Here's a neat coding project recently posted over at http://blogs.msdn.com : http://www.theserverside.net/blogs/showblog.tss?id=BuildProviders
If I were you I'd take a project or concept you're really interested in and think of a way to build a great application on it. Or whats a task that you do often that could be automated? Automation programs are nice. Ever sit around wishing you had a program that did such and such? well write it.
Thats how many small projects get started. At work we couldn't find a system that fully integrated help desk tickets with code changes in a project with automated build deployment across multiple servers and the verification that those files were the only files that changed on the servers that day. And don't forget source control, and logging of what developer did what when and why. So you know what, i wrote it.
Thats what we programmers do. We solve problems with code.
What about a program that you use frequently that's missing a feature you really want? Write that feature.
You could perhaps create a database that would contain all types of information about a user's friends and family. When they recieve an IM from the person, a side bar would pop up with a picture, name, phone, address, web sites, last five emails, and last five IM conversations. It would give you a chance to use some interop components, a database, and write a gui and all yourself.
Just some ideas....
