Adventures in DIY

Being a combination of crafty and cheap, DIY projects are just our thing. Projects range from hardware hacking to furniture making.

First Weather Balloon Payload Testing on a Model Rocket (Pt.1)

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Working with a professor at my college and Carolina Edge of Space in May of 2010 I, along with a small group of friends, sent a weather balloon 74,642 feet into the sky.  This post is mainly about the payload I designed, built and tested for the project.

This project was inspired by many seen recently online where students have been sending cheap payloads into the stratosphere. It started around December 2009 when we all met for the first time to discuss the project. It turns out that one of the professors in the Earth Sciences department focuses on remote sensing (gathering data about earth from satellites, etc.) who had done some weather balloon projects in the past. We all got together to discuss a possible launch.

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Turn Your House into a Spooky Face for Halloween

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My Scary Face House in the Daytime

Many people think the fronts of cars look life faces.  There is even an entire Flickr set devoted to car faces!  Well, ever since I saw my house for this first time, I thought my house look like a face.  The windows are perfect eyes and the garage looks like a mouth.

House Starting Point

I needed to put my anthropomorphic house theory to the test. (Yes, I had to look up how to spell anthropomorphic.)  For Halloween, I decided to use my house face palette to create a scary face.  Adam and I had different visions for our beauty, so we sketched out our ideas using paint to end our squabble.  Yes we are that anal retentive.  Our ideas were:

White TeethIdea 1: White Pointy Teeth with Black Background

White Square Teeth for HouseIdea 2: White Square Teeth with Black Background

Square Black TeethIdea 3: Black Square Teeth

Black Pointy Teeth Idea 4: Black Pointy Teeth

Although we thought Idea 1 would likely look the best, we decided to go with Idea 4.  We figured cutting out black teeth would be easier than trying to create a black background.  This is how we did it.

Materials:

  • Big Black Garbage Bags
  • Permanent Double Sided Tape

Tools:

  • Good Quality Scissors

Cutting TrianglesWe cut the edges off each garbage bag to create black squares of material.  From there, we cut out isosceles triangle shapes to use as the teeth.  We didn’t measure any sizes, but we did use the square pattern in our garage door to measure sizes.

ProgressIn the two top windows, we added a pupil to add to the eye effect.  Using the double sided tape, we put up each tooth one at a time.

Progress 2Because we didn’t officially measure the teeth sizes, the last two teeth had to be cut smaller to make them fit.  We did this to the last two teeth so there wouldn’t be one tooth that was noticeably smaller than the rest. This way the overall visual sizes of the teeth look balanced.

Progress 3More double sided tape was used on the bottom teeth than the top because we were concerned water or wind might more easily remove these teeth.  The bags had a bit of static cling which also helped them stick to the garage door nicely.

My Scary Face HouseWe lost daylight pretty quickly, but I couldn’t help but snap a nighttime shot.  Of course that adds to the drama of our scary faced house!

My Scary Face House in DaytimeHere is a daytime shot from the next day.

My Scary Face House in the Daytime

Overall this was an easy and fun project.  It only took Adam and I less than an hour to complete the entire project, including creating idea sketches in paint.  Can you turn your house into a face?  Send us your results!

DIY Home Rug Roundup

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Fabric Vinyl Rug

Our future plans involve laying down hardwood in our entire home.  Since the carpet that currently exists still has some life left, I don’t want to replace it until it is necessary (oh the suspense is killing me; but I think it is practical to do major redesigns when they are warranted and not just because you want to).  Anyway, my point is we are going to need to start building up a rug collection for when we have hardwoods.

Because there is tons of fun in doing-it-yourself, I scoured the internet for diy rug options.  I was pleasantly surprised at all the choices I found.  They really push the boundaries of the the term “rug“.  Because sewing doesn’t agree with me and braiding/crocheting  seems time consuming – these are options I think would be simplest to do.

Plywood Rugs

I discovered my most favorite unexpected rug option at Sugar Bee Crafts -you can make a ‘rug’ out of plywood!  Oh the options for a plywood rug!  You can stain it or paint it (or both).  You can use stencils or tape.  You can make it fit your style. (The vinyl rug below has the same customization options).

Plywood Rug

At our old place we had a low pile carpet.  Office chairs roll nicely over this carpet.  Our new house’s carpet, not so much.  This plywood rug might just be the ticket for this space!

Vinyl Rugs

The thing I love the most about vinyl rugs is the potential of putting a remnant piece of vinyl to good use.  Based on the tutorials I read, any vinyl will work; however a thicker vinyl is a must.  You can either paint vinyl like Addicted 2 Decorating’s post (pictured below) and Design Dazzle’s post or…

Hand Painted Vinyl Rug

Or you can cover vinyl with fabric like In My Own Style.

Fabric Covered Vinyl Rug

I am also in love with Momtastic’s quatrefoil version of a fabric vinyl rug.

