I love my laminator. I also love trying new things with it. There is nothing more fun than trying out a new idea.

One day I’d seen some pictures on Pinterest of nice laminated fall leaves. I thought, what similar things could one laminate like that?

Flowers!

That sounded like a good idea. But instead of reading online about how one should do such a thing, I decided just to give it a go.

I just picked some flowers and sent them through the laminator. It turns out that was a bad idea. In retrospect, it is very obvious.

They were still all fresh and wet and steamed on their way through and made sizzling noises. They came out looking gross and had a bunch of liquid in there.

Yet for some reason, I sent a few more through. And these ones made sizzling noises too. And steamed. And started to smell burnt. But they did not start to come out of the other side of my laminator.

Worse, I had used only a partial laminator sheet so I didn’t have any of it sticking out so I couldn’t pull the thing back out. All I could do was unplug it and listen to it continue to sizzle.

(That’s actually a normally a great hack for laminating small things: just cut a laminating sheet to slightly larger than what you want to laminate and don’t waste the whole thing. You just want to be careful that the front and back pieces are the same size and carefully aligned.)

I figured that the sheet must have gotten wrapped around one of the rollers. I assumed that it would be completely melted to it and fused to itself. I even got a little excited thinking I would have the perfect reason to upgrade to a better laminator. (Like maybe this one that is 12 inches wide verses the 9 inch one I have.)

But then I decided I had to at least try taking it apart and seeing what it looked like inside and if I could salvage it.

It turned out that while the sheet was wrapped around one of the rollers, it was not melted and fused to itself. It pulled right off. It did permanently want to be rolled up after that, but my goal was to save the laminator not my failed project.

It turns out that laminating sheets are actually designed so that the inside will melt and fuse to another sheet but the outside does not.

Here’s a few more pictures if you’re curious about what the inside of a laminator looks like. They’re actually ridiculously simple: just a couple of rollers and heating elements. (The orange here is the rollers.)

And a little motor to drive the rollers.

My process for getting the sheet out involved unscrewing the case and also undoing a couple of the screws on the ends that hold the rollers in place so I could take one of the rollers out. The whole thing took just a couple of minutes.

I also later made successful laminated flower coasters and bookmarks that came out really cool! Here’s a picture of a few of the bookmarks.

Read about my other laminator projects!

The post How to fix a laminator that ate your paper appeared first on Live Hoppy.

These cool ornaments impressed all of B’s relatives when we gave them as presents last year. Plus, I love the idea of still having two-year-old B swinging on my Christmas tree in 20 or 30 years.

This is a fun laminator project and slightly older kids could probably even help make them.

Yes, I know it is no where close to Christmas time right now but I thought this might be a good project to do for people that have extra time at home right now.

Looking for more laminator ideas? You might also like Laminator Projects: cool and unique things to make.

Supplies needed includes:

• A laminator – The budget models are super cheap on Amazon. You can get them starting at like $20. If you think you might really be into laminating though I’d recommend one like this with a wider input. I have a 9 inch one. Even though it works fine, I find it’s hard to feed everything in perfectly straight sometimes. I wish I had the extra room so I didn’t have to be so careful with things. The laminating sheets go a little past the thing you want to laminate so with a 8.5 inch paper there’s not much room to spare with a 9 inch input.
• Laminating sheets – I use these ones.
• A utility knife
• A cutting mat
• Ribbon or string to be the new ‘chain’ for the swing.

You’ll also need a picture of you child on a swing. The background doesn’t matter since we’ll be cutting it out anyway. For mine, I just printed these out on photo paper, but you could order prints at Walgreens, Walmart or another store. Here’s the one I used.

If you want to make multiples so you have some to give away, you’ll need a picture for each ornament. I decided to save on ink by cropping the images and putting them side-by-side.

Then I carefully cut out each one with a utility knife. I cut the chain off above his hands because the ribbon will be the new ‘chain’.

Once I had them all cut out, I laminated them. This serves to protect them forever and also to make them stronger for threading the ribbon through. I then cut around the image, leaving just a bit of the clear edge.

Next up was making some small slits for the ribbon to go through.

I wanted to make it look like he was holding onto the ribbon so it goes behind the ornament where his hands are.

Then we had to get a tree to hang it on! (We picked one from our land that was too crowded and would have to be thinned out anyway.)

Here’s the final look.

