Make a Bacon Alarm Clock

Is the smell of bacon the only thing that will help you emerge from your slumber? If tantalizing your olfactory senses is the only way to get you out of bed in the morning, construct your own alarm clock that cooks bacon by your bedside instead of having to wake up to an annoying buzz or screaming disc jockey. You don’t need to be overly handy––all that's required is a raging love for bacon.

Steps

Preparation of Workspace and Toaster Oven

  1. Clear a well-ventilated area in order to paint your toaster oven. Cover surfaces with a drop cloth or newspaper or consider spray painting your oven outside. Tape and cover all the parts you don't want to paint.
  2. Clean toaster oven with a micro-fiber cloth. If the oven is new it won’t need a lot of cleaning; however, you will want to ensure that any dust or debris is removed before applying the spray paint.
    • Cover the window portion of the toaster oven with painter’s tape. You’ll want to see the bacon sizzling away inside the oven so don’t coat the window with paint.
  3. Spray the paint toaster oven. Cover the entire oven evenly with paint. If you want to apply two coats, make sure the first coat is completely dry before applying the second coat.
    • Make this toaster oven something special by creating a little piggy face on the front. Since pigs are pink, pick up a can (or two) of high temperature auto engine paint. Although this paint may be found at craft stores you can also hit the automotive outlet for paint too. Of course, if you're a dude and having a pink pig in your room isn’t very manly, pigs come in other colors like black, grey or white.

Designing the Pig's Nose

  1. Cut the wood into a circle. This will form the nose.
  2. Drill two holes into the round wooden circle. This makes the piggy nostrils. If you want, you can color these black later, using a Sharpie to add detail to the nose.
  3. Smooth the nose by sanding it with 1000 grit sandpaper.
  4. Add primer to the wood so that the spray paint will stick to it.
  5. Lay the “nose” on the newspaper or drop cloth. Paint it.
    • Add black nostrils to the nose after the paint has dried using a black Sharpie pen. Draw two circles for the nostrils.

Making the Pig's Ears

  1. Create the pig's ears. Cut the wood into two squares.
  2. Add primer to the ears. Paint.

Adding the Features to the Toaster Oven

  1. Add the googly eyes using super glue.
  2. Install the nose. Drill the side of the toaster for screws to add the nose with.
    • Screw the nose on the side of the toaster.
  3. Stick the ears on top of the toaster using heat resistant glue.
  4. Add a tail. Curl the fuzzy wires into the shape of a pig's tail.
    • Drill the other side of the toaster for a screw to fit in, this is where you are going to put the pig's tail.
    • Install the screw.
    • Make sure you shave off the end of the fuzzy wire just to be sure it won't heat up and potentially catch fire. Once shaved, it should be easy to tie the fuzzy wire to the screw you installed.
    • Attach the tail to the toaster's body.
  5. Consider alternative decorative elements. While the method above may work well for you, there are some different options that you might wish to consider for attaching the features to the oven:
    • An alternative way to decorate the exterior of the toaster oven would be to use a hot glue gun to affix the nose to the middle of the window and the googly eyes to the metal area above the window of the oven.
    • Instead of wood, use felt. Cut out two large circles from the pink felt. Use the craft wire to construct pointy piggy ears on top of the oven. Apply the wire with hot glue to the toaster and allow it to dry. Wrap the wire with the felt circles and secure around the base of the wire. Trim excess material if necessary.

Adding the Final Touches

Your bacon alarm is almost complete.

  1. Set the timer. You may want to test drive the timer to ensure you have set it correctly.
    • Plug the oven cord into the timer and the timer into the wall. Follow the instructions on the timer for setting the time.
  2. Set the piggy toaster oven to cook the bacon. If you have your timer plugged into the wall, the piggy toaster oven should not start cooking until the designated time. However, you should have the oven set so it's ready to cook. Synchronize your alarm clock with the digital timer of the oven.

Using the Oven

  1. Consider how you plan to have the bacon ready in the morning. There are a few ways to approach this:
    • Place frozen bacon in the toaster oven the night before. On the one hand, the bacon could sit in the toaster oven for a few hours, thaw and be perfect for cooking. However, be absolutely certain that allowing meat to sit out for a long period of time will most likely attract bacteria, causing it to be unsafe for eating. This is especially so if your room is warm.
    • Set another alarm to wake you up a few minutes before your toaster oven is set to activate. Head to the kitchen refrigerator to grab a few pieces of bacon and place in toaster oven.
    • Keep a small refrigerator near your toaster oven where you will maintain your bacon supply. Set another alarm and when it goes off, simply roll over, remove the bacon and place in toaster oven.
  2. Test different settings on the toaster oven to identify the best way for your bacon to cook. Not everyone likes their bacon cooked the same way so you may want to adjust settings during the first few days to cook it the way you like it.
  3. Finished.

Tips

  • Line the inside of your toaster oven with aluminum foil for quick and easy clean up. Serve cooked bacon on the foil and then simply discard used foil each morning.
  • Consider adding an alarm element to your toaster oven to help you wake up. Either plug in a separate alarm clock near the oven or even add a toy that makes a piggy or even a rooster noise.

Warnings

  • Unplug the toaster oven when it's not in use.
  • Always check your connections to avoid a fire hazard.
  • Use appropriate precautions when handling bacon being used as food.
  • Be careful, Test it before use, as modifications to the toaster may make it a fire hazard.
  • Clean the toaster oven daily to remove grease and debris. Not only will this help you avoid attracting bugs, but also grease can pose a fire hazard.

Things You'll Need

  • A new toaster oven

    • Look for an oven that has a setting for meat or bacon to ensure your bacon cooks correctly.

    • Consider purchasing a toaster oven that allows for pre-set timing; if you can purchase a model that allows you to have it turn on at a certain time you won’t need a timer

  • A timer; many timers allow you to plug the appliance directly into the timer, which goes into the outlet; this means that the timer can be set according to your specific time so, if you must wake up by 7 a.m., you could program your toaster oven to turn on at approximately 6:45 a.m. so the smell of cooked bacon will hit your nose by 7 a.m.

  • A digital alarm clock with a large LED Display, to sync your bacon alarm clock

  • Heat-resistant spray paint

  • Extra large (the largest you can find) googly eyes, craft wire or fuzzy wires and wood something you can use for piggy nostrils; have the wood pre-cut to shapes that would look like ears as well

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