Making My Own Touch Screen Gloves- Take 1

Tectouch Gloves

I love my phone. I hardly go anywhere without it. But there's a small problem. It's getting cold outside and my hands really hurt when the temperature drops. I'd love to buy a pair of touch screen gloves, but I'm a little on the cheap side (If you're not, check these out!) I read this Instructables post a while back and have been planning to make my own touch screen gloves.

Gloves, Thread, Needle, Phone

I was so excited about this project because I figured it was a perfect project to blog, too. It's simple, it's a good way for me to demonstrate some of my living with ADD steps, it's tech-y, and I figured it would also photograph well.

I've learned that it's a really good idea for me to practice Mise En Place aka "Everything Set Up." The process of gathering my materials and getting them in one spot seems to center my mind. It also ensures that I have what I need at hand. Today that meant getting my gloves, the roll of thread, and a needle. I put my phone in the pic because I knew I'd be testing the gloves on the phone.

It Didn't Work!

A couple of quick stitches and I was ready to go!

Actually, I wasn't. Even though I followed the Instructables guide, my "new" touch screen gloves didn't work.

And I'm still blogging it.

I'm taking this as my daily lesson in humility. I figure it's much more interesting than telling you about how I messed up dinner because I forgot to get the super important ingredient that was whole reason I went to the grocery store in the first place. Plus that kind of story doesn't have cool pics.

What? Still reading? Well, as you probably expected, there's more to this story. I found a neat overview of the different types of Conductive Thread at Fashioning Technology. As for me, I'm thinking about buying a 10 ft thread card from Lamé Lifesaver.

That's it for today. Have fun and thanks to #NaBloPoMo I'll see you tomorrow, probably right around this same time.

#NaBloPoMo

I Get It

Malcolm Gladwell wrote in Outliers that it takes 10,000 hours or approximately 10 years to get really good at something. I'm pretty hard headed, so it might take me an extra 5,000 hours. But I think I'm starting to get it now.

You have to understand first of all that sometimes my brain amazes me. The other day I punched in the number of an old high school friend...even though I'd last dialed that number in 1992. And sometimes my brain disappoints me, like when I forget what I came into the kitchen to get even though it's just a few steps away from the living room.

Finally "getting it" also means that I'm not arguing with myself that I oughta know this already. It means accepting that for me it sometimes takes a little bit more effort. Or a lot.

I get that I have to write everything down or it may not stick in my brain.

I get that I need to have a combination of a distraction and a focal point to get repetitive tasks done. Hello Podcast!

I get that I miss interpersonal cues. For me to get a message I either have to have all my active listening skills set to "ON" or have someone hit me over the head with a 2x4. The good news is that after 15000 hours of practice I'm getting better at this. The bad news is that it's still work, and it probably always will be.

I get that sometimes I have trouble stopping myself. Those are the days when it's better to go shopping at the flea market than at the mall.

I get that adding people to my mix increases my stamina and enthusiasm. If Aunt Polly asked me to whitewash the fence by myself I'd totally pull a Tom Sawyer and try to get out of it. Well, sorta.* But if I'm working with someone else I'm like the energizer bunny and just keep going and going.

I get that I have no concept of time. Not only does everything have to go on my calendar, I have to set every single reminder option so that time doesn't get away from me.

Most of all, after 15,000 hours of turning on my ears and using my calendar and grocery shopping list and doing a load of laundry a day and checking for my keys every time I walk through a door ... I get that this is who I am and that I'm really good at being me. You see, along with the distraction comes some really cool creativity and amazing energy. Since everything new draws my attention I've had the chance to meet all kinds of really cool people and do some really neat things. I am so thankful that I've been able to remain positive through everything. Even though I haven't always been thrilled with every thing that has come my way, things really work out once you rub a little persistence, creativity, and positive energy on it.

And I finally get it.

*I couldn't exactly do like Tom and collect marbles and a dead cat while my friends whitewashed the fence. But I might tweet about it

Taxonomy

Our church takes the kids on a museum or cultural experience the first Sunday of every month.  This month we spent a couple of hours at the Staten Island Museum learning about their collections. The Museum was founded 128 years ago by a group of amateur naturalists with an astounding interest in education and study - local history, art, and more. The museum is the last remaining interdisciplinary general interest museum left in New York City.  It's way cool.

Taxonomy Worksheet. I sorted by shape :) 

The sheer number of varied items that the museum has is boggling.  The director, Diane Matyas, worked with the young and the young at heart in attendance to explain how items are sorted into categories. She gave each of us a big pile of candy and a taxonomy worksheet.  We spent some time talking about how different items can be categorized, as well as about visible and invisible characteristics (like how the candy tastes!)

I was amazed at how similarities and differences jumped out at me once I some structure in front of me.  Next time I clean out a junk drawer or the hall closet I'll use something similar to help bring order to the chaos.

Oh yeah, and taxonomy is the science of sorting. How cool is that :)