Now I Know Why People Pay for Pine Cones

I thought it would be a fun thing to collect pine cones, glitter them, then put them in a bowl on our kitchen table. I was inspired by Becky's post. It would be an inexpensive, pretty decoration. Besides, who would pay to buy pine cones at the store when you can find them outside for free? Um, I would.

We went out Sunday afternoon to collect pine cones with one of our couple friends from church. We couldn't find any good ones at first, just the small, smashed, lopsided ones were all that were left. Guess the black Friday crowd hit up all the pine cones before we got there. I knew we should have come earlier. Our husbands were so sweet to try to get us some fresh ones. They were using the frisbee to knock the real beauties out of the trees. Pretty funny to watch as they were determined to get them down. We finally hit the jackpot in the Japanese Gardens. Lot's of good ones there. We filled up our bags then headed home.

Pine cones are so Christmasy. I love them. Oh, but apparently baby roaches do too. Who would have known a small colony of roaches had taken up residency in the pine cones I collected? I unknowingly sat the whole car ride home with a bag of roach-infested pine cones upon my lap. That is sick. When we got home to form the pine cone line-up to determine who would make the bowl, I began placing them in a height line. That's when they came alive. Each one had 3-5 bugs in them. Greg was so sweet. He violently shook each one until all the bugs came out. We are not talking microscopic slow-moving bugs that you can flick out the door people. We are talking small roaches that can do 0-60 in a millisecond. Has anyone ever played the arcade game whack-a-mole where you hit the moles with those big soft mallets? It was like watching Greg play that game while I yelled their various locations. Left knee, 10 o'clock! Above the towel, by your foot! He's getting away! After an intense roach-war, finally all the casualties were removed. I sprayed all the pine cones with bug spray, then placed them in air-tight zip lock bags in case any of them had decided to lay baby roach eggs to carry on their legacy. After a couple hours of suffocation I figured they were all dead and began the glittering process. Here is the final product. I added a bag of bead fillers from hobby lobby.

Buying pine cones might not be such a bad idea after all...