(Continued from Maker Faire Kickoff) After a short snafu with a missing labcoat, we managed to find a brand new one at LabPro in Sunnyvale, and with it we arrived in scientific style at Maker Faire Education Day.

When we arrived, we were amazed at how much everyone had worked to get there, and wanted to enlighten both kids and educators. With Intel making a huge presence volunteering to lead the huge troves of student groups, eagerly awaiting a glimpse at the wonders awaiting inside the gates.

We found our way to the exit accidentally, and Sylvia hopped on board to sign about 100 of the special "School's Out" MAKE Magazines being handed out to students as they leave! Sylvia had a blast playing celebrity for the moment, then it has back to the cool stuff.

What few makers were setup, still had lots to show off. From a kickstarter we'd only seen last week was Makey Makey, an instant touch interface for makers to turn anything conductive into a keyboard key. With beach balls and bananas kids were amazed at how easy it was to turn every day objects into interfaces with just alligator clips and a simple little board.

After the students had all left, it was time for the teacher education portion of the day, and with us squarely in both categories, we stayed for the fun. MAKE: Education was announced, with conversations by AnnMarie Thomas, Gary Stager, Steve Davee and many more big personalities in real world hands on education.

After a fun romp talking to educators, signing magazines and eating pizza, we headed out to Evil mad Science headquarters, for an impromptu tour and opportunity to try out their brand new industrial embroidery machine.

And all this before the actual event! Friday is shaping up to be a lot of fun on its own, and maybe with a bit of luck and elbowgrease, we can find a time and place to remake our DML demo for a new audience at Maker Faire 2012.

(Continue the adventure with Maker Faire: Day 0)

This year, the Kauffman Foundation has graciously offered to sponsor Sylvia and I to be a big part of their Kansas City Maker Faire. We incredibly honored to be brought halfway across the country just to see and be seen by our fellow makers.

We plan on doing multiple group sessions on things we've done before (Molding/casting, ALTAlarm), and a few new-to-us classics (Mr. backpack, No heat lava lamp). We also hope to bring kids and adults together to make some simple things they can take home and be proud of (Crazy Putty, Chicken in a cup). It's going to be great! See you there if you're coming, and if you can't make it, we'll be posting some photos to Flickr and a video to come.