Austin, was it you who mentioned seeing ready-made articulated legs that could be bought to use with a robot?

Those wonderful LED strips at adafruit are actually out of stock, and very expensive (since I'd need 4 meters per umbrella). I've decided to return to the original idea of just soldering together 64 LEDs with wire (should be faster than sewing w/ conductive thread). I found another helpful instructable to guide me. It's so much cheaper to substitute my labor! Anyway, your advice has been soooooo helpful. You're like a walking instructable yourself!

Thanks for thinking about this, Austin! Probing around on the adafruit forum yields the info that the RGB LED strips don't work w/ Lilypads (adafruit doesn't sell Lilypads or design stuff for them) - the software that goes w/ the strips only works w/ the "regular" Arduinos.

Hey Austin, how do I figure out what kind of power supply to use for my umbrella using that LED strip? The strip & the Arduino need 5V. The strip draws 120mA per LED segment, or about 2A per meter, but only if LEDs are at full brightness & all are on. I will have 64 LED segments, but only 8 will be lit up at a time, and not at full brightness (colors rather than white). What kind of portable power supply would work?

Wow! I didn't know there was such a thing! This will make my life much easier, once I figure out how to use it. Thanks for the link!

Hey Austin, the Find Home glove was fabulous! Thanks! I still have to video my glove so I can post it - maybe tomorrow.

hey Austin, Sorry I missed your Transformer ping pong balls. They look great! Hope to see you next month.

Hey Austin, It was nice to meet you! And the Eggbot was a real treat! Hope you can bring it again next month.