So back in the beginning of January, I talked a bit about the things I was looking to change, create, or get rid, of in my post about my resolutions.  One of the first things I did was go see the doctor and I’m mostly on track with that – I may have had a bad day yesterday, but mostly on track and I’m happy with my progress on that front.

The second thing I’ve been working on is creativity – I talked in the first post about figuring out what makes my heart sing and taking pictures does that.  I don’t know that I’d want to be a pro, but I love taking pictures of the events that we go to, of the field trips we take, the food we eat, etc.  I have to admit that I was not much of a photographer when you had to go develop film, but since digital photography became affordable, I have been all over it – I got my first digital camera in 1999.  Back in December, I went on a photo walk with local photographer, Kent Weakley after having taken one of his online courses.  I really enjoyed the course – but there were some things I just didn’t quite get, so I thought that taking the walking class I’d have the opportunity to ask him about the things that confused me. You see, I’ve really been trying to “up my game” when it comes to taking pictures and I was getting frustrated that I couldn’t figure some things out.  Kent was great, he really took the time to figure out what my problem was and he was so nice about it.  In the end, it turned out that my camera (a high end point and shoot) was still auto focusing even when I was telling it not to.

I have to tell you, I was so relieved that it wasn’t me! I knew then and there that it was time to finally take the plunge and get a DSLR.  I did tons of research about Nikons and Canons and in the end I decided that the Canon was the one I wanted.  I went to stores and held them all, played with the features, really got the feel.  I loved the way the Rebel felt, but I was really confused about kits. I came across on article on The Pioneer Woman’s site by Miz Booshay about kits and the lenses that usually come with them and I knew that I needed the 50mm f/1.8 lens – I want to play with bokeh and take soft portrait shots with shallow depths of field and I got the impression that this was a great lens to start with.

Pretty, right?

Ok, so I knew I wanted this one – but I also wanted a lens for walking around and landscape and event photography, with a zoom.  I polled everyone I knew, in real life, on Facebook, Twitter, and everyone talked about buying the 18-135 or 18-200 mm.  the 18-200 was out of my price range, but there was a kit that had the 18-135.

Even Prettier!

Hmm..

The problem, however – is that this was going to cost me about eleventy billion dollars. Ok, just under $1100.00.  Still – I don’t have that kind of money lying around.  Not to be deterred, I sold everything I owned that we weren’t using;  all the old iPods, iPhones, cameras, homeschool curriculum, anything that was fetching a couple of bucks on eBay and then Jim got an unexpected bonus and gave it to me, so that I didn’t have to wait for all the money to clear before ordering the camera.

I ordered the camera and not one penny came out of our household finances.  Yay!

I received the camera yesterday and I’m blown away by the features and photographs it takes. I can’t wait to get out and start taking pictures – as of now, I’ve taken pictures of my living room, just to lock in my memory where each of the settings are and what they do.  I’m a little intimidated by the camera, but I know that once I start shooting I’ll be much more comfortable.  There are hundreds of online groups and challenges and I’m thinking I might start with this one:

Kelly Moore Bag: 2 Sues Bag from kelly clark on Vimeo.

Are you doing any photography challenges or groups?  Want to connect and share your photos with me?  I’m on Flickr.

P.S. If you’re in the market, make sure to check B&H Photo – they had the best prices on the camera and lenses I was researching.
P.P.S Extra points if you can name the film from which I blatantly stole the title.

For Christmas my husband got me something that I absolutely love to receive.  An iTunes gift card.  It really is still one of my favorite presents to receive.  And.  He got me a nice, big one so that I don’t feel guilty buying app after app after app – which?  Is exactly what I’ve been doing. I thought I’d share some of them as I go through and test them out.

First one up is “Big Lens” from Reallusion (.99).

I was drawn to this app because of it’s “shallow depth of field” settings. I’ve been slightly obsessed with the Bokeh effect and had absolutely no luck with it.  I have a high end point and shoot, but there’s no way to turn off the auto focus, even when you set it to manual.  (boo!) This has led to me selling everything I own in order to buy myself a Canon Rebel T3i.  I should have it by February, but in the meantime, I’ve been forced to do without little heart, star, or snowflake shaped twinkling lights.  I know!  So not fair.

