Just Married!

Ok, so this project is a big one.  A happy and healthy marriage for the rest of my life.  Totally doable.
 

Deb and I got married in Virginia Beach over the weekend and I couldn't be more jazzed about it.  And the first thing that I was ever early to happened to be my own wedding... bonus!  Check out the gobo and the lighting.  Nice huh.  Props to Mary and Rhett for the picture.  There were a few missteps along the way but that just added to the charm of the event.  Deb was beautiful, our guests were a blast and Blue Steel Lighting rocked the reception out.  I have a feeling these memories are gonna stick around a while.  Now we're off to Jamaica.  Can't wait to post about that. 

I'll call you Stampie

So, they are chairs that you take to your chairs.  Cute huh?  These fun little wedding favors kill two birds with one stone.  Hmm, maybe not the best saying for a "love birds" themed wedding.  While they are a great way of distributing the favors (inside the chair) and alerting guests of their seating arrangements, the best part was how we customized it with a handy little stamp from Simon's Stamps.  We have a nifty little logo that will be making a few different appearances at our wedding already and thought that it would be great if we could get it on the front of the paper chair somehow. The original idea was to print it on a sticker but experimented with the stamp method cause there was a good chance the outcome would look much better.  And we were right.  It wasn't so much the idea as it was the stamp.  It's good.  And surprisingly good at that.  Some of the text is pretty darn close together.  I was impressed.  Though it took a bit of practice to get the pressure and alignment just right, only a few chairs made the ultimate sacrifice in the name of personalized decoration. A little candy here and some calligraphy there and we have ourselves quite the unique wedding favor.  Special thanks to Rhett for help with the logo.  The man has the Photoshop skilz to pay the bilz.

One Touch Disco Room

The concept of instantly transforming any seemingly pedestrian space into a disco or romantic enclave isn't new but the manner in which you accomplish this task can vary greatly depending on available infrastructure, technical knowledge, resources, space, mood, style and timing.  If you're looking for an example, you may remember Eric (Otter) Stratton's bedroom from National Lampoon's Animal House.  Or possibly the scene in Accepted when Justin Long's character uses the Clapper to turn on a disco ball and mood lighting. Same basic idea.

The genesis of this idea actually grew out of a few smaller projects that I was working on concurrently.  Since I had already proven out designs for my RC-5 IR receiver circuit, iPod communication code, and common collector peripheral switching circuit, it seemed natural to combine them all in a single housing. 

It's basically a custom iPod/iPhone dock with the ability to remotely switch a variety of external devices.  to begin with, I knew that I wanted to control my disco ball spot light, disco ball motor, flux capacitor, knight rider belt, and silly fiber optic lamp I got from Ikea.  I included three extra ports for expansion.  The desired effect would be reached if, by pressing a specific number on my IR remote, the lights in the room would dim, my lighting projects would turn on and a pre-selected song would start playing.  I think I captured that quite nicely in the video below.



This box works better than my previous dock for a few reasons.  Foremost, it adds an LCD on the front that can display artist and song title information which you can't see on the iPod unless you're right next to it.  And the old dock has a very limited remote.  Sure it's small and cute but I don't mind the bigger universal remote when considering the added functionality like mute and iPod menu navigation. 

You may be wondering why I went with IR control over cooler technologies like wifi or bluetooth.  Good question.  I'll eventually incorporate that stuff into future projects but for now it just made sense to go with a short range solution considering that the person initiating the disco room will most likely be in the room when they do it.  That and I thought it would be a neat exercise to learn the proper way to create a program capable of receiving a Manchester encoded bit stream. 

You know what I wanna do now.... Strut.

Fly pumpkin fly, on the road to victory...

When carving a pumpkin, what shape or form could you leave upon it that would be more ghoulishly frightening then the Philadelphia Eagles football team?  The answer is none.  None more frightening.  Opposing teams...neh, ALL... shutter with fear in their presence. 

Not quite sure why I did this but the idea popped into my head last week to put the "Eagles" logo on a pumpkin so I went for it.  It's actually a fake pumpkin and the logo is more etched than carved but the effect is the same and this one won't end up a rotten mess in a couple weeks. Check out the second picture with the 'kin lighted from the inside.

