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Project feature: Circuit Stickers birthday card

I backed Circuit Stickers by Chibitronics last year when it was crowd funded, but I haven't had the chance to try them out. I decided to make a birthday card where the candle on a cupcake lights up with an LED.

First I drew a cupcake and punched a hole where I wanted the LED to light up the flame. I cut out construction paper pieces for the cupcake. Drawing an image works well too.

I drew the battery positions and placed the copper tape so that it lights up the LED circuit sticker (the positive side of the battery touches positive side of the LED). The Circuit Stickers instruction booklet use this clever corner fold for the battery to turn on the circuit, so I used it for my card.

Tada! The candle lights up when you fold the battery into the corner!

Doing your own Circuit Stickers project?  I'm sure they would love to hear from you!

@chibitronics on Twitter chibitronics on Facebook Read an interview with Jie Qi, the founder of Chibitronics.

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Happy Solstice!

I hope all of you in North America enjoyed the longest day of the year.  During my year of bitwise hiatus, I worked in tech in the Bay Area, and I've made a lot of changes!  I've moved to Boston and I'm starting a postdoc in the fall at the Center for Engineering Education and Outreach at Tufts University.  My work will involve engineering education in makerspaces.  In the meantime, I'm taking the summer off to craft/make/hack, cook, and play frisbee and I'll be sharing some of my adventures here.   I will continue to use bitwise E-textiles as a forum to share cool projects and tech in e-textiles and soft circuits along with connecting maker communities in Seattle, San Francisco, New York, and my new home Boston.   Follow me on Facebook or twitter for weekly posts. I would love to see what you are up to this summer. Tag bitwise on Facebook and use #summerofawesome on social media.  I'll be watching! Full newsletter here.

Returning to my basics: knitting and spinning.

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I’ve seen some cool best of Bay Area Maker Faire posts (list, slideshow).  Here is a recap of my favorites:

Jie Qi gave a fabulous talk on paper circuits and all of her work is beautiful.  Her talk was so good that the sound guy said it was the best talk of the two days he was working.  Check out her pop-up book and and interactive LED painting.  

Shaper is a self-aligning, hand-held CNC router. It uses tape printed with dominos laid on the work pieces to locate itself.  It can do fine alignment when you are close to the shape you want.  Awesome if you want to do some cutting but don’t have any room for a large router.  They said it would retail around $1-2k.

Remember Bop It? (Bop it!  Pull it!  Twist it!)  There was a large person-size one that shot fire for the different motions.  Bop it was a pedal, pull it was a rope, twist it was a bike wheel.  It was super cool. My high score was 6.  :)

I enjoyed all things Maker Ed.  Went to a talk by teachers of High Tech Middle, who talked about inquiry-based learning in the classroom.  Also attended a talk by Samantha Cook of Curiosity Hacked, who talked about learner-centered education (check out this article about how she is hacking education).  Missed AnnMarie Thomas’s talk on making makers, but ran into her later (check out her Squishy Circuits).

See you at NY Maker Faire in the fall!

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Happy Valentine's Day from bitwise E-textiles!

Make a Valentine's Day LED cuff bracelet using my instructable! 

You'll need the following materials

conductive thread, 2 yards needle threader sewing needle (embroidery size 7) battery holder CR2032 coin cell battery LED size 3 snaps  felt polyfil stuffing embroidery floss

round nose pliers scissors ruler Here's the image of the heart shape.

Sew the bracelet as in the instructable and test it!  Put your felt heart over the LED.  Add a little bit of polyfil stuffing and sew it onto your bracelet with embroidery floss.

Happy Valentine's Day!

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New! Seahawks LED bracelet instructable

I posted an instructable for my Seahawks LED bracelet, complete with laser cut logo!

Check it out!

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I'm in! Seahawks LED bracelet

Here's my LED bracelet in Seahawks colors!  For more details, find the instructable here!

The green eye lights up when the bracelet is snapped closed!

