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Pound nails not fingers with the Safety Nailer

NEWS – I’m the son of a carpenter, but I did not inherit the carpenter gene from my father. Admittedly I’m terrible when it comes to using a hammer and nails. Maybe its because I’m left-handed (or at least that’s what I tell myself), but I either bend the nail, drive it in crooked, or worse end up smashing my fingers with the hammer.

The Safety Nailer magnetic nail holder makes hammering easier and safer.

And it can even be used with screws.

The tool attaches to your fingers using elastic bands and allows you to start nails and screws while protecting your fingers.

It also helps prevent nails from buckling and keeps screws from wobbling.

The large target area is made of impact-resistant ABS plastic, nails are held in place with strong neodymium magnets. There are 3 different size nail groves with the largest capable of holding a size 20D nail.

Safety Nailer is large enough to protect your fingers but small enough that it won’t get in your way while you’re working. And when you’re not using it, it can be stored on your hammer.

The Safety Nailer magnetic nail holder costs $9.95 and is available from The Grommet.

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Pound nails not fingers with the Safety Nailer originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on March 20, 2019 at 10:00 am.

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The Make-Your-Own Hot Sauce Kit is a tasty way to DIY

NEWS – I LOVE hot sauce and have always wanted to try making my own, but the process seemed like an arduous one. Finding a recipe, then shopping for all those hard to find ingredients you don’t have on hand.

The Grow and Make Make-Your-Own Hot Sauce Kit takes all the guesswork out of making your very own hot sauce. Each kit comes with all the spices and dried peppers you need to get started.

All you need to shop for is a few fresh ingredients.

The kit even includes bottles to store your finished product in.

Now you’re ready to get cooking.

You can choose to follow the easy step-by-step recipe, or you can get creative and customize your sauce by making it spicier or sweeter.

With this kit, experimentation is encouraged.

The Make Make-Your-Own Hot Sauce Kit includes labels, instruction booklet, gloves, funnel, powder sanitizer, and hot sauce ingredients.

The kit is available in two different types, the Artisan 3-sauce kit with three 5-ounce bottles ($29.95) and the Deluxe 6-sauce kit with six 5-ounce bottles ($39.95). Each can be purchased from The Grommet.

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The Make-Your-Own Hot Sauce Kit is a tasty way to DIY originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on March 14, 2019 at 10:00 am.

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Be prepared for the spring gift season with wrap buddies

NEWS – And you thought that the holidays were behind us didn’t you? That’s adorable… Springtime is a busy time for holidays like Easter, Mother’s Day, Father’s Day, and graduation.

That means you’ll need a tool to help you wrap all those gifts you’ll be giving to family and friends. What you need are some wrap buddies!

Wrap buddies are plastic clips that are designed to grip the edge of most tables and hold a roll of wrapping paper between them. Consider wrap buddies like an extra hand. They can hold any size roll and they have a built-in tape dispenser on each end for even more convenience. See them in action below.

For more info visit the wrap buddies website and you can buy them directly through their site for $20 a set or head over to Amazon and save a penny.

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Be prepared for the spring gift season with wrap buddies originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on March 1, 2019 at 10:00 am.

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Here are a couple of inexpensive tips for covering up the cameras (or LED lights) on your devices

ARTICLE – I love my gadgets, but I don’t want to worry about the cameras on those devices getting hacked, so I cover many of them up. Am I paranoid? Maybe, but I know I’m not the only one concerned about this so I thought I’d pass on my tips to those of you who are interested.

Even though there are some phone cases available that are designed with a mechanical camera cover, what do you do when there is nothing for your particular phone or, for that matter, all the rest of your devices with cameras?

I use mounting putty (a.k.a Loctite Fun Tak or Scotch Removable Mounting Putty) for non-mobile devices……and black washi tape (a thin, decorative, rice paper masking tape sold as Scotch Washi Tape or Duck Washi Tape) for my portable devices.

Mounting putty works well as a covering for non-mobile device cameras. It works especially well on my Amazon Echo Spot’s camera without covering up the light sensor. I simply pinched off a tiny bit of the putty (my putty is blue) and rolled it into a teeny ball and placed it over the camera (shown in the photo above located at the top of the Spot in the black bezel area). What’s nice about using this stuff is that it can easily be shaped and flattened to fit the camera without impeding the function of the light sensor on the Spot. It works perfectly!


Mounting putty is also useful for covering up annoying LED lights on things like desktop chargers, power strips, etc. located in your bedroom which can be distracting if you like to sleep in complete darkness as I do.

The funny thing is, I use this putty for lots of handy things except when hanging things on my walls because it leaves an oily stain behind over time.


I found that washi tape is ideal for covering the cameras on my portable devices like my phone. I used a hand-held single hole puncher to quickly cut out small circles of tape which are large enough to cover the cameras. I then placed the washi tape on my phone’s front and back cameras. I used black washi tape so that it would blend into the background of the black bezel on my phone. You can barely tell it’s there.

Washi tape is ideal for this use because it is lightly adhesive – enough to stay on the device when slipping my phone into my purse or pocket but easily removable when I need to use the camera. And it doesn’t seem to leave any residue when removed. You can use the same piece of tape several times before needing to replace it.

I also use it on our laptop cameras which get zero use in our house. 


How well do these coverings work? Very well. The above pictures show the front-facing camera on my phone with me standing right in front of it (left screenshot above) and the other shows my laptop cam (right photo above). Both pictures show that you cannot see anything when using washi tape. The mounting putty worked equally well in blocking any images on my Echo Spot.

All-in-all, both of these solutions are easy to apply, remove, and reuse leaving little to no residue and they’re a fast fix. Another benefit to using mounting putty and washi tape to cover my device’s cameras and LEDs is that they are really inexpensive: Scotch Removable Mounting Putty is sold at Target for $1.89 and Duck Washi Tape black is sold at Walmart for $2.88.

What is your favorite way to cover up your cameras (that is, if you care enough to cover them up)? Leave a comment and let me know!

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Here are a couple of inexpensive tips for covering up the cameras (or LED lights) on your devices originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on February 27, 2019 at 10:00 am.

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Light up Valentine’s Day with WHDTS heart-shaped soldering kit

NEWS – Are you searching for that perfect Valentine’s Day gift, and you enjoy tinkering with a soldering iron, crafts or DIY projects?

Or maybe it’s your sweetheart who’d get a charge out of creating a small light-up display.

In either case, check out the WHDTS heart-shaped, three-piece flashing LED DIY soldering kit. It’s advertised as a practice kit for those learning to solder and seeking a practice project, a hands-on starter kit for anyone interested in electronics.

Most of your time will be spent carefully installing the 22 LEDs around the perimeter of each heart, based on the detailed schematics in the downloadable user manual linked to the Amazon listing.

Once you’ve finished, if you’re successful, you’ll be rewarded with three light-up hearts, just under 2 inches by 2 inches, one glowing red, one green and one white.

This kit is perfect for someone who’s looking to dust off their soldering iron, or seeking a project for a budding electronics student, or if you’re in the market for a unique, homemade gift for your beloved this Feb. 14.

Find the WHDTS heart-shaped, three-piece flashing LED DIY soldering kit on Amazon Prime for $9.99.

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Light up Valentine’s Day with WHDTS heart-shaped soldering kit originally appeared on The Gadgeteer on February 2, 2019 at 10:00 am.

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