failed Pin.
I wish i would have read this a few months ago when i spent nearly 40 mins boiling and re-boiling popsicle sticks
Pissed myself at the end of this post!!! This is what I think would happen if I ever attempyed pinterest DIY!! Hahhahaha
I’m not sure these ARE Popsicle sticks.They look more like thin pieces of birch or something that are WAY longer than a Popsicle stick.They aren’t even straight so I am guessing they didn’t come from a fudge sicle…(BTW I tried it too.same results)
You’re right. It’s all an elaborate hoax. I made up the part about the fudgesicles. I actually went in my yard and found a birch tree, chopped it down, and made my own not-really-popsicle-sticks because I KNEW that would make this pin test fail. I WIN!
Best reply ever!
Seems she meant the original pin looks unlike a real popsicle stick. At least not any brand I’ve ever seen. Probably something special from a craft store.
I am guessing that Christina meant the pinned version of the “popsicle sticks” don’t look like real popsicle sticks because I thought the same thing. Yours are clearly popsicle sticks but the originals look thinner and do not have straight edges.
In that case, I retract my earlier snark. 😉
hahahaha! hilarious! you are fucking awesome 🙂
You are my new favorite person.
I made these, similarly convinced they would be awesome. I used craft sticks (thinner and wider than the actual kind – http://www.amazon.com/Charles-Leonard-Craft-Sticks-Regular/dp/B00342VDG6/ref=pd_sim_sbs_k_4 like those) I boiled them, bent them, etc etc… It worked sort of. They did bend into an almost full circle – then I mod-podged scrapbook paper on, because I shouldn’t paint anything ever.
In about three days they began to unbend slowly.
Oh well.
I tried this too but alas with a group of 4th and 5th grade girls. That will teach you to try and do something without testing it first…….fail!
I ended up doing these and had to completely revamp the “recipe” so it would work. I was successful, but only because I didn’t follow the directions.
Omg, I just discovered your blog and this post had me crying. I was laughing so hard that my 3-year-old daughter came over to investigate, ‘what’s funny mommy?’. But I was laughing too hard to answer her. And then her eager little face and repeatedly asking me what I was laughing at made me laugh even harder. I needed this laugh, thank you!
Yup…just found your blog…now I have tears streaming own my little cheeks…my DH thinks I’ve lost my mind. You, dear Pintester, are HILARIOUS. Love your blog. Phyllis from London, Ontario, Canada
LOL I love it! That’s a redneck grill you got there!! You just gave me some ideas thanks!!
I love, love, love that you tested this one! So many of my friends have pinned it and the 1st time I saw it I was like NO Fricken Way!! Thanks for the laugh and I will be bookmarking your blog and pinning your results! You Rock!!
I actually tried this one. I used wide craft sticks, boiled them for half a freaking hour (which made my kitchen hotter than the hinges on the gates of hell, I tell you), let them dry for 2 days (which was very inconvenient since we had 12, and drying required all but 1 of our glasses… meaning my husband, 7-year-old, and 3-year-old had to drink out of sippy cups because no way was Mama giving up the one glass that would hold an entire can of Diet Coke AND the required amount of crushed ice), and finally painted the suckers. That was a few weeks ago, and they still look great, but for all that trouble, I’ll steal one of the 7-year-old’s hair elastics the next time I want to wear something colorful on my wrist.
you are absolutely hilarious. I laugh out loud reading your posts because it’s resonates with my own humor perfectly. Pinterest is such a fake ideal for so many “cute” things whose only home will forever be on a “wedding ideas” board, and it’s about damn time someone exploits it 🙂
Think you need to try the toothbrush bracelet now 🙂
http://pinterest.com/pin/60165344992471302/
Haha, you have me cracking up… this shit is hysterical!
Thank you for being so insane and hilarious!
I doubt I will stop laughing for a few days.
