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Looking for an “aww”-inducing Father’s Day gift, or just looking to keep your coffee warm and your fingers burn-free? The object project blog posts a tutorial to making a DIY photo coffee sleeve.

You don’t have to fill this sleeve with an oh-so-nostalgic picture, of course, and you don’t have to make a photo-holding cut-out at all. But as object project’s crafters envision it, it’s a noble combination of corduroy, fleece, plastic, velcro, and a single cardboard/paper coffee sleeve as a guide. The blog breaks down the project step by step with pictures, and the end result depends on how straight you can cut and what type of picture you’re inserting. Personally, I’d dig a picture that makes it look like something evil is trapped inside that coffee, but then again, I’m not getting Father’s Day gifts quite yet.

Got a unique design spin on this project? Different materials you’d use? Gather ’round the workbench in the comments.

Before you officially unpack your swimsuit for the summer months to come, it’s time for a quick look back at the posts you liked best this May. We hacked our batteries, enjoyed 10 incredible and tiny Windows utilities, spiced up our wallpaper with some retro video game remakes, and more.

• 10 Killer DIY Projects for Your Extra Day Off
  The year’s not quite half over, but already we’ve featured buckets of amazing DIY projects. Here’s a quick look at a few of the best, most popular projects you may want to undertake on your extra day off.
• Top 10 Battery Hacks, Tips, And Tricks
  The gadgets you love don’t always love you back-at least when it comes to battery life. But you can get more from your laptop, your iPod, your phone, and other devices with these 10 techniques.
• Top 10 Tiny & Awesome Windows Utilities
  It’s the little things that make a Windows system great-like utilities that use less than 10MB of memory to make your life easier. Here are 10 apps that pack a lot of greatness into very little space.
• How to Dual Boot Windows 7 with XP or Vista
  This post wasn’t written this month, but with the release of Windows 7 RC, a whole lot of you wanted to know how to get your dual-boot on.
• Absolutely Amazing Video Game Remake Wallpapers, Take Two
  Lifehacker reader Orioto stunned us a few months ago with his gorgeous paintings of classic video games for your desktop-and he’s at it again with another must-see collection for your eye-candy needs.
• Five Best Free Data Recovery Tools
  The best way to recover from unexpected data loss is to be properly prepared. With one of the following tools on hand, you’ll always be ready to save your data from the Reaper.
• The 10 Best U.S. Cities to Live and Work
  Personal finance site Kiplinger has released their annual list of the best cities in the United States to live and work. The key this year: It’s all about where you can find-and keep-a good job.
• Lifehacker’s Guide to Upgrading to Windows 7 RC
  Whether you want to set up a dual-boot system, you’re ready to migrate all the way to Windows 7 RC from XP, or something in between, here’s what you need to know.
• Clean Up and Revive Your Bloated, Sluggish Mac
  A few years back you dropped significant cash to switch over from the virus-laden world of Windows to a shiny new Mac, but over time it’s gotten slow and crufty.
• Top 10 Skills to Master Your Grill
  There’s something about grilling food outdoors that’s both exhilarating and terrifying. It’s great to commune with your food in such a straight-up way, but what if it goes wrong?
• Windows 7’s Best Underhyped Features
  We’ve run down the top 10 Windows 7 features and the best new features in the RC, but after using Windows 7 exclusively for a week straight, the real goods are in the small stuff.
• Google Wave “Is What Email Would Look Like If It Were Invented Today”
  Google announced today a new, experimental idea aiming to reshape the future of communication on the web. It’s called Wave, and if you believe its developer, it’s “what email would look like if it were invented today.” It’s also going to be totally open source. Intrigued?

When we last visited brewing the best possible coffee cheaply, many of you were amazed we didn’t mention the AeroPress. Check out this photographic guide to see what the fuss is about.

Lifehacker reader Richard wrote in to share a step by step AeroPress photo guide his friend had put together on Flickr. If you’re curious whether the $25 AeroPress is worth the hassle, these pictures are a pretty good gauge. The device is mechanically simple, with a plunger forcing boiling water through the compressed grounds in a filter at the end of a tube. It’s like a hybrid of a French press and a hand-powered espresso machine.

Many of your fellow readers swear by it, and this editor was impressed enough to order one. Because, really, how can you go wrong with a coffee maker made by the same company behind the world-record holding flying disc? Check out the guide on using the AeroPress at the link below to see it in action. The AeroPress is $25, and comes with enough filters for a year of daily use. Bulk replacement filters are a penny a piece. Thanks Richard!

If cappuccinos, lattes, and other espresso drinks are a big part of your disposable spending, you might enjoy roasting, tamping, and brewing your own beans at the perfect temperature. MAKE magazine has three free PDF articles explaining how to do just that.

