Pinterest, I hate you. Again.

Today, I stumbled upon an experiment for homemade lava lamps on Pinterest, bookmarking it for later use. I made the mistake of leaving the window open, and when Ben was looking over my shoulder this afternoon, he spotted it. Ohhhh, cool. Can we make those today? Ben asked. Sure, my love. We can.

I took out the measuring cups and the vegetable oil and a glass jar before realizing that we were out of food coloring. Ben’s face fell. When Daddy gets home, I’ll get you food coloring, I promised. Don’t worry.

When Jeff got home, I held up my end of the bargain. We have a Whole Foods five minutes away and I called to make sure they had food coloring before heading over. They did. Phew.

I arrived at the store to discover that Whole Food indeed carries food coloring, and that it is priced at TWENTY DOLLARS. I lost five minutes of my life standing in the aisle debating whether it was worth the extra fifteen bucks to save the time and energy it would take to drive to the Giant 15 minutes away or if I should just suck it up and return home with the damn bottles. My little boy’s face appeared in my head and the next thing I knew, I was waiting in line.

The clerk asked how I was this evening. I smiled and grumbled that I was fine other than the fact that I was about to spend twenty dollars on freaking food coloring. She laughed and asked why didn’t just go to Giant where they sell it for a few dollars. You’re right, I responded. I thanked her and left empty handed.

Drove 15 minutes to Giant. Found the food coloring. Waited in line. Read about Drew Barrymore’s new baby. Grabbed some gum. Discovered once I went to pay that I’d left Whole Foods a little more empty handed than I realized and had no way to actually pay for the four dollar food coloring I was so thrilled to see.

Left Giant to drive back to Whole Foods to retrieve my wallet, which I prayed was where I left it. Fortunately, it was. Along with the twenty dollar food coloring which I promptly purchased, rolling my eyes at myself the whole time and vowing to never again pin science experiments for the kids.

Arrived home to eager Ben waiting to conduct the great lava lamp experiment of 2012. Added the oil, the salt, the water and the food coloring to the glass jar and, together, we waited for the magic to happen. And we waited. And we waited some more. “Isn’t it supposed to do something?” Yeah, Ben, it was. Sorry, my love.

I blame the all natural, no preservative, plant based food coloring.

Pinterest, we’re done.

(Once again.)