Anyway, this app has some really nice effects and is very easy to use. Let me walk you through a little of it.

Open the app and then load the image you want to work with:

This is the ferris wheel on the Ocala Downtown Square – I took this picture during a photowalk led by Kent Weakley (He has great information and a really relaxed, comfortable style of teaching.  He offers classes online too if you’re not lucky enough to live in Ocala =) I used a shutter speed of, I think 4 seconds.  I’m really enamored of this effect too.

Now what I want to do is blur everything, except the ferris wheel, which I want to be the focus of the shot.  So, I select the parts of the photograph that I want to exclude from the blur filter. Just using my finger I draw along the wheel.

When I’m happy with what I’ve blocked out, I simply touch the right arrow button in the top right corner…  and presto – the background is blurred.

Then I touch the “lens” button and I’m presented with the different shapes to choose from.

I decide on the starbursts and then mess around with the aperture until I’m happy with the way it looks.

Next, I started playing with the filters – there really are quite a few here – below is one of the flare filters…

I kind of like the way the flares mirror the ferris wheel..

I really liked the light ray filter, also. (I love those religious pictures with beams from the sky, too… hmmm)

And then you can increase or decrease the intensity of the filter.

And then I decided to make it snow…

There were really so many choices and I played with this for hours – The app is so easy to use, you literally don’t need any experience with taking these photographs and while they don’t look as absolutely wonderful as if we had created this shot in the camera, it’s pretty neat.

Disclosure: I liked this app so I thought I’d share.  I received no compensation.

I love a good organizer.  Or a calendar, or a to do list, and check boxes, how I love checkboxes!  And color coded tabs?  Be still my heart! So when I read about 2Do: Tasks Done in Style, I knew I had to check it out.  At $6.99 it’s a little bit pricier certainly than a lot of organizer apps, but I really think this one was worth every penny.  The interface is gorgeous.  The tabs for your different calendars can be dragged and dropped, colors changed and even toggled invisible or password protected. Right now I’m working on grouping similar calendars together and doing gradient colors so that they span a spectrum, but that’s just me.

In your main window, you have the list of whatever calendar you’re on.  This happens to be the “All” option, which shows all your upcoming or past due entries. The calendar to the right is only available in landscape mode.  Below that, there’s a summary of what’s coming up.

Along the bottom bar, are your settings, tags, syncing options etc. There are a couple of options with syncing.  You can download their free 2do helper if you want to sync with your desktop.  There are also Toodledoo options as well as iCloud syncing. (I’m using  iCloud). I’ve installed the app on my iPad as well as my iPhone and it’s super easy to sync wherever you are.  I tried the desktop sync, but when I was out, I obviously couldn’t sync and that bugged me a little, so iCloud was the best option for me.

Within the app you can make checklists or projects and I have a couple of projects that I’m working on.  They all fall under the “Creative” calendar.  You’ll see that there’s a brief case in front of each of my projects.  The number after is the amount of steps that I have left to do within the project.  Let’s look at one.

Under “Paint Office”, you’ll see that I have a couple of steps necessary to complete the project, that I check off as they’re completed, but also the right sidebar has changed.  This is where the app really shines. I can add notes, alarms, times, start dates, due dates, change the calendar that it’s under, and lots more. There’s also a recurring feature that can handle even complicated recurrences (Third Tuesday, etc.).  You can add audio, pictures, really making this a robust tool for planning.

I love planning, have I mentioned that?

There’s also a Today calendar which shows you all of your items due today or starting today which makes things really manageable on a daily basis.  This is particularly good for “honey do” chores – Jim has one day off a week, so if there’s anything I need him to help me with it’s simple to keep that handy.

And yes, that does say “adjust toilet”.  Jim replaced the master bath toilet seat with a new, fresh,  comfy one, but didn’t tighten it all the way – so I always feel like I’m falling.  I kept forgetting to ask him to adjust it.  This week, I had my organizer remind me and now no one is sliding around.

One of the coolest things is the “Nearby” feature. Enabling locations allows you to place things on a map and when you’re out, you can check your nearby feature and see if you’re forgetting anything. I hadn’t set anything up that was near my house when I was creating this review, so there’s a beautiful shot of my roof.

