Cali Trip Day #1- Dead Dino's and Deader Busses.

So I got to tag along on this years 8th grade California Science trip...  Meaning I chased 12 of the 110 students that rode a bus from Blackfoot, Idaho, to San Diego, California, see all of the sites, and then ride all the way back.

What. An. Experience.  It was a ton of fun with many, many memories made along the way.

So day one.  Whats more fun than waking up at 5 a.m., loading all your crap up on the bike, and riding off to meet the bus?  Well, sleeping in comes to mind, but that wasn't an option.



We got everyone checked in, loaded all of the luggage, and trundled off down the freeway. We had THREE buses- 2 full size MCI's and a Ford Superduty "Truck Bus". After only an hour or two we started having some overheating issues with our bus, which after a few freeway roadside stops it was decided the temp gauge was off so we continued on our way. Hmmm....

One of the bus-fulls of kids:



First stop was the Museum of Ancient Life at Thanksgiving Point in Lehi, Ut.  Cool stuff!





Of course, our boys had more fun in the little kid play area...



After a few hours there we loaded up, got some new drivers, and headed down the road again.

New drivers... Wow. Our buses were a little new to them and shifting turned out to be quite a challenge. ESPECIALLY on the crazy road up through Panguitch, Ut, to get to our next stop: Bryce Canyon.

Originally, we had planned on doing the Queens Garden hike but because of SEVERAL stops to check the overheating bus and reeallly slow going up all the switchbacks, we ended up doing the Navajo Loop trail, which was incredible!

How do you get 110 13 year olds through a canyon!? Very carefully!!!















Beautiful place. I'm going to have to go back there and do some more exploring! SO- now it's getting later, 7 or 8 in the evening. Load 'em all back up and trundle off to the next stop- Mcdonalds for dinner. Our bus made it in decent time... but the OTHER big bus blew a rad hose. We unloaded our boys and sent our bus back for the other bus. Spent the next FIVE HOURS at Mcdonalds waiting for the bus to get fixed. Ug. What to do at Mcdonalds for 5 hours....

Juggle basketballs?



Sit around? Charge your cell phone?



Lay down on the bus once it got back from rescuing stranded students and try and sleep?



Sure, why not.

Note to self- Don't let the students sleep on the lawn next time... When the sprinklers kick on they aren't happy when you laugh at them. Or maybe that note should read: Be sure to have the video camera ready next time.

They finally got the other bus fixed. Of course, then the good bus had a DEAD BATTERY. We finally ended up getting out of there at 3 a.m. and picked up some fuel and new drivers again in St. George, Ut.

What a loooonnnnngggggg day. Hope it gets better from here on out!

Smashing Cricuts.

Well, not really, but I used a Cricut vinyl cutter for the first time today.  Lotsa fun!

I found a set of Adobe Illustrator templates for my bike several years ago and have been meaning to do this for a long time.  I designed some new graphics a couple of years ago, but still didn't get them cut.  Today was the day.  Last day of school, no students, room was all checked off and I was good to go.  Been fighting with file formats for the last week so I figured I would give it one last try, glad I did! Got them all straightened out and ran them through "Make the Cut".  The OLD version, that lets you run the Cricut like a CNC without having to cut only whats on the stupid cartridges.



Cricut doing its thing.



Peeled off the extra vinyl and had this left. Made a few stickers for my website with all of the extra space.





Used a little bit of contact paper to transfer this piece over,



The rest were just stuck on by eyeballing it.

Before:



After!



Not to bad for eyeballin it!  One side done:



Now to do the other side and finish up a few little things.

FWIW, the templates I have DO NOT fit perfectly... I had to trim a little to get it to look right, and because the tank is not perfectly flat there were a few teeny wrinkles in the vinyl.

I spent about $25 on vinyl- just used whatever my local craft store had in stock. Don't like the orange I got so I will probably order some brighter stuff but I was impatient and wanted to get it done.

