By Jessica Wilson

When I was a kid we didn't have pool noodles, we had boogie boards. While boogie boards were very cool in their own 1980s way, they were not nearly as versatile as the candy-colored pool noodle. There are all kinds of nifty things you can do with a pool noodle. You can float on them, build with them, turn them into swords and lightsabers, and even make nifty gear-styled walls, all sorts of fun things.

How awesome is this drill powered drum roaster? Very awesome.

I never tire of seeing new takes on building your own sample roaster. Keeping the beans moving is the key to an even roast. Tim Eggers decided to use a drill to turn his drum, made from a soup can. He cut and folded vanes into the drum to aid the tumbling. A second soup can drum focuses the heat from his stove-top burner. Genius idea, and look at those lovely beans.

Vik from the RepRap blog created these printable ball-chain gears, and uploaded STLs and SCADs to Thingiverse.

Two galvanized nails set in a plug of plaster-of-Paris. That's it. The Cheap Vegetable Gardener, who created the sensor for an automated grow box project, explains:

Last week on CRAFT we saw:

How-To: Baby Care Bear Costume

Flaky Cheddar and Ham Biscuits

In the Kitchen with Jarod: Make a Mother of Vinegar

Filmmaker and crafter Holly Klein combined her talents to produce this short, Maggie and Mildred. All of the set pieces and characters were cross stitched by hand, then scanned into a computer and animated. [via fem!n*Ally]

Vickie Howell created and shares this pattern for these cool crochet earrings based on a pair worn by American Idol contestant, Lilly Scott.
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Yesterday I took a Sunday Scroll over at the North American Handmade Bicycle show site, drooling over the bikes pictured with their enthusiastic creators. With categories like "best fillet brazing" and "best carbon fiber," it's clearly a maker's kind of tradeshow.