I’m really pleased with this app. It wasn’t too pricey, and the features are really worth the cost.

Full disclosure: I didn’t receive anything for this review, I just liked the app and thought you might too.

Everyone seems to be giving up their land lines, but I just don’t seem to be able to do that.  I’m on the phone far too often for too long (sometimes over three hours a day!) to gobble up all my minutes allowed on my cell phone plan.  I switched my land line to my internet/TV provider to save some money, but my phones were really old and really beat up.  Also, the new phone company charges extra for voice mail, so my sorry excuse of a home phone would just ring and ring and ring.  That’s a little bit of a problem when my children are enrolled in virtual classes and their teachers call sporadically to check in with them.  I would wind up scrolling through the caller ID multiple times a day to see who I’d missed. Yeah.  Not really the most advanced set up and for someone who prides themselves on the advanced technology in her life, it was a little embarrassing. So, when I received this opportunity to review the  VTech LS6475-3 Multitasking phone system, I was so excited!

I got the package and unwrapped all pieces, set it up and plugged it in – the directions recommend allowing it to charge for 10 hours and I’ve learned the hard way to pay attention to charging instructions.  When it was ready to go, I unplugged my old system and connected the new one to the phone line. I started playing with the settings and set up the voice mail and it was all so simple, but I was really surprised at the clarity when I’m on a call. It was absolutely crystal clear.

Another really neat feature is that ability to have the caller ID announced verbally – no more looking for a handset to see who’s calling, it just announces the caller ID.  If the caller is already in your phone book, it over rides the caller ID and announces your phone book listing.  The kids and I are having a load of fun with that, coming up with silly nicknames for everyone in my phone directory.  Now, every time the phone rings and it’s someone we know, we all giggle. Yes, we’re quite silly.

We’ve now been using the phones for about a week and I’m very pleased.  Making holiday calls this year will be an absolute pleasure.

Did you know?

In a new survey conducted by independent market research firm Toluna on behalf of leading U.S. cordless phone manufacturer, VTech® Communications, a wholly owned subsidiary of VTech Holdings Ltd. (HKSE: 303), 45 percent of respondents said a phone call to catch up is the best present a distant friend or family member could give them during the holiday season. In fact, a phone call outpaced gifts under the tree, holiday cards and emails.

I wrote this review while participating in a campaign by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of VTech and received a product sample to facilitate my review.

Moby has come out with a free app for iPhone, iPad and Blackberry (Android coming soon – get on the pre-registration list for notification!) that is a private location sharing service – meaning that you decide who sees the information.  Very much like other location sharing apps in its ease of use, the big difference here is the privacy.  This?  Is such a great idea I can’t believe no one thought of it before now.

I have teenaged children and they’re venturing out into the world without me, much more than ever before. My oldest will be driving soon and this just makes a world of difference for my own peace of mind.  With Moby’s app, they can check in with me to let me know where they are, check in when they’re leaving so that I know to expect them and with the privacy settings, no one can see these check ins except the people that they’re shared with. Brilliant.

I downloaded the app and set it up on my phone and had the rest of my family do the same.  It was extremely simple to set up and then I imported the contact information of the people I wanted to try this with (my husband, kids and my Dad in NYC just because I’m nosy and he goes to some really cool places). A couple of taps and I was all set up.

Watch the video and you’ll see just how simple this is.

Such a smart app. I think my favorite feature is the ability to ask someone to check in.  You know how kids (or husbands) can forget to check in, or make an unscheduled stop, causing them to take longer and making you worry? (Hi Jim!)  Well, with this, you can request (or demand, depending upon how worried you are) a check in with a couple of clicks.

To learn more about the product, visit their site and read about how they specifically tailor the features for families.  Honestly, I can think of a whole bunch of ways to use this app – meeting with your playgroup, scheduling an outing or field trip to make sure everyone knows where to go and is on time – and the most important – safety. Really well done.  I know we’ll continue to use this app and in August they’re expecting to release a new version with even improved efficiency for battery life.

I wrote this review while participating in a blog tour by Mom Central Consulting on behalf of Moby and received a promotional item to thank me for taking the time to participate.