Fridge Magnets / Magnetic Necklace

This craft project started a little outside my wheelhouse. An old roommate and a fellow classmate invited me to make jewelry with them. Jewelry? I'm not much of a jewelry person myself, but for whatever reason on this particular day I decided to go for it. 

Maybe I thought wearing a necklace would make me seem... "edgy"? Let's not dwell on this idea too much. The fact is I decided to make a necklace.

As we were travelling to get supplies, I had a thought. Why not make a pendant necklace where the pendant portion could be swapped out for other pendants? That way, the same chain could be re-used across multiple necklaces. This was arguably a great idea, within the scope of what continued to be an overall terrible idea.

We arrived at Michaels (my happy place), and I immediately found a way to make this dream a reality: small paired magnets. By attaching one magnetic pole to the necklace chain, and one magnet of the opposite pole to each of the pendants, they could easily be pulled off and replaced on the chain. Super. I bought these, as well as some wire, a necklace chain, a clasp and other jewelry tidbits that I felt would look cool hanging from my neck. Rad.

Back at home, we assembled our jewelry while listening to some awesome tunes. For the chain, I created small loops of wire and fed them through each end of the chain. To one of these loops I added a clasp to close the chain. I then found the center of the chain (opposite the clasp) and attached one small magnet with some wire. 

I created different pendants by looping a small amount of wire through each loop stemming from a small magnet (i.e. the complementary half to the magnet already on the chain). I used the other end of the wire to wrap and hold my Michaels jewelry pieces, paired with various household items: paperclips, cork, Met pins, metal scraps, thumbtacks, guitar picks, some weird hook-like thing. You know, normal things to be seen with in public dangling from your neck.

I'll skip several steps, including saying how I would wear these every day and the inordinate amount of time I spent in front of the bathroom mirror. 

Eventually, I wore one of these pendant necklaces out to a bar with some school friends. I'm pretty sure I even wore one on an OkCupid date once. Needless to say the whole necklace thing was not well received. 

Maybe in the future they'll look back and say that I was just ahead of my time?

Until that day comes, I've found an alternative use for all of those carefully crafted pendants: fridge magnets.

Materials:
Small paired magnets
Thin wire
Jewelry tidbits
Random household items (whatever you can find that you think would be trendy!)

Necklace chain (optional)

Necklace clasp (optional)

Time commitment: 30 mins for three pendants

Estimated cost: Roughly 25$ 

I have to say, they look much better on the fridge than they do on me.

This is not to say that a magnetic necklace wouldn't look good on you! Be bold and give it a chance, knowing full well that you have a Plan B if your friends start pretending to not know you in public.

Happy Crafting!

Cinnamon Cold Brew

Coffee. The savior of mankind.

What can I say, I like my statements like I like my coffee: bold.

Aid to the weekend warrior, the late shift-er, and other people who forgo sleep for staying out late and/or getting up early. And also normal people. Coffee is great for normal people too. I'd hate to go to work on Monday morning decaffeinated, and I'm sure people would hate to go to work with decaffeinated me there as well.

With all the newfangled coffee fixings out there, you can drink your coffee almost anyway you like. Double tall skinny vanilla latte? Sure. Orange mocha frappuccino? Probably.

Myself? I'm a purist, and straight up black iced coffee is how I roll. Although after trying this recipe a few times, I'm starting to spice it up a bit.

Add a kick to your morning habit with this cinnamon cold brew iced coffee.

Ingredients:

Coffee, 12 tbsp (medium grind)

Water, 6 cups

Ice cubes

1 Cinnamon stick

Mason jars (or non-hipster liquid-worthy vessels of your choosing)

Time commitment: 15min active, 8-12hrs inactive

Estimated cost: 2.50$ (the cost of one grande iced coffee a la Starbucks. Can you say "profit margin"??)

Cold brew coffee is really easy to make. What I mean to say is, it's easy to make the poor man's version described here. Leave the fancy gadgets to the baristas!

It's best if you grind your own coffee fresh from whole beans right before you are ready to use them. But if the ground coffee you're using has been properly stored in an air-tight container, it should suffice (read: coffee snob).

Add all of the water and one cinnamon stick in a pot on the stove and boil for 3-5 minutes. Remove the pot from heat and allow the water to cool all the way back to room temperature (about 20 minutes). Your cinnamon water should be brown in color by the end.

Next, pour the cooled cinnamon water into the mason jar containing 12 tbsp of ground coffee. Stir the mixture thoroughly, and seal the mason jar with the lid (or other covering, such as wax paper and a rubber band). Allow the slurry to sit out on the counter for 8 to 12 hours. I recommend getting as close to 12 hours as possible, or else the coffee might taste a little weak. Another option is to add less water to compensate for less incubation time.

When you wake up the next morning, you have a couple options. You can take your coffee mix and pour it into your cup through a fine sieve or a coffee filter. Alternatively, you can press out the grounds in your mix using a french press, if you have one. (You can also do your cold brewing directly in the french press for an even easier time!).

If all of these things sound like way too much work for 7:00 in the morning, just try to carefully pour out your coffee, avoiding the grounds that should be resting at the bottom of the jar. Just think of the grounds that slip through as "coffee nibs".

Drop in some ice cubes, stir and enjoy. Oh yeah, and add milk and sugar to taste, if you're into that sort of thing.

Hopefully your cup of coffee tastes as smooth and cinnamon spicy as mine does. Keep in mind that your coffee can only be as good as the beans you're brewing!

Note: this cinnamon trick is a great way to enhance your tea as well. More on that in the winter. For now, bask in the lingering days of summer! With iced coffee in hand, of course.

Happy Crafting!