Credits for this recipe go to Liz over at Greenparent

…copied here in case that link breaks, so I can easily find it again.

500g oats
300g unsalted butter
4+ tbsp golden syrup
small tin condensed milk
340g sugar

160 oven pre heat

line trays with parchment if not non stick paper then butter it

sugar butter syrup in pan simmer slowly til melted
add condensed milk and simmer a bit on low (don’t turn it up to do it quicker)
add oats slowly, should be sticky but coated
if getting dry add more syrup
pour in tin(s)
15 mins ish, depends how thick/deep your trays are
will be squidgy when you get it out of the oven but will set on cooling

when cooled a bit and getting more solid mark out pieces (if too squidgy just wait a bit longer)

if it is brown round edges try and take it out of tray (still on paper if squidgy) as the heat from tray will carry on cooking it.

eat with a cup of tea

OpenScad is a great toy, and pretty quickly you can get some amazing effects.

I’m just playing at it right now, learning more about CNC routers, but this process has given me more appreciation of the designs I’ve seen in my online travels for sure. It’s more complicated than it looks. Anyone who has built one of these and got it working deserves big respect.
So far I can only dream of completing one of these things in the flesh…

Then when I acquired a broken angle-poise table lamp I saw great potential…

See the short video here: Skull Video

Here is the arduino sketch :

#include <Servo.h>
#include <Bounce.h>

Servo myservo;  // create servo object to control a servo
                // a maximum of eight servo objects can be created 

#define PIN_SWITCH 2
#define PIN_SERVO_CONTROL 9
#define PIN_LEFT_EYE 6
#define PIN_RIGHT_EYE 11

#define DEBOUNCE_MILLISECS 5

// Instantiate a Bounce object with a 5 millisecond debounce time
Bounce bouncer = Bounce( PIN_SWITCH ,DEBOUNCE_MILLISECS );

void setup()
{
  myservo.attach(PIN_SERVO_CONTROL);  // attaches the servo on pin 9 to the servo object
  pinMode( PIN_LEFT_EYE , OUTPUT );
  pinMode( PIN_RIGHT_EYE , OUTPUT );
  pinMode( PIN_SWITCH , INPUT);
  digitalWrite( PIN_SWITCH , HIGH );
}

void loop()
{

  // Update the debouncer
  bouncer.update ( );

  // Get the update value
  int value = bouncer.read();

  // Turn on or off the LED
  if ( value == LOW) {
    // The switch is ON, as the pull-up resistor is being pulled low.

    int jawAngle = random(60,100);
    myservo.write(jawAngle);    

    int ledLevel = random( 0 , 255 );

    analogWrite( PIN_LEFT_EYE , ledLevel );
    analogWrite( PIN_RIGHT_EYE , ledLevel );    

    int delayTime = random( 100,500 );
    delay(delayTime);  

    // Close the jaw again.
    jawAngle = 100 ;
    myservo.write(jawAngle);  

    delayTime = random( 100,500 );
    delay(delayTime);    

  } else {
    // The switch is OFF, so the pull-up resistor is pulling the voltage high.

    // Turn everything off
    int jawAngle = 100 ;
    myservo.write(jawAngle);
    int ledLevel = 0 ;
    analogWrite( PIN_LEFT_EYE , ledLevel );
    analogWrite( PIN_RIGHT_EYE , ledLevel );
    delay(300);
  }

}

• 40g Butter
• 150g Pudding Rice
• 150g Sugar
• 1.5 litres milk

Butter the inside of the slow cooker pot. Add ingredients. Stir. Cover and cook for 3-4 hours.

Oat cookies fresh from the oven. MMmmmmmm

Recipe follows after the break…

• 200g Butter (or margarine)
• 150g Caster sugar
• 4-6 tablespoons golden syrup
• 200g porridge oats
• 200g Self-raising flour
• 1tsp bicarbonate of soda

1. Pre-heat over to Gas Mark 6, or 200ºC
2. Grease 2 baking trays
3. Melt butter, syrup and sugar in a pan over low heat on the hob. Do not boil (or it turns into toffee). Set aside.
4. Sieve flour into mixing bowl, add bicarb and oats. Mix.
5. Add buttery sauce to mixing bowl until it’s moist but not too sticky. You might not need to use all the mixture. Mix well.
6. Roll into small balls, size of a cherry-tomato, or roughly dollop mixture onto baking trays. I prefer rough shapes as they are more artisan.
7. Bake 8-10 mins until golden brown.
8. Cool for 5 mins on side before transferring to a wire rack for cooling.

