Category Archives: Holiday

DIY Santa Claus Singer with Flyport

Stefano has completed work on a holiday project known as the DIY Santa Claus Singer with Flyport. It is built around an animated Santa Claus decoration with the control switch bypassed with an NPN transistor. The switch is controlled over the internet via the Arduino/ethernet shield combo which responds to Twitter messages. Part one of […]

Christmas Tree email alert

Matt Richardson from MAKE presents his take on the traditional CHristmas tree email notifier utilizing the Arduino and the Ethernet Shield. He says: “On a set interval, the Arduino will connect to a PHP-enabled web server which will, in turn, check for new email. The PHP web server will return the count of messages to […]

ATtiny13 controlled LED Christmas lights

A simple example of a Christmas light project using store bought LED lights and components you probably have lying around the shop. Mark VandeWettering found a set of battery powered LED Christmas lights and decided to combine this this an ATtiny13 to make an MCU controlled lighting display. He explains: I found a set of […]

How to make a CheerLights controller with Arduino and ioBridge

CheerLights is an ioBridge Labs project that allows people’s lights all across the world to synchronize, stay linked based on social networking trends. It’s a way to connect physical things with social networking experiences and spread cheer at the same time. We are all connected. The Arduino is used to generate the PWN signal to […]

Colornode holiday lighting microcontroller board

ColorNode is a wireless Arduino-compatible microcontroller board designed to replace the stock controller board on GE Color Effects light strings. It’s a project designed by digitalmisery and was inspired by deep darc’s Hacking Christmas Lights project last year. The schematic and photos are available, and they promise to post the code as soon as the […]

Arduino controlled flamethrowing Jack-O’-Lantern

Randofo published the details on this flamethrowing Jack-O’-Lantern on Instructables. This bad boy is designed for remote control via Squidbee RF modules so you can shoot a one-second burst of flame on command. (As randofo observes, you should be able to substitute any Arduino/XBee combo for the SquidBee.) This definitely qualifies as a Dangerous (Halloween) […]

Arduino sound-responsive Halloween skull

Boris presents this project just in time for Halloween. It’s a simple Halloween skull which employs an Arduino to read the level from sound sensors and controls a servo connected to the skull’s mandible. You can see more project details and get the source code from the Open-Electronics website. Via the contact form.

Instructables version of the Hackable Christmas card

The Instructables version of the Hackable Christmas card & ornament is up. Seeed has copies of the card as a surface mount kit for $12, or assembled for $15. The card is already being manufactured so it can be delivered ASAP. The Seeed stock numbers aren’t accurate, less than 100 are being produced and we’re […]

Prototype: Hackable LED Christmas card & ornament

Holiday cards that blink and beep have always fascinated us. This is our hackable DIY version, made with an ATtiny13A and a few LEDs. Push the button to play a short light show in the tree. We’re sending these to friends and family this year. It’s a handmade, hackable gift, and it was a ton […]

Remote control color changing pumpkin

Halloween is only a few days away. We’re getting into the spirit by building a remote control color changing pumpkin. Channel buttons 0-8 on the remote toggle the colors of the rainbow. Button 9 activates an ‘angry pumpkin’ mode that flashes a scary red strobe for a few seconds. It uses a minimal PIC 18F2550 […]