March 3

Tutorial: Glowing USB Magic Potion

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You know those glowing potions you pick up in many fantasy video games (hopefully right before a boss fight)? This is a quick project that makes a glowing, USB-powered potion that looks great at your cubicle/desk/office and shows off your geekiness. Unfortunately, no matter what I tried, I could not take a picture that does this justice. It looks amazing in person though, trust me – it’s very blue and bright.

Backstory: when I first got my blue Scion xA, one of the first things I did was swapped out all the dash lights for blue LEDs and installed blue LEDs under the cupholders so it would make any translucent beverage container glow bright blue. When I saw these mana potions at ThinkGeek, I immediately thought those would look cool if they similarly glowed blue. So, this is how I did it…

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Category: Computers, Craft, Gadgets, Geek | 3 Comments on Tutorial: Glowing USB Magic Potion
March 2

New Geek Crafts Writer: AmyLynn98 – A DIY Jedi Wanna Be

amylynn98

“Always in motion is the future.”

–Yoda, Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back

Good morning, fellow Craft Geeks! I’m AmyLynn98 and I get to join all of you as your new Saturday morning poster. I enjoy crochet (a lot of the kinds of crochet and sewn items I make tend to be toys for friends and family made from my own patterns), sewing and card making as my main crafts, and now I can show all of you the really creative and crafty people out there that share our love handmade goodies. My favorite item that I’d like to take a crack at myself are these awesome TARDIS Chuck Taylors!

Some of the “geek” things that currently turn me on are Spider-Man (Peter Parker), Spider-Woman (Jessica Drew), Batman, Star Wars, Star Trek (I called myself a Trekkie before Trek was cool, and was proud of it), Doctor Who (my Doctors are #1, #4 and #10), Stephen King (I have a dog named Cujo), “The Big Bang Theory,” “Face Off” on SyFy, Abraham Lincoln, the Terminator, and most anything Halloween-related (more about the holiday than the movies, but those were good too). My plans for Halloween this year is to make a Gonk droid for my yard, finish off my Jedi costume (I’m a DIY Jedi!) and fix my full size guillotine.

Since I have to act like an adult most times, I work as a volunteer coordinator for a local hospice. I was able to start sharing my love of all things yarny and crocheted with our patients by providing them with handmade blankets. Volunteers up and down the East Coast help me to make them, and they all rock for it!

See you all on Saturday mornings…after the good cartoons are over, of course! Last one to the TV is a rotten egg!

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March 2

Enderman Soft Toy

Enderman Sewing Pattern

Do you speak German?  Of course you do, otherwise why would you be here?  This adorable Enderman sewing pattern comes from bleeptrack.de, a ridiculously awesome site devoted to “geeks, games und der ganze rest”.  I could have used Google translate to figure out what is going on with this pattern, but there is a handy video included that saves me the trouble of using my fancy book learning to figure out words.

I am a bit of a Minecraft fanatic, so when I saw this pattern I knew I had to share it no matter what language it was written in.

Go Check out the Pattern here!

Check it out in English here!

While you are there, be sure to check out some of the other awesome stuff on bleeptrack.de, like the Lemmings paintings or the Minecraft comic.

Category: Geek, Toys, Video Games | 2 Comments on Enderman Soft Toy
March 2

Mr Drippy/Shizuku Amigurumi

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Check out this awesome Mr Drippy/Shizuku amigurumi plushie from Ni no Kuni made by Jastra Alethea on Kitten’s Crafts.

I must admit, I thought Mr Drippy (Lord High Lord of the Fairies), or Shizuku if you’re playing the Japanese version of the game, was an ugly little thing when I first saw him, but he’s grown on me since playing the game, and now I think he’s a very tidy little fairy, welsh accent and all! And this crochet amigurumi of him is awesome! The pattern is free so you can even make one of your own (which I intend to start any day now!) I would definitely put a little bell in the lantern, as well, so it would jangle around just like in the game!

 

Category: Craft, Geek, Video Games | 3 Comments on Mr Drippy/Shizuku Amigurumi
March 2

Sheldon Cooper Quilt

sheldoncooperquiltFor those of you experiencing another blast of winter weather, this Sheldon Cooper quilt by semel at Craftster might be just the thing you need to keep warm. Semel, of Candy Coated Quilts in Nova Scotia, said it is made of  7,500 individual squares and took 6 months to make. “I started cutting pieces for this quilt in July and finished the whole thing in January.”

And in case your very own Sheldon blanket just isn’t enough, semel posted some advice on how you could make your own Leonard, Raj or Howard quilts.

“First, I made the pattern using the above photo and myphotostitch.com. This is a cross stitch pattern maker but it works pretty well for a quilt pattern as well. You will have to play with the settings a little bit to get the image you want. Once I had my pattern, I purchased my Kona colors that roughly match the suggested thread colors.

sheldoncooperquilt2“So then, I basically followed Sew Mama Sew’s instructions for how to ‘quick-piece tiny squares.’ Here’s the link to that. …I drew the grid directly on the interfacing which came in 8.5×11 sheets. Next time, I would definitely buy a pre-gridded interfacing that came in metres as this became quite expensive. This is supposed to be wash-away interfacing but I haven’t tested that theory yet.” (Don’t you like how semel worked the word theory into a post about a Sheldon Cooper blanket?)

For those of you new to Dr. Sheldon Cooper, he’s been portrayed by actor Jim Parsons since 2007 on CBS’s “The Big Bang Theory.” A couple of Sheldon Cooper fun facts for you: The asteroid 246247 Sheldoncooper was named after Sheldon. In 2012, a newly discovered species of bee was named Euglossa bazinga, after the character’s noted catch phrase, “Bazinga!”

 

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