Here's what you need: battery, green LED, conductive thread, needle and threader, battery holder, snaps, felt, and glue.  I traced the Seahawks logo and cut out a simplified version out of felt.  

Here's the logo I used.  I printed it out at 60% size.  I glued on the blue pieces to the white.

Test out your green LED!  The longer leg of the LED goes on the top face of the battery to light it up.

Place all of your components on the bracelet.  Mark where you want the LED eye.

Bend the LED legs into circles and sew the components with conductive thread.  Be sure not to sew across the components (see instructable for more detail).

Snap the ends together to test it out!

Decorate! Snip a little hole in the seahawk eye to slip the LED through. I stitched the logo to my bracelet.

  Lastly, I added battery holder cover.

Go Hawks!

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bitwise E-textiles gift guide

Here are some fun gifts for the e-textiles / soft circuits enthusiast in your life!

1. Textiles Messages

Edited by inventor of the LilyPad Arduino herself, Leah Buechley - Textile Messages tops my wishlist!  

2. Pulse sensor

Adafruit has a pulse sensor that is Arduino-compatible.  Perfect for maker-athletes!

3. Circuit stickers

Circuit stickers!  Make circuits with stickers!  Back this crowd-funded project by December 31st to get your own.

4. Circuit scribe

I backed Circuit Scribe the day I heard about it.   A lot like conductive paint, but dries faster.  Use it to connect your circuit stickers!  Back them by January 1st.  

5. LilyTwinkle Protosnap

Sparkfun's LilyTwinkle Protosnap is a great way to add some sparkle to your project.  The twinkle is preprogrammed and laid out on this board - just sew the parts where you want them.

6. littleBits

Little Bits is a fun and easy way to get into electronics.  The color-coded parts snap together - put together some buzz with a button and a little juice - and bam!  You have a circuit.

7. LED cuff bracelet kit

Make your holidays shine bright!  Sew a circuit you can wear.  The LED bracelet cuff is a fun activity for adults and kids alike.  Order by 12/18 for Christmas delivery.  Use the code FB2013 for 10% off your order.

Happy Holidays from bitwise E-textiles!

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Art Every Day 11/22

Wake up call

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Art Every Day 11/21

This is how it feels when I get packages in the mail!  That helps with the inventory!

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Art Every Day 11/20

This is what happens when I take inventory.

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Art Every Day 11/19

"Are you drawing me now?  Oh, great."

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Art Every Day 11/18

Today's art is inspired in part by Jennifer Lee of the Right-Brain Business Plan.  Jennifer has been part of Art Every Day for 7 years!  She draws and paints whimsical mini pieces that you can see on her webstagram.  I thought I should sketch something fun too.

Today's art is also inspired by my husband, who actually said this. 

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Art Every Day 11/17

Lava Clouds

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Art Every Day - Day 8

focus the turbulence, feel the flow

For when the noise in my head gets too loud.

I may color this in the future.

I will be away from my computer for the next week, so posts will be sporadic or will resume when I get back.  I'll have my art supplies with me!

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Art Every Day - Day 7 - The weight of the world is ever changing

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Art Every Day - Day 6 - High and Low Frequency

This drawing is inspired by my friend Aubri's knitting.  She was knitting a long scarf and all of her stitches bunched up together like waves.  Here's my interpretation, drawn in colored pencil and crayon.

The high and low frequency makes me think all the little things I do every day and the ebbs and flows of weeks and months.  Also, it makes me think of a leafy seadragon.

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Art Every Day - Day 5 - Boundaries

I was inspired by my cat sitting in a box that was just her size.  It reminds me that I need to set boundaries.  These boundaries mark off a space that can fit just right.

Here's the photo that this painting was inspired by.

My painting is pretty abstract.  My cat doesn't even have eyes in it, so it's a little creepy.  (I tried to paint them, but wasn't too pleased.) In an attempt to do art every day, I'm doing so quickly.  I've been trying to let go of the details and capturing as much as I can in broad strokes.  Quite literally.  :)  So in that sense, I've drawn my boundaries.  (Yay, more puns!)