These were fun to make and I’m super pleased with how they turned out. Plus they made great gifts for the grandparents.

Here’s a few other laminated Christmas ornaments I made the year before. For these ones, I used pictures from the previous Christmas.

And for this one, I used one of B’s handprints.

Here’s some more of the laminator things I’ve worked on: Laminator Projects: cool and unique things to make.

The post Kid on a Swing: DIY Laminated Christmas Ornament Project appeared first on Live Hoppy.

I love my laminator and all of the cool options for laminator projects.

After I first got my laminator I searched for cool projects to do with it and a lot of the same stuff came up over and over. Some of the best ones from those lists I’ve included here.

But…

I wanted to make a list that went beyond laminating fall leaves, bookmarks and your kid’s artwork. So I’ve also included a few laminator projects that I haven’t seen anywhere else. Think cool pouches, magnets and earring holders.

Laminators may be more affordable than you think

First off, I just want to say that if you don’t have a laminator, they are super affordable and so worth it.

If I had known how affordable small home laminators are, I would have bought one way sooner. I bought this one from Amazon for $30. It works great. There’s even an Amazon Basics model for only $22. (I haven’t tried it out, so I’m not necessarily recommending it. I just want to demonstrate the point that laminators are super affordable.)

My sole complaint about the one I have is that it is just wide enough to laminate something 9 inches wide. (Basically an 8.5 inch page plus a little extra for the edges of the laminating pouch.) If I feed something in a little crooked, it can mean the edges get crunched. Beyond eyeballing it as best as I can, I haven’t figured out a way to make sure I feed things in truly straight.

If I was going to buy one today, I’d probably go for one of the wider options. (I think I would get something like this one that will laminate things 13 inches wide and is only $40.)

In addition to a laminator, you’ll also need laminating pouches. I use these ones which are $10 for 100.

Laminated pouches

This is one of my favorite laminator projects. They are fun to make and so useful.

Plus this is a project that I have not seen anywhere else. I came up with this idea by accident when I had laminated two sheets back-to-back and trimmed the edges too closely.

The result at the time was not at all what I wanted, but it got me to thinking and helped me come up with this cool idea!

Step-by-step instructions on how to make cool laminated pouches.

Laminated picture magnets

These picture magnets are so fun to create. Plus they make fantastic gifts.

The thing about putting pictures up on the fridge is that you never know when they are going to get splattered with something. This completely fixes that problem.

Laminated picture magnets four different ways.

Earring holders

I was looking for a solution to an unorganized pile of earrings and made these simple, yet awesome earring holders.

I’m missing a good photo of these and at the moment, don’t even know where they are. So a description will have to do.

All I did was laminate a small square of card stock and then use a thumb tack to poke pairs of holes in it. Then I secured the earrings to the little card.

Tip: They make different sizes of laminating pouches to use, but you can always just cut down the big ones to whatever size the thing you’re laminating is.

Laminated baby book pages

I got my laminator not long after B was born and used it to do all of his baby book pages. My favorite thing about this is knowing that they will be well-protected and basically last forever.

See all of my laminated baby book page ideas.

Laminated recipe cards

These come up on every post about things to laminate. I just have to include them here because it makes such a big difference in the kitchen. I definitely had a stack of well-soiled recipe cards before I got my laminator.

Now I love my crisp, clean recipe cards. It’s so nice to know I can just wipe them off when I’m done using them.

Laminated Christmas tree ornaments

These swing ornaments are one of my absolute favorites. Here’s my post on how to make these. I’ve also done some simpler laminated ornaments.

I had my Christmas pictures of B printed as wallet-sized prints. Then I cut out squares of red construction paper to put behind them. Some of them are double-sided and have pictures on the back too. I do wish I’d written the year on the back side of the single-sided ones.

A quick trip through the laminator and a hole punch is all it takes to finish them. These made fantastic little presents the next year at Christmas time.

I also did a Christmas tree ornament out of B’s handprint. This is going to be something I love pulling out of the box of Christmas decorations every year!

The post Laminator projects: cool and unique things to make appeared first on Live Hoppy.

I did B’s entire baby book with laminated pages and came up with some cool ideas for how to do it. In this post I will share some of the tips, tricks and ideas I came up with while working on this laminator project.

Benefits of laminated baby book pages

First off, let me mention a few of the benefits to making laminated baby book pages.

