Flasher
I recently bought a PIC programmer kit from DSE (cat. no. K3610, design by Silicon Chip) and assembled it. My first project was the device pictured below. It has 8 LEDs which are flashed in a such a pattern as to display the word 'HELLO' (or any other bitmap) 'in the air' when it is waved from side to side. I'm thinking of improving it so that the image to display can be entered by the user with a couple of buttons on the device.
The 18 pin DIP IC in the middle is a PIC16F628A. The 3 pin IC on the left is a 5V voltage regulator.
If you want a copy of the source, contact me.