Lately I’ve been trying tons of new recipes from cooking sites like AllRecipies.com.  Now, if I were a more patient person I would probably take the time to print the recipe before heading to the kitchen – but I’m not.  In fact I’m a bit of an impulse chef.  I tend to browse around the web until I find something that looks delicious and then head straight to the kitchen.  Of course the problem with this lack of preparation is that my laptop is often left exposed to loads of kitchen hazards.  I can’t count the number of close calls I’ve had with computer-killing ingredients like honey, flour, and boiling water.

That’s why I was thrilled when I read a fantastic laptop-saving idea on one of my favorite blogs – ParentHacks.com.  The contributor, Marisa, recommended covering your keyboard with plastic wrap to protect it from crumbs, spills and sticky liquids in the kitchen.  I was a little skeptical at first.  I thought the plastic wrap might make it hard to use my touchpad.  Much to my delight, it worked beautifully.  I was able to navigate a web page, type and scroll without any trouble.

The first time I tried this, I cut the piece of plastic wrap so it was just big enough to cover the keyboard and tuck under the sides of the computer.  However, it was tricky to move the computer around the kitchen and didn’t protect the bottom of the laptop from my messy counters.  On subsequent tries, I found it worked best to wrap completely around the base of the laptop so the ends “grab” each other on the underside of the computer.

I’ve also found that this is a great way to protect your laptop from sticky kid fingers too.  If you share a computer with your kids, you’ll definitely want to give this simple solution a try.  Just thought I’d pass it on.