• It ensures that you are creating something that will basically last forever.
• It also creates a format for consistently sized pages.
• Laminating the pages ensures that any photos or other additions stay in place- you don’t ever have to worry about glue getting old and things falling off.
• You can 3-hole punch everything and find a stylish binder to put the pages in.
• It’s also cheap and easy.
• Plus, laminating stuff is just cool!

As a new mom, I didn’t have the bandwidth to get too elaborate. My main goal with B’s baby book was just to preserve the memories. Most of what I used for it was just stuff I had collected like the cards people gave us. I also had some pictures printed and periodically took 10-15 minutes to make journal entries.

(Now that B is almost two, I can say that I am SO glad I put this together.)

Laminated baby book page ideas

Ultrasound pictures

I started my baby book off with a few of my journal entries from when I was pregnant and some of my favorite ultrasound photos.

A warning: some ultrasound photos are printed on heat-sensitive paper and do not fare well in a laminator. After I discovered that, I used some self-sealing laminated pouches that seal with adhesive instead of heat for my ultrasound photos and then I used scrapbook tape to stick them to a laminated sheet of black paper.

Hospital mementos

I stuck B’s hospital bracelets (cut and flattened) on the official letter from the hospital stating that he’d been born and laminated them together. It came out cute and also turned them into a page that was easy to stick into the book instead of a random thing I didn’t know what to do with.

I also made a page out of the footprints that they took at the hospital.

Cards

For cards, I still wanted to be able to open them and read what people had written. So I laminated solid colored sheets of paper. Then I used double-sided tape made for scrap-booking to stick the backs of the cards to the laminated sheets.

Postcards

For the postcards we got, I cut rectangular holes in the black paper and then carefully positioned the cards so that the backs lined up. Then I sent them through the laminator. This way I can still see both sides.

Related post: Laminator Projects: cool and unique things to make.

Pictures

I put lots of pages with pictures in B’s baby book. I know I have all these digital photos, but I just wanted something tangible.

Some of the photo pages I did were themed like pictures of B with his grandparents, summer playtime, or hiking.

Journal Entries

I made sure and occasionally journal about how things were going. I kept it simple- just a sheet of lined paper. It doesn’t make for the cutest, fanciest baby book pages, but now they are some of my favorite pages. I love the way my journal entries bring back memories.

Free Printables

If you browse around the internet, you can also find all sorts of cool printable baby book pages that would do super well in a laminated book.

The post Laminated baby book page ideas- fun & cute! appeared first on Live Hoppy.

I have been working really hard on these DIY kits and I am so excited to have them out in time for people to give them as Father’s Day gifts.

They are super easy to glue together and decorating them is so much fun! The ability to personalize them makes them such thoughtful, unique gifts.

Check them out in my Etsy store!

S, B, and I made some of these for our moms for mother’s day. They turned out to be so awesome that I wanted to make these kits available to others as well.

Creating things is so satisfying and I want to spread the joy

I find few things more satisfying than making something myself. The process is so much fun.

Plus I love to give gifts that are thoughtful and personalized. These boxes fit that bill perfectly.

Here’s the box B and I made for his daddy:

(We’re on top of things this year! Father’s day is still like a month away. )

B didn’t quite grasp the whole paint thing when we made the boxes for our moms. So for the box for his dad I kept it simple. I just painted his hand and did quick hand-prints on the sides.

I’m sure older kids could get much more involved with decorating these.

This one is for my dad:

I painted the sides of the box and the lid the same colors. Then I just turned the lid 180 degrees so that all of the color were visible at once.

I also got a purple smudge on the top because I didn’t wait long enough for the paint to dry. (sigh)

The kit

Here’s what the kit looks like:

Here it is once it’s put together with a bit of wood glue:

So many options available for finishing these!

The cool thing about a kit like this is that people can let their imaginations run wild and come up with their own ideas on what to do with it.

• Paint
• Sharpie
• Gluing stuff on them
• Decoupage

These were such a fun project and I love the idea of people customizing these for their dads.

Buy your own kit now.

(Here’s my process for taking the photos used in this post: A beginner’s guide to good photos for selling products online or documenting projects )

P.S. It is so nerve-wracking putting something new into the world and hoping that somebody will like it. Even when it’s something that seems small.

P.P.S If these do OK, I plan to start making customized boxes next so people can specify what they want the text to be or even use drawing or images!