Like many MAKE projects, these projects lend themselves to really taking your time and learning what it is you’re exactly doing—especially when you’re messing around with the wires and timing inside your espresso machine. But the results, and the feeling of made-it-myself satisfaction, probably speak for themselves. We’ve featured different takes on roasting your own beans before, including a popcorn popper modification and a heat gun setup, but MAKE’s tutorials are probably the most thoroughly illustrated and explained you’ll find around the net. Set aside some time and check out how to make your own coffee roaster, espresso tamper, and brew temperature controller. [via Serious Eats]

Most coffee flavorings are a mishmash of fake flavoring, preservatives, and sugar. Adding a little herbal tea to your French press coffee is cheap way to add natural flavoring.

Photo by stevenpolo.

We’re big fans of the French press coffee-making method, and judging by the comments on various coffee-related posts, many of you are too. It was the comments of several readers over the last few months, in fact, that inspired us to try using a French press to brew loose leaf tea. It turned out to be an excellent tea brewing tool, which in turn led to the next discovery. While boiling water for the press, I couldn’t decide if I wanted tea or coffee.

On an impulse, I decided to combine peppermint loose leaf tea with fresh ground coffee in the French press. The result was absolutely delicious. Experiments ensued, and peppermint, mint, cinnamon, and vanilla flavored herbal tea all blended well with coffee. The brew time for loose herbal tea is the same as French press coffee, so both get optimum steeping time. A few tips learned by trial and error: Peppermint coffee is delicious iced, cinnamon coffee is best served hot, and, so far, the best ratio seems to be 1 teaspoon of herbal tea to 4 teaspoons of ground coffee. If you try that ratio or one of your own devising, share the results in the comments to help refine it.

Your coffee grounds are good for a lot more than a liquid pick-me up, so before you trash the next batch, read on for ways to reuse them instead. Hint: a flea rinse is involved.

Photo by How can I recycle this.

According to Natural Home Magazine, the coarse texture of coffee grounds makes them ideal for scrubbing hard to clean dishes. Start by packing the grounds into a square sized cloth, then gather its ends and secure with a rubber band. This tip also works on tea bags.

If you’ve been chopping garlic or other fragrant foods, rub the grounds on your hands to eliminate the smell. Dropping some in your plants will help keep out garden pests.

You can also use diluted coffee grounds as a natural flea rinse on Fido—or try addding an egg white with 1/4 cup of grounds to make a well-deserved facial mask for yourself. We’ve covered some of these coffee-ground inspired ideas a couple of years back, but the Natural Home post offers a few more suggestions worth highlighting (check out the full post for more). If you’ve got any other DIY uses for old grounds, let us know about them in the comments.

Good news for those who get jitters, headaches, and really bad social graces when deprived of their caffeine fix—beating the habit and switching to a placebo can leave you feeling just as energized.

Photo by Kevin Lawver.

After dividing up 16 “regular caffeine users” (sounds so clinical!) into two groups, researchers gave half of them the equivalent of 20 ounces of strong coffee per day, while the other half thought they were getting the same fix. The big reveal is that everyone, getting real caffeine or fake, saw their brain getting more blood flow and activity, and the placebo crew felt just as awake or tired throughout the day as their temporarily lucky counterparts.

Unfortunately, the placebo takers also had unmistakable headaches and, temporarily, occasional decreases in alertness or energy. Once a heavy caffeine dependent got past their withdrawal symptoms, however, it appears their brain was happy to keep up the illusion that a caffeine-free beverage break at 3 p.m. was just as good as the real thing. Update: As a few commenters point out (some more helpfully than others), actual placebos are only as effective as the illusion that they’re the real thing, or just something helpful. So perhaps this is a trick best employed with a friend’s sneaky help, or by keeping yourself distracted enough with something else that the mere action of raising a mug to your lips activates your Caffeine Equals Waking Up impulses.

The full 13-page PDF study results are available at Springerlink (direct link). Tell us if you’ve had your own successful switch to a placebo, or quite the opposite, in the comments.

Good news for those who get jitters, headaches, and really bad social graces when deprived of their caffeine fix—beating the habit and switching to a placebo can leave you feeling just as energized.

Photo by Kevin Lawver.

After dividing up 16 “regular caffeine users” (sounds so clinical!) into two groups, researchers gave half of them the equivalent of 20 ounces of strong coffee per day, while the other half thought they were getting the same fix. The big reveal is that everyone, getting real caffeine or fake, saw their brain getting more blood flow and activity, and the placebo crew felt just as awake or tired throughout the day as their temporarily lucky counterparts.