Here's what my poor bike looked like before:



and AFTER!

 






You might notice I changed a*few* other small things besides the stickers... Glad it's finally back in the dirt! Hoping to do a lot of riding with the family this year... I even figured out how to stuff the bike, the 4 wheeler, and two mini-bikes on my teeny little trailer!



Oh, and did I mention?  SCHOOLS OUT!!!

Do I get a gold star?!

TWO. MORE. DAYS.

I will have made it through 4 years of teaching.

This year has been pretty interesting. I started off with a few goals for the first trimester- fairly large for me and requiring a lot of organization / preparation / lesson planning. I for the most part achieved my goals to the benefit of my curriculum and students. 2nd tri was a brand new experience, with the purchase, assembly, testing, and finally implementation of a brand new piece of technology- a 3D printer. STILL having fun with that one. Third tri was a blur of projects and activities but we made it through.

For me, it's kind of a crossroads. Mrs. Punch, my wonderful wife, graduated in January. A few weeks ago she officially was offered a job as a teacher starting this fall. While we will love the much needed extra income (remember, Idaho is still the second lowest paid state, and now we are BOTH teachers...) I'm hoping and planning that its MY turn to get some more education.

Here's the problem. What does someone like me, who has no desire to get a masters in administration, do!? I love working with my hands. I love showing others how to work with their hands and MAKE. I would love to make myself a better teacher but overall, I want to know more about the how, why and why-nots of making. There are so many things I want to try- blacksmithing, jewelry making, industrial design and all that goes with that, metallurgy seems fun, and anything that sucks fuel in, blows it up, and makes wheels spin is always at the top of my charts- the older the better.

Figure I've got a year to figure out the WHAT, then comes the how- how do I do that while hanging on to a job I love, how to do it from here in the place we love, how to make it work.

Just what I need, ANOTHER project.

In the meantime, a pic from today. Final shop cleanup. Spent all day doing this- felt like hearding 120 ducks from point A to point B, all the while trying to get them to leave a SMALLER mess behind...

Custom Built Hotwheels- The second attempt.

Had so much fun the first time I thought I'd try it one more time.  Got a little overboard with this one though...  you can see a ton more pics here:  http://www.advrider.com/forums/showthread.php?t=880643&page=3

This one I'm entering into a "competition".









Dang purple paint was a royal pain to get off... 




Made some beds,



and got 'em sorta fitting...


 





Sort of how it'll sit.

 




 


   





 




 

Trying out all kinds of new things on this one... The thumbtack air cleaner is probably my favorite so far though.  Have a long ways to go still, and not much time to do it.  I entered this one in a "competition" just for fun.  Not planning on winning anything but I figured it would keep me motivated to finish it.  

Mendelmax 2.0- Updated to the "Birdstruder"

I downloaded and printed my first "thingy" from thingiverse the other day- the "birdstruder".  Noticed my extruder idler was cracking!



It was still working, but occasionally the filament would slip and the print would skip.  Here's where thingiverse comes in- downloaded and printed this little gizmo to replace the Maker Gear plastruder.  The new one is even quick change capable!

Parts freshly printed:
 


Assembly (you can probably see why its called the birdstruder):



Latched,



Open:



Installed, tested, and working!



Pretty happy with it so far, seems to be much better designed and I love the tool-less filament change now. Took a tad bit of dremel-ing to get things to fit perfect but overall it was pretty darn close.Had to buy 2 longer screws and nuts to go with them, for a grand total of something like 78 cents.  Can't argue with that!

Tech 2 has been working on their "big" projects.  Went back and forth with a few different ideas of what they could do but in the end here's what we decided. 

I gave them some real basic guidelines- must have at least 3 different parts, one of which must "move". So far we have 3 Ipone / Ipod cases, a pair of glasses, a boat anchor and winch, 2 lego people, a folding lawn chair, and an airplane. This oughta be interesting...  Hoping to start a batch printing tomorrow, because we've only got a week and a half of school left!!!