The post Perfect Father’s Day gifts- DIY boxes for dad! appeared first on Live Hoppy.

This is gong to be a beginner level overview of the process to give you an idea of how it works. If it’s something you’re looking to learn, it will be enough to give you some direction to start with. Or if you’re just curious how pictures like the one of this ride-on giraffe are taken, it will provide an overview of how the process works.

What is product photography and what else are these techniques good for?

The class I took focused on taking pictures of things to list for sale online. Some of the same techniques would be good for other things like documenting work on a project or taking artistic photos.

The basic goal here is to have the picture be just of the object, not of the weird miscellaneous stuff you may have in the background of your house. It is also to really give people a good idea of what the thing looks like.

And to make it look good so they’ll want to buy it!

Have you ever wondered how people get those pictures of things that just appear to be floating on white?

I have. And this class answered my questions about it. Most of the tricks are in the setup.

Setting up the studio

The setup for this does not have to be too complicated, but a few key items are necessary to create the wanted results. One could spend a small fortune on a setup, but it’s not necessary.

All that’s really needed is a good back drop and a few lights.

The backdrop

The first trick is a good backdrop. After taking the class, this was the one thing I felt like I couldn’t live without. They make all different types, but the one my class used was a roll of paper specially designed for photography.

It features low reflectivity and a very unnoticeable texture. I ordered a roll of Savage Seamless Background Paper to start playing around with.

One thing I’ve learned in life is to try to practice any new skills I learn as soon as possible if I hope to retain the information. I took the class on a Saturday and ordered my background paper the next day.

The nice thing about a paper background is that it comes on a long roll. If the part you use is still clean when you’re done, you just roll it back up. If you scoff it up or somehow mess it up, you just tear off the bad part.

The key with setting up the paper is to have it start higher than the object and then to make sure that there is a gentle curve between where the paper is vertical and where it’s horizontal. This makes the background totally continuous without any sudden changes in lighting or shadows.

Lights! Camera! Action!

Actually, this part is just about lights.

The class talked about a few different options including using real flashes that are meant for photography. Maybe I’ll get there some day, but I’m not looking to purchase a ton of gear at the moment.

I focused on the cheap and easy option of using a couple of lamps.

The tips I took away about lighting were to:

• Use at least two lamps
• Use the brightest bulbs possible
• Use the same bulbs in all lamps for consistent light color
• Make a shade for the lamps using wax paper to diffuse the light

For my current setup, I’m just using a couple of cheap lamps I already had around. I haven’t tried out the wax paper yet. It’s supposed to help diffuse the light to prevent hard shadows.

Camera setup

The biggest idea I learned as far as camera settings was to manually set the white-balance before starting.

I had seen the white-balance setting before, but I never really learned what it did until now. And it’s so cool!

This process tells the camera that the white background is supposed to look white. Then if the lights have a yellow tint (or blue or red or whatever color), the camera will adjust everything to compensate for it.

The exact way to access the white-balance on each camera is different, but once you find the setting all you do is point the camera at the white background and have it measure off of that.

You can see that the backgrounds for the photos on this post are clean grey tones and don’t have a colored tint to them.

Now you’re ready for the Action! step. Oh. Wait. These are still photos, not video…

Editing

Once you have your photos, the last step is a little editing.

This could be done in Photoshop, Lightroom or another program. I won’t get into steps for how to do it on any specific program here, but you can always search online for how to edit the things mentioned here using your software of choice.

The four things we talked about editing were:

• White balance
• Contrast/tone
• Sharpness
• Cropping/straighten/rotate

The hope with the white balance is that setting the custom white balance on the camera does most of the work. Doing it with editing software is just to get any final tweaks.

My camera did a good enough job that I didn’t actually edit the white balance or sharpness of the photos here.

The tip I took about straightening/rotating is to aim to make the vertical lines of the subject vertical. Especially if one is looking at an object from a corner rather than straight on, the horizontal lines of the object may not appear horizontal in the photo and that’s ok.

Enjoy! Or get out there and sell!… Or whatever you want to do with your photos.

Yep, that’s it.

The photos on this post are the first ones I took using this setup. I just used a few items that were close to hand.

The whole thing went super quickly and I’m quite pleased with the results.

My photos do sort of have a double shadow thing going on which would probably be reduced if I used real flashes, was a bit more skilled with my editing or maybe if I’d rigged up some sort of wax paper shades over my lights.