 If you want to make something similar, here's what you do. First ya gotta find a pattern that strikes your fancy.  Obviously a black and white picture with moderate detail would work best.  You'll be etching out the white parts so make sure it has a black border.  Next comes finding a fumpkin (fake pumpkin) that is the appropriate size.  AC Moore or Michaels has a decent selection.  Even though my logo is more wide than tall I went with a tall fumpkin cause it felt more traditional to me.  Print out your picture, scaled to your liking, and tape it on securely.  Starting from the inside out, use an exacto knife or pin to cut through the paper into the fumpkin where black meets white.  After the image is thoroughly traced, remove the paper and clean it up a little.  Now comes the fun part. Ideally, you'd use a dremel with a small engraving bit to clear away the orange skin but any sharp cutting tool will work.  To top it off, cut a softball sized hole in the bottom and apply some light.  A candle would be a very BAD idea since the foam fumpkin is most likely flammable.

Happy Halloween campers!

Proposal

There are many things to consider when proposing to your girlfriend. Some of more importance than others. I'd guess the ring delivery system is probably pretty low on most people's priority lists. But apparently not on mine. I wanted to find a way to make this proposal unique, make it personal and memorable. Short of implanting a light source in the ring, making an over the top jewelry box to house the ring seemed like the right thing to do. You'll want to check out the video for full effect. Oh BTW, she said yes!

Draft Beer at the Homestead.

If you want, you can purchase a kegerator from any number of locations. However, if you haven't figured it out by now, that's just not my way. I endeavored to give my beer dispensing refrigerator a bit of home brew style much like the beverage I hope to create for it one day. Turns out, the hardest part of the process was finding a suitable chiller. Most mini fridges these days are designed with the cooling element at the top and the compressor at the rear-bottom of the inner compartment. This arrangement is not conducive to the measurements of a 1/4 barrel keg. Fortunately, I found just the right model at Walmart online. (Danby Mini Fridge Model# DAR440BL). You'll need it shipped to a store near you. It had a flat cooling plate oriented along the backside of the interior. However, a bit of modification was still needed to ensure the proper opening.

I began by removing the plastic injection molded panel from the inside of the door. An electric screwdriver made short work of this. Needing to maintain the suddenly absent vapor barrier, I cut a sheet of 1/8" lexan to size and drilled the appropriate holes. Looking back, I really should have done something to cover the visually exposed insulation in the door. But it's on the inside so it really doesn't matter that much to me. Now that I had the required interior dimensions, it was time to create an opening for the liquid hose and design up a riser/keg tower to house the tap and shank. I like the industrial look of cast iron pipe and thought it appropriate given the nature of what I was building. And the flanges were convenient because they terminated the pipe nicely as well as provided a great connection point to the fridge and shank adapter. At 3/4", the pipe was wide enough to snugly fit both the 1/4" clear plastic tubing and 1/4" foam insulation. Gotta keep that beer cool.

I had the round white shank adapter machined as more a placeholder than permanent design element. Though I've come to like it. It's clean and makes a good transition between the pipe and faucet. My original thought was to create an electronic display using that space. It would house readouts for temperature and remaining beer. I'll make that one day but not until I finish a couple other projects on the drawing board. At the moment, having ice cold beer on tap is good enough for me.

I'm crazy bout those cupcakes cousin.

There are many places to find out about local/popular eateries around town... weekend insert, internet, word of mouth, doorknob hangers, etc. Personally, I prefer Lonely Island SNL Digital Shorts for all my foody info. Check out "Lazy Sunday" to see what I'm talking about. Deb and I hit up NYC recently to see some friends and do some exploring. While there are many cultural and historic sights to see, Magnolia was definitely on the top of my short list of things to do. If you ever find yourself in the city, do me a favor. Get yourself some cupcakes and a carton of milk. Pick a cushy swaft of grass and chow down. You can't go wrong, I promise you. But be prepared to stand in line. The place can only fit like eight people, six if they really like cupcakes. Wasn't too bad though, well worth the wait.