Project Man

Ethan has been keeping himself busy with some projects of his own lately.

Ethan found an old swiss army knife that was missing a handle at a previous scout camp.  He decided to fabricate his own handle for it out of popsicle sticks.  He glued a stack of them together with wood glue, then cut them in half length-wise, making two equal sides.  He then carved each side to fit the knife, securing them on with super glue.  

Once the handles were in place, he sanded them smooth. Eric found a can of stain and they stained them together.

Ethan's next project was a rubber band gun. He has played with one before, and saw how the mechanism worked to load and fire a series of rubber bands, so he decided to make one for himself. From memory, he assembled his own version out of--what else--popsicle sticks.

The pictures don't do this gun justice. It is full of moving parts that shift and slide next to each other to make the next band descend to be fired.

Ethan's most recent project has been a miniature Millennium Falcon which is laser cut from metal sheets. He punched the pieces out and assembled them, following the blue-print instructions. The packaging said for 14 years and up, so we had to give him a hard time about not being old enough to assemble it, which was laughable.  He had the thing completed in several hours.

I am continually amazed with what this kid comes up with. Most of it is on his own, without any guidance from me or Eric. He has a unique way of looking at things and how they operate, calculating ways to replicate them or even make them better. I love his creative mind and intense focus. It is a pretty inspiring sight to watch him when he is in "the zone."

 

I can only imagine what this little man of mine is capable of achieving....anything!