But if I wanted to sell something on eBay, I feel like they would be more than good enough to show an accurate representation of a product and make it look good.

I’m happy with my photos for a first time with this sort of photography and a setup that cost less than $50.

Questions? Thoughts? Tips? Leave a comment!

Thanks to Ethan from cameradactyl.com and Quelab for the great class.

The post A beginner’s guide to good photos for selling products online or documenting projects appeared first on Live Hoppy.

I recently made this kid’s step stool for toddler B. (Plus it folds into a table!) In this post I’ll share my process and steps.

After joining Quelab, I knew I wanted to come up with something to make in the wood shop there. They require training on any of the equipment that is potentially dangerous before you’re allowed to use it and the best way to get trained on a lot of things is to have something you actually need it for.

Then one day I was searching for kid’s step stools on Amazon. B is at an age where he needs one. Whenever I’m cooking in the kitchen, he wanders around underfoot trying to get my attention, making noise, trying to figure out the child latches on the cupboards and fussing.

Mostly, he’s just curious and wants to see what is going on but is just too short. He likes it when I pick him up so he can see, but a lot of cooking tasks are hard to do while holding a child.

Eventually I found a couple of cool kid’s step stool designs that also fold into little tables. They were sort of expensive and I decided I’d like to give building my own a shot. In retrospect, considering the extensive amount of time it took me, it wasn’t exactly economical. But I wouldn’t go back and just buy one if I could. I learned so much through the process and I just love the feeling of having something that I made.

I sent out an email to the Quelab mailing list and one of the guys volunteered to help me with my project and train me on the equipment I needed for it. (Thank you D!) Have I mentioned on here how much I love Quelab?

Making Plans

The first day we met, we just talked and discussed the plans. He insisted I draw up plans for the project. (I just wanted to dive in, but my plans really did pay off.)

Cutting out the pieces

The next time we met, we planned out how the pieces would need to be laid out to cut them out of a piece of plywood. We figured out we could do it all with a four foot by four foot sheet. Then we made a trip to the hardware store to buy the plywood, some hinges and some clasps.

The first order of business was using the table saw to cut the plywood down into the pieces I’d need. I also got instructions on running the shopvac. The table saw made me crazy nervous, but I’ve since used it again for another project and I feel more confident with it. I’m still super cautious though. I know somebody who chopped off the tip of their finger on a table saw and I don’t want that to be me.

Then I had a stack of rectangles, which I was unreasonably proud of.

Shaping the pieces

The third day D and I met up was to start cutting the curved edges for some of the pieces and cut out the inside holes. When I started the project, I did not think holes were necessary, but D explained that they actually served a purpose by reducing the weight of the final project.

He taught me how to use the bandsaw to cut some of the curves for the outside edges, but I ended up thinking the scrollsaw was easier for it.

The bandsaw won’t work for cutting out inside pieces, so I got to learn how to use the scroll saw for those. But first up was learning how to use the drill press. One needs to have a hole to start with to put the blade through in order to cut out an inside piece with the scroll saw.

The scroll saw

The cool thing about the drill press is the ability to drill holes that are straight up and down. This is nearly impossible to do with a handheld drill. This wasn’t actually an important thing for what I was doing, but I can see where it could come in handy.

Once I had a few starter holes drilled, I got to work with the scroll saw. It’s a super fun tool because you can basically cut whatever shape you want.

D said my cutouts could be whatever shape I wanted, so of course I picked bunnies for the bottom part. For the cutouts for the top parts, I kept it simple because that piece turns upside down when the stool is converted into a table. I didn’t want upside down bunnies.

As a side effect, I ended up with scroll saw bunny puzzles. And something in my head clicked about where the term ‘jigsaw puzzles’ comes from.

Sanding

Then there was lots of sanding to get all of the edges smooth from my scroll saw cuts. I like things to be sanded, but the actual process is just dusty and not that much fun. I also put wood filler in any places that needed it.

Routing out dados and making rounded edges

On yet another day, D showed me how to route out little indentations (officially called dados) for the back supports and the step/seat. He also showed me how to use the router to round the edges of the pieces. Hearing him talk about it, I wasn’t convinced this was a necessary step, but when I saw how sleek the rounded edges looked, I was sold.

