MindMup Maps Your Brain in the Browser

If you like to plan and brainstorm by creating mind maps to link together ideas, MindMup is a great browser-based program that helps you get organized with lots of features.

The app is a lot like previously-mentioned Coggle, but it offers a few more features that power users will love. The biggest difference is the ability to augment your nodes with various right-click options. For example, you can attach long notes and images to your nodes, and click through to see them later so you don't have to clutter your map with too much top-level information. I also really enjoy the ability to drag and drop nodes on top of each other to reorder them in the hierarchy. These little touches make the app feel more native, and less like a typical web app.

One much-appreciated feature is the ability to save your maps, either to Google Drive or MindMup's own servers, to edit at a later date. You can also export your maps in various formats, including PDF and HTML, offering you a ton of flexibility when it comes time to act on your data. Granted, not everyone likes using mind maps, but if you do, take MindMup for a spin.

MindMup (Free)

Related Mind mapping is a great way to brainstorm, make a plan, or turn ideas into the steps needed to make it real. Thankfully, there are great tools out… Read…

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Crochet Your Wedding Bouquet

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Turn That Last Bit of Honey into Delicious Lemonade

When you start running low on honey, the last few drops are usually too hard to extract from the jar to make them worthwhile. Instead of throwing the jar away though, use it to make a refreshing pitcher of lemonade.

Melissa Clark's recipe puts that throwaway honey to great use, especially on a hot summer weekend. Just add a little lemon juice to the jar, and shake it all up. The acidity of the juice will help loosen up the honey so it comes off the edges of the jar. Once it's all mixed in, the honey acts as a great sweetener for the lemonade. Once everything's well-mixed, pour a little bit of the mixture into a glass, stir in water, and enjoy! If it came out too sweet or too bitter, just add sugar or lemon juice until you're satisfied.

Kitchen Hip Tip: Honey Jar Lemonade | Melissa Clark - Food Writer via The Kitchn

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Cat Enclosure

Start off by deciding how much space you have in the yard and how much your cats are going to want. Keep in mind that the pipe is cheap and that fancy fittings like the three way joints are what will rack up. I chose my dimensions, 7X5X3, because my cats love to climb and the length and width facilitated three levels of platforms that would fit in the shade.

here was my shopping list:

1.)  12 - 10 foot schedule-40 1/2'' PVC
http://www.lowes.com/pd_23966-1814-PVC+04005++0600_0__?productId=3133079&Ntt=pvc+3-way+1%2F2&pl=1¤tURL=%3FNtt%3Dpvc%2B3-way%2B1%252F2&facetInfo=
2.)  4 - 3-way fittings (most stores have the third direction tapped but Lowes had the right ones in my town)
http://www.lowes.com/pd_315498-1815-413005RMC_0__?productId=3344666&Ntt=pvc+3-way+1%2F2&pl=1¤tURL=%3FNtt%3Dpvc%2B3-way%2B1%252F2&facetInfo=
3.) 24 - T fittings
http://www.lowes.com/pd_26051-1814-PVC+02400C+0600HC_0__?productId=3514896&Ntt=pvc+t+1%2F2&pl=1¤tURL=%3FNtt%3Dpvc%2Bt%2B1%252F2&facetInfo=
4.) 36'' X 50' plastic poultry netting   
http://www.lowes.com/pd_157764-13113-090786_0__?productId=3457516&Ntt=poultry&pl=1¤tURL=%3FNtt%3Dpoultry&facetInfo=
5.) ZIP TIES (100 - 150 will be plenty, cheap at dollar tree)

Got it all for $80.00

You might also need:

1.) a pipe cutter
2.) a marker
3.) tape measure

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Etsy Craft: PLUSHIES!

Well, everyone knows that Plushies seem to be a fad right now. You can see them in sizes and shapes ranging from Avengers look-alikes, to anime, to the little Cthulhu squiddy things that people make in their spare time. Today we bring you a Make Robot plushie that you can make in a few minutes with only a few pricked fingers (remember your thimbles!).

You'll need:
Scissors
Thread
Hand-sewing needle
Fabric for outside of plushie
Padding for inside of plushie
Cookies! (Because my wife is amazing and baked some for me for taking pictures of her, that recipie comes later!)

JesseeSueM made the design that you'll see in these photos, if you want the printout, you can find it here.

Thankfully, the printed fabric design comes with a cut line included. An easy trick for the backing? Pin a similar-sized piece of fabric to the back of the robot so that you won't have to mess with lining up both pieces again. Trust me, it helps.

After you've pinned both pieces, cut along the dotted line. It doesn't have to be clean, just make sure you don't get too close to the 'bot.

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Cutting Out Your Face

Let's say you have a photo of your face. Or your child's face. Or your dog. Or, really, any photo you find pretty much anywhere.

Let's say you want to cut it out of metal (perhaps with the plasma cutter at TechShop) or out of wood or cardboard (maybe on the laser cutter) or on a tshirt (vinyl cutter) or even carve it into a pumpkin! You'll need to convert that photo a black and white image that can be fed to one of these machines. Or you can print it on a transparency using a regular ink-jet printer and then shine light through it. Project it on a wall and paint it, or onto a pumpkin.

Before you can do any of these things you need to transform your photo from a thing with 32000 colors to something with only 2.

I'm not going to go into much detail about how to cut it out. This instructable is all about how use the software available at any computer in Techshop (and other places) to create the cutout. I spent several hours last night figuring out the exact steps; it should take you about 20 minutes to follow these steps!

I made it at Techshop!  www.techshop.ws

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