| I am always on the lookout for new and different items. On our trip to the ECLSTS we made sure to check out the local Wal-Mart to see if they had anything new and different than in Post-it Falls, ID. Sure enough they did. In the toy section we found some highly detailed NBA sports action figures. These figures are made of resin and are made by McFarland.com. There are several sets with different players. We chose the Yao Min and Tim Duncan set. You can find Shaq, Jason Kidd and others in different sets.    The units are packed well and use tape and twisty-ties to keep the people in place. Take extra time when removing the figures. The arms look jointed, but they are not. Don't try to reposition them. The basketball has a ring link clip on the ball that lets the figure hold onto the ball. (Wish they had that in real life.)
   You can place the figures onto the stands provided. The one flying in the air uses a small pole that was keyed with a round and a square end for placing the figure on the stand. The other figure used pegs that fix into the shoes. I found that it was easy to knock the figure off the pegs and hard to get him back on.    I thought that would be the end of the story, until Jon came up with an idea on how to make a simple basketball backboard. He was organizing some of our video tapes and noticed that one part of the plastic tape case was about the right size for a backboard. With the face of the box 2" x 2.75" it was well within the "that's close" for a regulation board that is 42" x 72". These are tape cases for the newer Digital Video Tapes (DV)   
He thought about cutting the plastic, but chose not to. This type of hard plastic can crack easily. He figured the lip could just be painted black and used for supporting the backboard on a pole. He masked off the plastic and used our painting pens to draw a silver line around the edge of the backboard. He also used a black pen to paint the back and top of the case lip black.    The key was to make a decal that could be applied to the front of the plastic case. Together we looked on the Internet at different pictures of backboards. Jon recreated a design that was simple and would give the extra appearance of metal supports on the back of board.    Jon used CorelDraw and our HP Color Laser printer to create the decals. They were printed on clear decal paper and, we of course made a few extras for any mistakes that might be made.    This was a large decal so we made sure to take our time when applying it. We made sure to get the wrinkles out as best we could.
The basketball hoop was a small plastic circle that was lying around from some other project. If you do not have one in a drawer somewhere, go down to your local Home Depot and check out the isle with all the washers and screws. You will find something to use. We painted our rim orange with our painting pens.    The support for the rim was an old hardware jumper for PC boards that was sitting around in the drawer. Any small black plastic piece will do. The final touch was to cut a 3/8" dowel painted black about 6" long. This fit under the support and held the rim of the basket at about the right height for our players. Glue with your favorite glue. The Net: One of the teenage girls at church is working on crocheting a basketball net. I will let you know how it turns out.  Top of Page
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