I came home from Quelab and told S that we should get a router. He replied that he has one. Then I remembered that I had seen a box in our shop one day that said ‘Plunge Router’. I had asked S about it, and he’d described to me what it did a little. It didn’t really seem relevant to me, so I promptly forgot about it. Now that I know how to use the thing, I have lots of ideas for it

Finally! Time to assemble my step stool!

After what seemed like forever, but was really only like four or five weeks, I was finally ready to start my assembly process. I used a combination of a few screws and some wood glue to hold everything together.

It was so exciting to see everything start to take shape! I stained the red step before assembly because I figured it would keep me from having to tape as much when I painted later. Then I ended up sanding it more and re-coating it anyway.

Adding hinges

This was the first time I’d ever put hinges on anything, so I practiced on a couple of scrap pieces. I was quite proud of my hinged scrap pieces, even thought they did nothing but open and close.

Then I got to put the hinges on the real thing. I put them on before painting to make sure that I had the spaces for them properly routed out and then took them back off before painting.

Painting the step stool/table

I’ve refinished some other furniture and the painting step is nerve-wracking to me. I don’t really make plans ahead of time. My visual imagination sucks and I can’t imagine how certain colors would turn out. I just start painting and pray for the best.

For this project, I used some colored stains that I’ve used on other projects like the coffee table I refinished. I love these stains because they’re easy to apply, they come in several cool colors and it maintains the character of the wood. Then I just put some clear coats on top.

Finishing touches

Finally it was ready for assembly. I put the hinges back on and added some clasps that lock it into position. I had routed out little indentations in the bottom legs to put in felt pieces so that it would slide easily and quietly on the floor and I cut out stick-on felt pieces. Suddenly, I was all done!

There is also a removable safety bar to keep a young child from falling off. When it’s not in use, there’s even a place to stash it under the seat. I made it so it would come off without any tools, but it’s still a tight fit. B took off the safety bar within the first 2 minutes of standing on the stool.

Final product!!

I can already tell B is going to love it. He really seems to enjoy being able to see what’s going on. Oddly, he hasn’t yet figured out climbing up and down on it, but I’m sure that won’t take him long. He climbs all over everything else.

Final thoughts

In some ways, this project was super over-engineered. It’s probably strong enough to support the weight of 20 toddlers. On the plus side, it can double as a step stool for me when I need to get in our tall cupboards. I was super perfectionist about all of the details, but since it was my first time with a lot of the tools and techniques, a few things still came out a little funny.

When I told S it was taking too long, he told me I was doing too much to it. Which was why at the very end, I quit after two clear coats instead of going for like six.

The last thing I did was to put on the clasps and while trying to put in one of the screws, I gouged the wood with the drill. Gah! Probably no one will ever notice the spot but me. I did put a little green stain on it to help make it blend in.

Overall, I’m psyched with how my kid’s step stool turned out

I’m proud of how it turned out and I’m really happy with the things I learned doing it. I feel like there are so many things that I see how to make now that I would have had no idea how to approach before I started this. The scroll saw and the router are my new favoritest tools.

I love making things. I love learning how to do things. It just makes the world open up. And also, did I mention the bunnies?

Update

Now that I’ve seen toddler B use this step stool for a while, I am so glad that I made it for him. He’s so much more involved when I’m doing things in the kitchen. I like knowing that he is learning about what is going on.

It did take him a little while to learn how to climb down off of it. We had to show him how to climb down backwards. Now he’s a total champ at it. And this helped him to learn how to climb down the steps on his playground.

He also recently learned he can push his stool around. This is the sort of thing that is amazing and scary to see as a parent. I have to be much more careful about what I leave out on the counters.

P.S. I hope to start making these to sell at some point so if you’re interested in one, let me know.

The post Making a kid’s step stool/table- with pictures, lots and lots of pictures! appeared first on Live Hoppy.

So when making pinhole cameras was mentioned at the recent photography class I took at Quelab, oatmeal came to mind. As it turned out, the cameras we made were a tad bit more elaborate (and also much, much cooler).

I got a kit made by Ethan of Cameradactyl (who also happens to be a Quelab member and was one of the teachers for the class). The kit included wood pieces cut on the laser cutter and a few 3-D printed plastic pieces.

This is not the first camera Ethan has designed and the attention to detail was clear. All of the pieces fit together perfectly. The first step was using wood glue to stick all of the wood pieces together.

