DIY Kindle Rest/Support
I love my Kindle Paperwhite. But, after several weeks of use, I have discovered one little problem: holding the Kindle in a reading position and moving my thumb to turn pages has started to hurt. The muscles in my hands have become sore and overextended. My left thumb, which I use most often for turning pages, often cannot be tucked against my palm without hot, shooting pain. This is clearly BAD! So, I knew that I would have to do something about it right away, lest the problem become more severe. But I didn’t want to give up using my Kindle, or even reduce the amount of time I spent on it. After all, if I didn’t read things on my Kindle, I would have to go back to reading them on my computer, which often gives me a headache and causes its own set of muscle pains.
So I searched online to see what could be done, and I found this:
This looks awesome, but I don’t have $35 right now. So, I thought I was stuck and would just have to try to be careful and put up with the pain.
But then, I remembered some shipping cases my brother had rescued from the trash for me. They are clamshell-type cases lined with foam, and have a hard plastic shell. They were used for shipping small, delicate parts, and then thrown away. I had already used several of them for storage, but I had a few left.
So I got one of the cases, a couple of square wooden dowels I had laying around, a thin sheet of craft foam, and some spare ribbon. Using my trusty hot glue gun and a bit of creativity, I solved my problem. I present the $0 Kindle Lap Desk:
It works great! The red foam sheet on front (last pic) helps keep the kindle from slipping from side to side. The entire contraption can sit on a tabletop or on a pillow in my lap.
The stand supports the Kindle in a comfortable reading position, so I just have to worry about tapping the screen to turn the page. I vary which hand and finger I use, to reduce muscle strain. My hands and wrists already feel a LOT better!
Best of all, the materials are either repurposed or things I’ve had for more than a year. When I have owned craft supplies for a year or more, I reduce my valuation of them to $0 to account for storage costs. Thus, this project cost me nothing! Yay!