We are all guilty of it: the mindless browsing, clicking from one Facebook profile to the next, avoiding productivity like the plague. Then, all of a sudden, an hour is gone and you have nothing to show for it! Even Facebook gets old when it’s a slow night for status updates, so why not try branching out of the usual procrastination pattern and hitting up some of these fresh new sites?
#1 Pinterest: I recently quoted one of my friends when she said, “Pinterest makes me a better woman.” You can scroll through endless recipes, fashion, DIY crafts, home décor, and wedding ideas. If you sign up for your own Pinterest account, you can create “pin-boards” onto which you can “re-pin” your favorite snippets. Your boards can be labeled to reflect your interests, and you can have as many as you want. When you sign up for Pinterest, you can even use your Facebook account to search for Facebook friends with Pinterest. This is a great site to visit if you want ideas to decorate your apartment or dorm room on a budget, or if you want to make homemade Christmas gifts!
#2 AllRecipes: If you are ready to break in the brand new set of untouched pots and pans your grandmother bought you as a house-warming gift, look no further than AllRecipes.com! This website is really handy, because you can either quickly browse recipes by ingredient, or you can set up an account and start saving recipes to your online cookbook. The tool that I have found handy is the “Search by Ingredient” option: You can list ingredients that you already have on hand, and it will bring up a long list of recipes you could make right then! The recipes are all rated with either one to five stars, and you can read reviews from people who tried the recipe.
#3 Tumblr: Essentially, Tumblr allows you to set up your own personal blog, then follow other blogs that you like. Unlike other blogs, Tumblr has a “Reblog” feature, which allows popular blog posts to be circulated quickly amongst many Tumblr users. Tumblr is full of all sorts of Internet goodness, from adorable pictures of cats, to funny Harry Potter gifs, to current events, and more. Tumblr can be confusing when you first start, especially when your Dashboard fills up with tons of posts from all the bloggers you follow. However, it’s totally worth it, especially when Tumblr blogs like “Feminist Ryan Gosling” exist. You’re welcome.
#4 Twitter: While most of us have heard about Twitter, not everyone has one, or tweets regularly. At first, Twitter may seem like a way to over-inform the world about your daily activities: “Omg, my cat has dandruff,” “I just sneezed like 5 times #gross.” Twitter is also a great way to stay on top of news, celebrity activity, and current trends. You can also follow your favorite stores, that will sometimes tweet special promotions, coupons, and sales that are available only to their Twitter followers. Some accounts also do giveaways for their followers, and you can win free books, makeup, and gift cards. Also, there’s nothing like the feeling you get after realizing you racked up two more followers overnight!
#5 College Fashonista: Ever wonder what college girls are really wearing? College Fashionista takes pictures of real girls wearing real fashion on real college campuses, and gives collegiettesTM like us a chance to show off our wardrobes. It’s a great site to browse for ideas on how to translate expensive runway fashion into practical styles for class, going out, and studying. You can check out the “Featured” section on the homepage, or you can choose specific university pages. Additionally, College Fashionista has partnerships with some of the brands and labels we love, and they offer special promotions to people who sign up on their email list. Be sure to sign up and check the UT Austin page– you might end up there someday