Michael and I have successfully reached the Twin Cities from Madison, WI, in our 10-gallon-tank rental car, learning a little bit about Wisconsin history at each and every rest stop. Tonight we have the pleasure of co-hosting TWO Twin Cities maker meetups to share our pair of MakerBot Replicators: one at the relatively new makerspace The Mill and the other at the hackerspace Hack Factory with TC Maker. If you’d like to learn more about these great places, check out this great piece that came out today in the Twin Cities StarTribune detailing them and the maker movement that has very much exploded in this community.

THE MILL: 6pm-8pm

2300 Kennedy Street NE, Suite #130
Minneapolis, MN 55413
(651) 592.3372
http://www.mnmill.org/

HACK FACTORY: 8:30pm-11pm

3119 E. 26th Street
Minneapolis, MN 55406
http://www.tcmaker.org/blog/hack-factory/

There are MakerBot Operators in both spaces that we can’t wait to spend time with. The two places cater to a different slice of the very makery and inspiring community here, so I’m very much looking forward to the two-event night despite the road weariness and confusion about reality that comes from waking up in a different motel every day for a week.

I’ve been dreaming of visiting Minneapolis for years — and have a few friends here who I’m hoping will help me locate the ideal Capture Your Town challenge sites for the Minneapolis Maker MUG to tackle. (Anyone up for a CaptureSession tomorrow in the Twin Cities?) Also, I’ve been told by many American poets (95% of which are published or funded by some foundation, publisher or org in the  Twin Cities area) that this is one of America’s most cosmopolitan communities. Take that provincial New York City (with the demise of funding for individual artists and poets)!

The enterprising will join Michael and me to both events — and perhaps to a late night CaptureSession should we find a suitably lit public art piece to #capture! At any rate, as our evening shifts from entertaining to hacking, feel free to dive in to the Capture Your Town processing and uploading that we will be doing to share back the spoils of our rather intense-but-awesome tour.

There is still time to enroll your child in a very important learning opportunity, and good news: the price has dropped and the eligibility has expanded!

NYU Poly’s Center for K-12 STEM Education and MakerBot are combining powers to get kids introduced to 3D modeling and 3D printing. This is an excellent chance to give them a leg up with a set of skills that will become very advantageous in the near future.

Here are the details:

Where: NYU-Poly Campus
6 MetroTech Center
Brooklyn, NY
Room RH 214

When: July 9th-13th, 2012 from 9am to 3pm daily

Who: Ages 10-13

Cost:  $500 $400/student (includes a lunch voucher good in our cafeteria)

Email [email protected] to find out more.

Click here to sign up!

Sometimes the things you make with a MakerBot are so lifelike that they confuse nature.

Continuing with the theme of wings for the day, a project from the MakerBot Applications Team:

Yesterday I asked what people are doing with their MakerBot Cupcake CNC’s, our very first 3D printer model that we released back in 2009. Here’s a pretty awesome answer to that question.

Jordie Smith made this WaspWings setup for a friend of his to wear to MakerFaire Kansas City last weekend, and he used the Cupcake at Cowtown Computer Congress Kansas City to do it.

You can see all the various MakerBotted parts in the shot below.

Many of the gears and fittings for this project certainly needed to be custom. We’re told this project came together really quickly, so even better that Jordie had a MakerBot on hand to make the parts he needed.

Of course we wouldn’t leave you hanging without a video. Check out how these wings flap, quiver, and collapse. Awesome!

Thingiverse citizen TheNewHobbyist is livestreaming some MakerBot action. What’s he making?

Live video by Ustream

A couple of our events staff, Nick and Keith, had a blast showing off The Replicator to Heidi Klum and Project Runway executive producer Desiree Gruber. Check out all the MakerBotted goodies in the pictures.

On Ms. Klum’s arm: Stretchy Bracelet by emmett
In Ms. Gruber’s right hand: Flippy the Frog by jbakutis
In Ms. Gruber’s left hand: “Okay” by cyclone
below: Big Love <3 – Heart Gears by faberdasher (based on Screwless Heart Gears by emmett)

The folks at the party last night loved the MakerBot and the things it can make.  What can we say? They have good taste.

But Heidi loved MakerBot so much that she honestly couldn’t leave without those Big Love Heart Gears. So, literally, Heidi Klum stole our heart.