One may be hard-pressed to find a designer, an engineer or maker that doesn’t thrive on knowledge and the learning process. It’s as if there is an inherent need for knowledge and understanding instilled within creators. We thrive on information we gain and look forward to opportunities to apply it. As Leonardo da Vinci once said, “Learning never exhausts the mind.”

So what happens when you gather a roomful of innovative thinkers?

We found out on Thursday, January 28^th as we celebrated National Fun at Work Day at Inventionland!

Many enjoyed food as fuel for the last hour of a successful work day as Industrial Designer and resident end-of-month party planner Sarah laid out a delicious spread of toppings for a Hot Dog Happy Hour, with the help of Inventionland’s go-to guy for Special Operations, Michael.

National Fun at Work Day proved to be just that, as well as an intriguing meeting of the minds as all put pencils to paper to answer perfectly-themed trivia – without the help of handy iPhone and Android devices! It was all brain power, which was fitting as the gathering was held in our very own Brainpower Ballpark. Brainpower Ballpark complete with hot dogs? Hot dogs and baseball – a combination that goes together like yin and yang!

Trivia questions ranged from easy to head-scratching hard, but the end result – no matter the question – was a lot of fun!

Even our founder and CEO George Davison got in on the trivia action with a few fun questions he found to be particularly peculiar. Check them out! Do you know the answers?

“Who averaged one patent for every three weeks of his life?”

“Which American city invented plastic vomit?”

Test your knowledge some more and check out even more of our trivia questions!

Check our Twitter page this week for the answers to these trivia questions! See if some of them have you stumped, too!

Copyright Inventionland, 2016

The post An Innovative Meeting of the Minds for National Fun at Work Day appeared first on Inventionland.

End-of-month work parties are always fun. Just take our Taco Thursday party for example, when we had our very own foodie fest equipped with you guessed it – tacos!

This month’s end-of-month work party is a little more exciting. Why? Because it falls on National Fun at Work Day!

In honor of National Fun at Work Day, we have some special surprises!

“The party is going to be a hot dog party!” said Industrial Designer Sarah Fahey, who is the planner of these end–of-month parties. “But we are going to have some fun prizes and mystery events for National Fun at Work Day.”

“What is more fun than a hot dog?” said Fahey. “It will feature a toppings bar with lots of options of things to put on your hot dog.”

Though the party is sure to be a hit, what’s National Fun at Work Day without a little playful prank… or two?

Just check out this house that Fahey built. Fahey isn’t just in charge of our awesome monthly parties. She’s also the mastermind behind some pretty awesome office pranks! See below:

What you’re looking at is an original Fahey creation. She used leftover materials to build a house over Product Designer Colt Dalmaso’s former workspace from when he worked on the build line.

When Dalmaso left for vacation, he came back to his new “house.”

“I came back from vacation and saw it there. It was pretty amazing!” said Dalmaso. “It had windows and shutters and a picket fence. I opened the door and looked and all my stuff was still in there.”                                                                                                                                                             

“It was a funny prank. It even had a light inside and working windows, too!” said Dalmaso who said there were even more surprises inside of his new “home.”

“I reached up to pull on the light string and flour came down! There was a bucket full of flour behind this fan. Luckily, I stepped out in time so it only got about half of me,” said Dalmaso.

Dalmaso admits that the new workspace grew on him as he kept his new home up for close to two months before it started to look a little dilapidated.

More recently, the build line got another new addition – a cool new hire… See for yourself!

Builder Jon George created a snowman that now goes by the name of “Biff.”

“I was trying to [finish creating him] for the holiday party, as we had a ton of decorations, but I didn’t end up having time. So I stuffed him on the shelf [in the Wood Shop],” said George.

While George built Biff, the Metal Shop’s Chris Macus was involved in decorating him as “the new guy” at Inventionland. But it wasn’t until former Prototype Builder Ryan Mattis went on vacation that Biff was plucked off the shelf and placed on the build line as the new hire.

“It was a joint combination of me and Prototype Builder Tommy [Werner] who decorated the snowman. Ryan [Mattis] wasn’t there and we decided to do it as a joke,” said Macus. “We just thought ‘we gotta put that in there somehow.’ “

We must admit, Biff seems like a pretty cool guy!

From everyone at Inventionland, we’d like to wish you and your coworkers a very Happy National Fun at Work Day!

Copyright Inventionland, 2016

The post National Fun at Work Day – Inventionland Style! appeared first on Inventionland.