For the past month, I’ve been busy battling my author friend Katie Ganshert in weekly Pinterest Challenges.
We’ve been holding our Pinterest Wars biannually since 2013. For 4-6 weeks each spring and fall, we find a challenge on Pinterest and announce it on Facebook and Twitter each Monday. We attempt the challenge during the week. Then, each Friday, we ask our Facebook and Twitter followers to vote and tell us who did it best. We count the votes to determine whether Katie or I won the challenge and we also choose a prize winner from among the voters. This spring we’ve given out autographed copies of our books, a B&N gift card, and a Starbucks gift card.
Katie and I thoroughly enjoy the Pinterest Wars (especially the smack talking we do privately via text message and a walkie talkie app called Voxer during which I insult her attempts and she insults mine in hilarious fashion). However, the Pinterest Wars are an even bigger hit with readers. Their participation and enthusiasm has steadily grown over the years and THAT’S what makes our Pinterest Wars so much fun.
For our spring war, we kicked things off with a baseball pops challenge:
Katie and I were actually together at a writer’s retreat in Washington DC when it was time to announce the winner of this challenge so we filmed a Facebook live video about the Pinterest Wars and the baseball pops which you can watch here. My result is #1. I won by a landslide. Katie claims to have run into frosting difficulties.
For our second challenge, we tackled chalk art. Here’s the inspiration photo we were trying to emulate:
And here are our results:
The voting was close on this one! Her result is #1 above and my result is #2. She won on her page and I won on my page. But in the end, she won on her page by a greater margin and raked in 55% of the total votes. Ladies, <excuses to follow> my 13 year old son was not thrilled to participate in this challenge, as he’s past the age for chalk and capes and posing for mom’s pictures. Also, he’s very LONG. A foursquare court had already been drawn on my driveway, so I had to try to fit him into one of the squares.
Next, we tried coffee filter flowers:
My result is #2 and I took home the victory over Katie’s tie-die looking taco-flower. When I visited the blog post that contained instructions for this craft, I learned that this craft is so easy that it’s suitable for Kindergarteners. Finally! A craft at our level.
Last week, we attempted an “Easy Twisty Bun”:
My result is #1 and Katie’s is #2. First of all, I call foul on whoever tacked the word “easy” onto this hairstyle. “Easy” was what persuaded us to give the twisty bun a try. Let me tell you that it wasn’t the least bit easy, <excuses to follow> especially because my hair is the longest it’s been in years since I’m so deep in deadline mode that I haven’t had time to visit the hair salon. I was wrangling ROPES of hair. Katie won.
Which means that we finished our spring war with a 2-2 tie.
Another Pinterest War is in the books!
It’s good to try new challenges every so often, isn’t it? What new challenge have you attempted lately?
Becky Wade
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I loved your Pinterest wars! They were too fun! I am tackling my TBR piles of books. I am going to try the method of one book in one book out. Tha is my new challenge. 🙂
Ha! Perfect challenge.
These were so much fun to read about. Somehow (my elderly mom moving in with us) I missed these wars this year but thank you for the recap.
I’ve tried two new afghan patterns recently. One I made up for the very first time and it went bonkers! The other was a Christmas one and I’m still going to try it again. Didn’t have the heart to throw these partials away so I placed them in a bag titled “fails”!
Good for you for trying new afghan patterns, Gail!
So much fun. And I have enough friends who are able to “smack talk” that I can easily imagine and laugh over what goes on during your challenge.
These are so fun, Becky. You and Katie are geniuses for coming up with this idea. Such a fun range of challenges, and so creative. I love how you are both competitive yet able to laugh at yourselves and your attempts. I still remember Katie’s hysteria over her failed baseball pops when we were in DC. I hope these “wars” continue for years to come.
Thanks, Karen! Katie’s failed baseball pop gave me lots of laughter, too. 🙂
Our daughter got married last weekend, which was a wee bit of a challenge.
How does that tie in to this Pinterest War? HA! I did her hair in an “easy twisty bun”!!!
No, it wasn’t easy, but hair spray works great as flower glue.
And you two are hilarious with your smack talk.
I loved reading the history or your Pinterest Wars. It is absolutely wonderful that you are such good friends that you can do this type of fun activity.
I haven’t really been trying any new challenges. With mobility and health issues right now life itself is challenge enough. I am adjusting to new-found freedom with the mobility scooter that the VA got for me.
I’m challenging myself by adding more weight during my work-outs. Not too impressive I know, but as someone who HATES going to the gym it is quite the feat for me. I’m leaving for the beach in 16 days, so that’s my incentive, but after my trip all bets (and weights) are off 🙂
Go, Amy, Go!
Cute challenge! My latest attempt is reading challenges on Goodreads. I am waaaaay behind! Guess I spend too much time posting on blogs and Facebook! LOL! Thanks you two!
I love your Pinterest wars. They’re so much fun! Right now, I’m being challenged to get my flowers planted. Between snow last week–yes, I know it’s May, but this is northern Utah–grandkids’ activiites and graduations, lack of energy, and a little bit of apathy and denial, I’m not getting much done! Have a great holiday weekend!
Wishing you a great holiday weekend, too!