So after shopping around for an LED light hula hoop, I decided that the price was too high for me. $200 for a hula hoop? Bah. I found this website selling kits to make your own LED light hoop for $50 in as little as two hours!! WOW!! So, $75 and 3 days later, (they fail to include the cost of new tools and the time it takes to screw up said project and re-do it, oh, let's say, four times?) I have a fabulous light-up hula hoop! Seriously, though, I'm a chronic DIY-er, and I know what I'm in for when I try to make a thing I've never made before. I figured it would be a pretty long and arduous undertaking. 4 days is nothing compared to some of the projects I have taken on.
The instructions are about as clear as they can be. This was my first attempt at an electrical project, so the fact that it works at all is a dream realized. I'm thinking of doing some modifications (adding some weights inside to balance it, changing the coupling to a spring-button version for easier opening/closing...tape for grip, etc. etc. etc.), but it's totally functional as is, and folds up for easy travel.
Here, see it in action! (Sorry the picture is super distorted--it was filmed on a vertical phone and my geriatric version of Windows Movie Maker simply did not know what to make of this new style of filmmaking.)
Okay, so I didn't actually make this; my students did. Well, in part. This was a collaborative project between nursery, pre-k and Kindergarten, and I think the kids did a really fabulous job. It was the opening piece of our art and science exposition featuring water.
I have 5 containers in a tiny cement patch barricaded by a wrought iron barrier. This patch of cement receives about 2 hours of sun during the 10 days surrounding the summer solstice and is shielded by an overhead train (and I don't have the greenest of thumbs).
So the fact that I've managed to nurture this tiny garden into a little burst of spring on the grayest block in the five boroughs is nothing short of a miracle.