Perfection with chunks !

Finest cookies

Makes ~16 chunky chocolate cookies

Ingredients

• 1 egg
• 100g butter (margarine just won’t do)
• 100g brown sugar (light or dark)
• 50g white caster sugar
• 15ml (3 teaspoons) vanilla essence
• 230g plain flour
• 25 g baking powder (seems way too much, maybe use less than this to experiment next time?)
• 225 g Cadbury’s dairy milk chocolate (English chocolate, sweet and milky)

Method

Turn on the oven. 190°C or gas mark 5.

our fan over takes about 10 mins to reach baking temperature

Cream the butter and sugar in a mixing bowl

working it together with the back of a wooden spoon

… until it looks like this:

sugar and butter creamed together

In goes the egg (white and yolk):

in goes the egg

… and the flour and baking powder:

plain flour measured out, with baking powder (same colour)

Mix it together. Set aside.

Take the chocolate… unwrap it (slowly). Sniff and enjoy the pleasure of a pristine family bar…

Put in a plastic bag (optional), hit unceremoniously with a hammer, rolling pin, or crow-bar (whatever is to hand). Aim to break each chunk into 2-4 pieces, depending on the chunkiness you prefer.

(Cue gratuitous pictures of the wonder-food we know and love)

My mouth is watering just looking at it!

Eat a chunk of chocolate. This is essential to the success of the recipe.

Bribe a child to grease two baking trays with butter/margarine (I wonder what with…), or do that bit yourself.

Pour choc chips into the mixture, and stir:

nice and firm

With (clean-ish) hands shape into about 16 spherical balls, placing on trays.

all ready

Into the oven… set the timer to beep in ten minutes.

Time for a cuppa

Prepare landing gear:

You should be able to tap a solid top without your finger going in:

Unload to cool down, and enjoy the smell…

See how long you can wait until you try one…

Hope you enjoy making them. I prefer the eating part which comes next

Credits: Mrs techcobweb for her excellent cookery and modeling.

Shirley the skeleton. Isn't she cool ?

Initial comments about this kit :

• This kit is large. A2 or bigger
• The pieces are pre-cut, and just pop out easily with your fingers
• It’s made of thick card, less bendy
• No glue involved. It uses split pins to fasten joints together
• Joints move once pinned, as they swivel around the pins
• Wall bracket included so you can hang him on a wall
• All the bones are clearly marked in English and Latin

This is a quick kit to make progress with.

(I put the bean tin there to give a sense of scale)

Comparison with Skeleton #1 (from Osborne):

• #2 is easier to build
• #2 provides a more impressive result
• #2 is slightly more expensive (£12-ish instead of £7-ish)

Overall: 10/10.

We call ours Shirley (the skeleton) and she likes to dress up in Christmas tinsel and sun glasses !

for old in *.JPG; do mv $old `basename $old .JPG`.jpg; done

I found two on the inter-web, and thought I’d get both to see which is the best…

First up is the subject of this post: “Make this life-size cut-out skeleton” by Osborne publishing.

Completed Skull

Here is the book cover:

I used simple tools, as it’s only card.

Cut out bits, stick them together… simples.

Looks like a great place to hide some electronics later ?

My own alteration to stop the jaw hanging down. Elastic band.

So far that’s about 4 hours of effort.

More soon as we go… spine is next…
… time passes …

… more time passes …

Ugh.

This is taking ages.

My other Skeleton kit arrived, which comes on much stiffer card, with pre-cut shapes, and uses split-pins to secure joints together… loads quicker than this cut-glue-the-tabs together, and each bone is labelled better too.

Knowing that the other kit is better, I doubt I’ll ever complete this model now. But maybe I’ll find a use for it… hmm.

It arrived today. Huraah !

Dutifully installed on my laptop case.