We went in the darkroom to slurp up more knowledge from Ethan on making prints while the glue dried. Then we returned to our projects to spray paint the inside black. The black cuts down on the light that reflects around inside the camera and also serves to seal off the joints where the wood pieces meet so no extra light seeps in.

Then I sanded it all down. The final step was adding a plastic knob to advance the film, a viewfinder, the shutter and what else but the pinhole itself!

Ethan showed me how to load the film and I snapped a picture so I wouldn’t forget. For real use, a second film canister goes in the other side and the film is started in it. Then when the film is advanced, it goes from one canister to the next.

The entire design is super slick while also being elegant and simple. It was so much fun to put together and I love the way the end result looks. I can’t wait to try it out.

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I didn’t really think over much about the process, but it definitely went in the this is something that I have to pay somebody else to do because I am completely clueless category.

Today, I made my own canvas print all by myself.

It turns out that the word print in canvas print sort of says it all about how the photo gets on the canvas. A roll of canvas is loaded in a big printer and it prints on it pretty much just as if it was paper.

I sort of stumbled upon this discovery. I’m a member of Quelab- a hacker/maker space in Albuquerque and they have a large printer and vinyl cutter. Somebody else had sent an email asking to be trained on them so I asked to join in. I didn’t know what I needed the printer or vinyl cutter for, but figured that if I knew how to use them, I would find something.

At the training, the guy mentioned that they had rolls of canvas to print on. So a few days later, I went in to print out a few experiments.

A quick search online lead to some videos on how to frame a canvas. I had to get S’s help building my first frame, but the second one I put together all on my own. S has this cool thing that I think is called a pocket jig that drills these cool angled holes that worked really well for how I wanted to build my frame.

Attaching the canvas to the frame basically involves a staple gun and a lot of staples. One does have to make sure it’s stretched tight and the corners are a bit of a trick. (Thank you YouTube.)

The first canvas I framed turned out to be a total disappointment. It was a gorgeous picture, I was so proud of my frame… and I screwed up my math by a half inch so the frame was just a little too large and the white edge of the canvas was just barely visible on the edges. It was almost perfect, but not something I could ever hang up in my house. It would drive me nuts to look at it.

I did learn something from mistake. I adjusted my math for my second frame and added in just a little extra leeway.

Today making a canvas print goes in the I will probably never pay somebody to do this for me again category.

I love the fine control I get with doing it myself. I can make my canvases whatever size I want. If the brightness of the print is off, I can adjust it on the spot. I can make overly sturdy wood frames.

I love the feeling of accomplishment and pride in making a thing with care and attention to detail. I love the process of creation. I love having things I’ve made around the house.

(This picture I used for this came from the Pecos Wilderness on a trip you can read about here.)

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These pouches/envelopes are quick and easy if you have a laminator (you could also try using self-sealing laminating pouches if you don’t have a laminator).  They’re a fun project and make a great place to store any mostly flat objects- papers, receipts, etc. 

For this example, I made a pouch to store these cool snow people I have.  (I also recently laminated the snow people so that they will be protected and last a long time.  They’re made out of a thin cardboard and the laminator didn’t do a great job sealing all the funny edges so I then had to carefully trim them all the way around to make them look better.  Note to self: thicker things with funny edges don’t laminate well.  This may also be related to having about the cheapest laminator money can buy.)

Check out my other laminated project ideas!

As with many discoveries, this one was something of an accident.  Once I saw the potential, the accident didn’t seem like such an accident after all. 

To start out with you will want a laminator or self-sealing laminating pouches.  The self-sealing pouches are fairly expensive compared to the pouches for use with a thermal laminator and you can pick up a decent thermal laminator on Amazon for $20-$30. 

The self-sealing pouches really only stick on one side, so you’d want to modify the instructions to just use one sheet of paper instead of two and then one side of the envelope would still be see-through.  This might even be a nice effect depending on what you’re looking for. 

You want to start with two sheets of paper which you can decorate however you want.  The red thing in the picture is a MyStik that I picked up at a scrapbooking store.  It basically applies double-sided tape and I used it to stick down my snowman so he wouldn’t move around before being laminated.  It’s totally not a necessary tool for this, but I’ve found it to be handy for a lot of my little craft projects. 

The two sheets of paper go back to back into a laminator pouch and through the laminator.  You’ll want to line the pieces of paper up as closely as you can.

Then the very top edge gets cut off.  A paper cutter is the perfect tool for this, but of course is not necessary. 

All done. 

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