Ok, this one is my favorite! By now, my co-workers are asking what the h*ll I’m laughing at over here! lol
seriously, you are the best cure for bad mood!
hahahaha… we have got to stop meeting like this… you doing funny shit and me laughing until it hurts!!!! lololol
I just want you to know that you have made my night!!! You are not the only lady who thinks like this and you have made me laugh out loud! Job well done! now pour yourself a glass of something amazing and lets toast to hilarity in failure!!! thank you *sniff sniff*
C’mon, you didn’t take at least *one* bite before feeding those frost bitten fudgesicles down the disposal?
I did this a few months back as well. Mine turned out basically like yours, although slight more round. But the end were still straight and a total fail as a bracelet. I even went so far as to try the paper decoupage, and that was just another step in the fail ladder.
I did this for my daughters sleep over birthday party. The kids loved doing them. BUT… They were a FAIL! Looked nothing like a bracelet, more like the mouth guard you showed. After a few hours they seemed to straighten back out. OH WELL< they had fun doing them!
I went to extreme lengths in trying to find ANY kind of success with this. I used doctors office tongue depressors, Popsicle sticks you buy in bulk, stick from actual Popsicles . . .
I tried boiling, microwaving, ‘glass’ glasses, soup cans (as the mold)
NOTHING WORKED *EVER*!
Not even close!
They all looked just like your results.
I was going to say maybe try a different type of popsicle stick but Nancy C answered that for us this is depressing they are very cute I was going to try it but now I dont!
ive actually done this! my mom used to be a “brownie” leader (ya know, like 5 year old girl scouts) and we made these. I have no idea how we made them back then, but I KNOW they worked. From thinking back id have to say the glass was the trick–we used small plastic ones that curled the bracelet almost completely closed. and knowing my mother we used some cheap ass generic popsicle sticks, nothing special. Plain brown popsicle stick bracelets to a 5 year old? bomb-diggity fo’ sho.
The pic of you wearing your new retainers is hilarious! I am addicted to your blog. 😀
Another hilarious post, I mentioned this in my blog at http://thissillygirlslife.blogspot.com/2012/08/the-pintester.html Check it out if you’d like!
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<a href=”http://thissillygirlslife.com/wp/the-pintester/”>This Silly Girl’s Life</a>
oh my gawd~ that so funny ~ i couldnt stop laughing esp after seeing the retainer part lols
[…] Popsicle Bracelet FAIL […]
Soaking in water for several hours rather then boiling makes them a lot easier to bend. also, you have to have REALLY small glasses, or you get the “retainer” effect you talked about.
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Haha this is really funny!
or …. you might have tried actually molding the sticks around something of the proper circumference to produce a bracelet and not a bent stick. Unless you’re a defensive football player in the NFL, there’s no way the glass you chose had a darn thing in common with your actual wrist.
It kind of cracks me up when people claim that an experiment, a recipe, craft directions, etc are failures – when it’s usually the person “trying” them out that is the failure.
Blanket response: http://pintester.com/oh-you-dont-like-it/
*Looks at dog/tabby cat comparison* *Looks at picture of dog* *Looks at tabby cat on lap* “Huh, besides the lounging on the couch in the same exact position thing I suppose I see your point.”
You have had me laughing on every post! Thank you! : )
I laughed so hard that my ribs hurt.
Have you got a link to the blog on this?
Yep, here it is! http://www.craftaffection.com/2011/06/super-cute-bracelets.html (The picture links to it but I was bad and didn’t put the link anywhere else on this post– sorry!)
My son is wanting to make these for his “girlfriend” (he’s 11) My thought was “I have no idea how big her wrist is? How do I know what size glass to use?” I will go ahead and let the little fella try it’s not like popsicle sticks are expensive. But I will show him your’s as well as the original. Thanks again, hillarious as always!
Did he try it? Did it work out? I need answers, please! 🙂
[…] Image Credit: pintester.com […]
http://bespangledjewelry.blogspot.com/2012/08/popsicle-stick-bracelets-diy-tutorial.html this work soo much better Try it
works*