“I use the Tom Bihn Snake Charmer (packing cube) as a diaper pouch and I swear by it. Perfect size for diapering essentials and can easily go from purse to car to bike basket to where have you. Best trade for a diaper bag I ever made.”
– Excerpted from SimplyBike’s post “bike ride to the first farmer’s market of the season”

Read the full post by Loaded Pocketz (with more photos). See also: the Synapse 25.

“My family recently spent the week at Disney World with two other families. There were 11 of us all together. My friend (also a Tom Bihn fan) had the brilliant idea to bring the clear organizer wallet to help keep track of all our tickets and Fast Passes. It worked like a charm, especially with the little dividers to keep everything organized.

Even with the pouring rain we had a couple of days, our tickets and passes stayed dry, as did everything my friend carried in her Synapse.”

Read the full thread (with more photos) posted by Toblerhaus in the Forums. See also: the Clear Organizer Wallet, Synapse

Read the full post by conversa in the Forums (with more photos).

Photo posted by jujigatame in the Forums. See also: the Co-Pilot.

Doodlers Anonymous has a challenge for you: draw your most essential item, the thing you’d take with you if you could only bring along one thing. Submit your drawing and you’ll be entered to win a Synapse 19 backpack.

Our essentials:

“Words cannot describe the love I have for the Tom Bihn Synapse backpack, but I will give it a shot. I affectionately refer to this 19 liter marvel of backpack engineering as “Marry Poppins” because of its astounding ability to hold an almost endless amount of items in a limited space. Everything you see on this list fits snugly into this bag. It’s incredibly comfortable – nice wide straps with a shoulder clip hold the bag firmly in place, and it has a waist clip as well if you ever needed to run with the bag. I have an 8″ metal plate in my left clavicle from a snowboarding injury, which the doctor said some backpackers complain about, but I’ve hiked through the jungle for 5 days with this bag on and shoulder pain was not an issue.

The bag is also waterproof – it has sealed zippers that do as good a job as possible at keeping the water out. In rain, it performs admirably, keeping my camera and computer dry. However, if you fall off a kayak while wearing this bag it may let a little water in. I know from experience. If you have your camera in the upper middle pouch, it will survive. The added benefit of having a waterproof bag is that you do not have to carry around a large bag cover, which takes up a lot of volume in the average bag (and the bigger the bag, the bigger the cover).

The structure of the bag makes everything incredibly accessible – I keep all my small electronics, sunglasses, flashlight, etc in the side pockets for easy access. An added benefit of the pocket structure is that it makes it so that there is no need to carry smaller packing cubes for organizing these items. The bag also doubles as my day bag. So when I am all checked into the hostel and my computer and other items are locked up I can take this bag out to carry my camera, water, headphones, and jacket. I don’t have to have a second “day bag”.”

Read the full post @ The Life Reengineered.

Computer: 11” MacBook Air (Mid 2011) ($$$). My employer has provided me with this laptop, and it’s the best I’ve had. Can easily power the 27” Apple Cinema display I use with it every day and runs everything I need, from Photoshop to Xcode, even with the bevy of OS X menubar items I keep running. 4 GB goes a long way on this Mac. It travels in a Tom Bihn Ristretto ($$$) which holds my laptop and a 10” iPad easily.”

Read on over at Brad’s blog for his full list of work tools.

RFID Blocking Passport Pouch, all colors

Side Effect in colors Steel Dyneema/Wasabi, Wasabi Dyneema/Wasabi, and Aubergine/Wasabi
Other colors — Black/Iberian, Black/Wasabi, Black/Steel, and Navy/Iberian — will ship soon.

Horizontal Brain Cell, Size 13″ MacBook Pro Retina
Horizontal Brain Cell, Size 6X

Citizen Canine, all colors

The Smart Alec backpack in Black/Black/Steel with the Side Effect in Steel Dyneema/Wasabi tethered to the bag via a Key Strap in Wasabi.

Read on at The Gadgeteer for a detailed list of what Andy carries in his Ristretto for iPad.