One of the Christmas gifts my daughter gave me was a little fabric stand for my iPad.
The choice of fabric was hers, and I love it because she picked it for me, but she clearly has no idea what my taste is, IYKWIM.
Now I have never been a fan of e-readers. I vastly prefer actual books. BUT DH stumbled on a book (The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry) that he gulped down in about two days. Very unusual for him – he reads, but not so much fiction. He suggested I read it and as it was already on his Kindle it seemed silly not to read it that way. I did, and I really enjoyed it. What surprised me is that I liked reading it on the Kindle more than I expected. At first, the whole way you had to grip it, to avoid triggering a page turn got on my nerves A LOT. But when I remembered this beanbag, it solved that and other issues. For example, I read while I eat (breakfast and lunch, which I tend to eat on my own, never dinner, which we eat as a family) and the issues with real books (keeping to book open, turning the pages and not getting food on them, etc) can be solved with an e-reader if you can solve the problems e-readers and meal-time reading (keeping them at the right angle for easy reading.) This little beanbag worked a treat.
Basically it is constructed like those sour cream containers (US ones, not UK ones) where you take a rectangle of paper (or in this case fabric) and sew a tube. Sew one end closed, fill with styrofoam balls (the small ones like for bean bag stuffing) then sew the other end closed the opposite. You can see a paper version on Dan99‘s blog if that is difficult to picture. This bean bag is exactly the same, scaled up.
I think DH intended I would use it for my iPad, but I never USE my iPad, really, unless I am laying down. Except to Skype DS at Uni, and that is the one case where this beanbag holder is less than ideal as the mic is blocked by the fabric. I should give it a go with a YouTube video or something, to see if the VOLUME on playback is affected like the MIC is for conversation. If not, I can see using this more often.
Anyway, I’ve been meaning to share it. The company he bought it from, at a craft fair, is called ebeanies.
scrappystickyinkymess 
15/01/2013 at 10:49 pm
What a clever idea! I love books, had thumbs down on ebook readers for a long time. Got a touchpad as gift, liked it a lot. Then decided I wanted a kindle so I could download while traveling. LOVE IT! I still read ‘real’ books too. Nice to have the best of both worlds. And I agree, it was a bit to get used to, with the way pages, turn, etc., but eventually one does. I also read as I eat a lot of times. Thanks for a nice post.
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15/01/2013 at 9:10 pm
Me likely!! I can see it would be useful for a lunch time read – as a librarian with access to discarded books I tend to keep a few of those handy for mealtime reads for the very reasons you suggest. Although obviously a big fan of books I am slowly coming round to the horses for courses point of view re kindles etc. a big problem for me is I can’t read in bed as the light is just too awful for my ancient eyes but I can read on my iPad… So coming round. Wonder if my mum could knock
Me up something like this!
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