We had an outstanding location – tall benches behind us served as a great display case for the many  e-textile projects we brought to show how fashion and technology go hand in hand for our young makers.  Having one of the few indoor locations made it possible to see the LED’s far better than if we had been out in the sunlight.

We had plenty of room for our working table where kids and adults (from toddlers to grandma’s) could sit down and create high/low tech art/technology LED pop-up cards from the materials we brought.

It was a wonderful success!  We met so many families – over and over we got to enjoy that moment when someone realized for the first time that making a circuit is not so mysterious and, “Hey, I can do this!”

Our participation was also included in this week’s West Linn Tidings.

This logo took a circuit-card background and turned it into a fabric, then added thread and lights.

Next up – young maker-designed logos, printable iron-on transfers, and T-shirts!

We will be manning a booth for the entire duration of the faire and will show off our soft circuits and wearables as always, but will also have a table set up with the hands-on pop-up card project that we’ve taken to various schools and events.  Participants will get to make an electric circuit using conductive tape and coin cell batteries – the circuit will drive one or more LED’s on the front of the card.

Please come find us September 15th and 16th in the OMSI parking lot (or perhaps inside one of the buildings where LED lights will shine a little brighter than they would in the sun)!!

We owe a debt of gratitude to one of the faire organizers Brian Jeppson – his gift of the Fashioning Technology book to Annika several years ago is what first piqued her interest in “electronic making”.  It was the catalyst that brought us to this point in time where we have a whole community of girls Making with fabric, thread, and lights!

In addition to meeting other makers and girls interested in technology, it was awesome to enjoy the EXPO atmosphere, see all the opensource projects, and vendors, and get a little bit of a sense of what that particular brand of geekdom might be like.

Most importantly, they had a lot of fun and enjoyed the hands-on activities at a lot of the other maker booths.

Maker Faire is tremendously accommodating in providing young makers with the critically important opportunity to share their work with other Makers as well as having time to explore the Faire.  2-hour shifts at the booth are the norm for young presenters, leaving plenty of time for enjoying all the other Making going on during these two days.

We were lucky to have a table in the e-textiles lounge where Annika talked with many of the leaders in the e-textiles maker crown, including Lynne Bruning and Mair Dundon.  Lynne interviewed Annika about her making – you can see the video here where she shows off some of the projects created by Anna, Mikayla as well as her own.

The rest of the time was spent exploring the Faire, including EdSurge’s fantastic DIY Education area where we ran into an inspiring young maker: Super Awesome Syliva – check out her videos here.

As part of the conference, we had a chance to attend workshops by various educators and facilitators.  I really enjoyed using software to control makerbots and attending a cool take-apart workshop (my closet now has a half-dismantled computer my kids are working on).  When it was my turn, I got to bring out the LED’s, batteries and conductive tape to show how even the youngest kids could make circuits to light up their artistic cards.

Among the attendees were artists, engineers, makers, informal learning educators, and other involved and interested adults.  The adults made cards that ranged from the simple to the insurmountably ambitious.  There were creative works of art, moving mechanically engineered dolls, professional looking circuits and novice designs working out the kinks for the first time.  The most delightful outcome for me was the way everyone, with their different backgrounds and prior experience worked together, shared ideas and expertise, and enjoyed talking shop with each other throughout the project.

For a description of how to do the pop-up LED project, look here.