Unfortunately, the placebo takers also had unmistakable headaches and, temporarily, occasional decreases in alertness or energy. Once a heavy caffeine dependent got past their withdrawal symptoms, however, it appears their brain was happy to keep up the illusion that a caffeine-free beverage break at 3 p.m. was just as good as the real thing. Update: As a few commenters point out (some more helpfully than others), actual placebos are only as effective as the illusion that they’re the real thing, or just something helpful. So perhaps this is a trick best employed with a friend’s sneaky help, or by keeping yourself distracted enough with something else that the mere action of raising a mug to your lips activates your Caffeine Equals Waking Up impulses.

The full 13-page PDF study results are available at Springerlink (direct link). Tell us if you’ve had your own successful switch to a placebo, or quite the opposite, in the comments.

We’ve previously offered some basic advice on storing coffee for a fresher, bolder-tasting cup of Joe. If you’re really into your coffee, though, a Starbucks co-founder has a seriously detailed guide for stashing your beans.

Photo by ReneS.

Jerry Baldwin agrees with Harold McGee and other foodie geeks/scientists that getting whole beans fresh from the roasters’ and holding at room temperature for a week or less is the ideal way to get a great cup. But that’s not a reality most of us grocery-buying citizens can easily slip into. So! The next best thing is to get whole beans from the freshest source possible, and then …

Use the freezer for longer storage. For example, if you bring home a pound of beans, divide it into weekly amounts to store separately. For this week’s coffee, leave it at cool room temperature or seal it and put in the refrigerator. The remaining weeks can be put into the freezer to be removed a week at a time.

Still, Baldwin, like Lifehacker commenter Mike Panic, can’t emphasize enough how great it can be to find a local coffee purveyor that roasts their own beans, and has honest, decent storage guidelines. And if you’re not sure just how old the beans you’re buying are, go ahead and ask.

Wanna go your own way? We’ve previously highlighted two means of rolling your own roaster—one involving that garage sale staple, the popcorn popper, the other utilizing a heat gun with finer control over the finished product.

Time for a quick look back at the posts you liked best last month. Among them: The newest Ubuntu gets rave reviews, marshmallows taught us about willpower, and we round up our favorite Firefox extensions.

• Learn Willpower Techniques from the Marshmallow Test
  Back in the 1960s, a researcher learned a lot about willpower from studying hundreds of four-year-olds left alone in a room with a marshmallow or cookie.
• Top 10 Must-Have Firefox Extensions, 2009 Edition
  Last time we compiled our must-have Firefox extensions, it was two years (and one browser version) ago. Our new list keeps some, tosses others, and remains our go-to, Grandmaster list of the best Firefox add-ons.
• Portable Ubuntu Runs Ubuntu Inside Windows
  Windows only: Free application Portable Ubuntu for Windows runs an entire Linux operating system as a Windows application. As if that weren’t cool enough, it’s portable, so you can carry it on your thumb drive.
• Top 10 Ubuntu Downloads
  The reviews are in, and the just-released Ubuntu 9.04, i.e. “Jaunty Jackalope,” rates as a slick, fully-formed Linux desktop.
• Top 10 Home Office Hacks
  Whatever kind of work you do at home, your office is one place you want to spend the time to make comfortable and convenient. Take 10 of our tips on organizing, fixing, and streamlining that space.
• Five Best Malware Removal Tools
  We asked you to share your favorite tool for purging malware from your computer. We’ve tallied the votes and we’re back with the top five contenders for best malware removal tool.
• Six Ways You Should Be Using Twitter (that Don’t Involve Breakfast)
  Twitter has become a nationwide phenomenon, and like any phenom, all the Twitter talk grows quickly tiresome. But despite what you may think, Twitter isn’t just for narcissists; it’s actually insanely useful.
• First Look at Ubuntu 9.04 Jaunty Jackalope
  The final release of Ubuntu 9.04 just hit servers, and award-winning Ubuntu author Keir Thomas takes a first look at what you can expect as a regular user.
• Top 10 Money-Saving Guides for Common Purchases
  The marketplace is an expensive place to get confused. Get more for your money when you buy laptops, air travel, eyeglasses, or other purchases with our roundup of thrifty buyers’ guides for common purchases.
• Avoid Unhealthy Junk with a Fast-Food Reality Check
  Everyone knows fast food is rarely the healthiest option when you’re looking for a quick bite, but sometimes photos look mouthwatering enough that you’re still convinced.
• Office 2010 Screenshots Preview What’s to Come
  Microsoft just pushed out Office 2007 Service Pack 2 this morning, but that doesn’t meant they’re not already hard at work on Office 2010, the next version of the popular Office suite.

Got a favorite Lifehacker post of your own from April? Let’s hear it in the comments.