Fabric Vinyl Rug

Fabric Rugs

Staying on a fabric roll, fabric rugs also have a lot of simple, diy options.  You can simply add a backing and lining to fabric you heart like High-Heeled Foot in the Door’s chevron beaut.

DIY Fabric Rug

Rugs are not just meant for indoors.  An outdoor burlap rug is featured on ohdeedoh’s how to post. One of the easiest rug options is to update an existing fabric rug with a little paint like Sarah Wandering did here.

Painted Rug

Or like A Little Bite of Everything’s Moroccan inspired design here. It is fab and super simple.  The only color painted on was the white for the pattern. LOVE IT!

Easy DIY painted rug

Roll Up Blind Rug

To add the cherry to this post, the easiest DIY rug I found was Re-nest’s idea of converting a roll up blind to a floor covering.  Very chic!

Roll Up Blind DIY RUG

So which rug am I going to make?  Right now I want to make them ALL!  They are added to my ever growing home to do list…

 

Our Master Home To Do (or Redo) List

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I wasn’t ever really a list person. This is likely because I would spend more time trying to find my to-do list than it would take to get done whatever was actually on the list.  Adam is a to-do list freak enthusiast.  I will admit that lists can come in handy, especially with a ginormous project like a house.  A new house.  A BIG new house.

Plus, this is a list I shouldn’t be able to lose.  (I also have secret hopes that this will grow to be the largest post on my blog.)  Even better, maybe the items sitting up here for the whole world to see will motivate us to tackle “The List” on a regular basis.

This list contains must-do’s as well as dream to-do’s.  Maybe I should color-coordinate the list?  Nah… Okay, strike that, colors may be a necessity.  I have new items since we have moved in.  This color will represent the 2012 must do’s and dream to-do’s.  Some to do list items we are currently undecided about.  Like curtain treatments.  We’ve lived without them and like the simplicity of not having them.  Do I still want them?

The List

Moving In Repairs We’ve been moved in for almost a year and still haven’t finished our moving in list.  Yikes!

  • repair the front door and frame (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add a rain guard to the back door
  • re-adhere the laminate in the kitchen
  • replace the end piece of laminate in the kitchen
  • ground fault the electrical outlets in the garage (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • move the location of the electrical outlet in the washer/dryer closet (why did they put it under the water hose?) (after debating we decided this didn’t need to be done, so I will check it off anyway)

Bedroom

  • paint the walls a dark gray (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add chair rail or some other similar architectural element like outlined here
  • add roman shades (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add curtain window treatments
  • get or make a rug
  • make a over the bed light/art sculpture like Ikea Gyllen

Master Office (Our office is in what most people would call the master bedroom.)

  • paint an accent wall green (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add roman shades (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add curtain window treatments
  • get or make a rug

Creativity Room (Don’t snicker; we have 4 bedrooms for one couple!  What would you do with an extra room?)

  • paint the walls a calm yet energizing blue (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add roman shades (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add curtain window treatments
  • get or make a rug
  • add chair rail
  • add beadboard
  • find furniture solutions

SheekGeek Inventory Room

  • paint the walls a calm yet energizing blue (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add roman shades (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add curtain window treatments
  • build a storage shelf of some type

Kitchen

  • paint the walls green (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add roman shades (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add curtain window treatments (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • find a quick fix for the linoleum floor by the back door (covered it with a rug!; checked as complete on 5/14)
  • replace the linoleum floor
  • paint or stain the kitchen cabinets
  • add spice rack inside doors
  • replace garbage can with under cabinet garbage solution
  • add shelving to laundry closet
  • paint inside laundry closet as inspired by designbuildlove
  • organizing solutions for pantry
  • organizing solutions for counter
  • organizing solutions for pots and pans (they don’t fit!)
  • install an overhanging pendant light (checked as complete on 5/14)

Living Room

  • paint the walls (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add a wall stencil or vinyl artwork
  • add roman shades (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add curtain window treatments (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add a chair rail or some other similar architectural element like outlined here
  • tile around the fireplace

Garage

  • install pegboard  (after debating we decided to change this to…) insulate the garage and put up drywall

Upstairs Bathroom

  • paint the walls green
  • add a towel bar (there currently is not one!)
  • add trim around bathroom mirror
  • add bead-board

Half Bathroom

  • paint the walls green (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add a toilet paper roll holder (there currently is not one!) (checked as complete on 5/14)

Master Office Bathroom

  • add roman shades (checked as complete on 5/14)
  • add curtain window treatments
  • add trim around bathroom mirror


Skywriting: Drawing Light Pictures

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Tree and Sky LED Photograph Example

Tree and Sky LED Photograph ExampleCreating led light drawings using a camera is a snap!  All you need is a camera (with the ability to set long exposure times) and a tripod (We actually used a table!).  Most of the pictures we took had shutter speeds ranging from 20 to 60 seconds; however, even shutter speeds as short as 4 seconds can work (you just have less time to draw!).  The camera we used for this project is my trusty (and no longer manufactured) Panasonic DMC-FZ30.  See more example pictures and tips after the jump.

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