I like and use Things for my to-do list. It works well for larger projects, and changing tasks. When it comes to household chores, however, I try (not always successfully) to follow the Flylady philosophy, which is all about breaking your chores into small tasks, and working on larger chores for no more than fifteen minutes at a time. Oh and shining your sink before you go to bed, of course. For most of the to-do apps out there, that would mean entering a whole lot of stuff every day, which would take more than fifteen minutes for sure.
HomeRoutines, while not an official Flylady app, follows the same basic philosophy. Everything is fully customizable, so you can create your own morning and evening routines. Zones for the week can also be edited, and the room names can be changed, as well as the tasks associated with them. So I may not have a dining room, but I do have a shed that is sometimes referred to as “the black hole”, so I can easily rename the dining room the black hole, and replace dining room tasks with shed tasks
Once you set up your routines for morning, evening, and weekly tasks, you just tap each task as it is completed and get a gold star! If you’re feeling like you haven’t gotten anything done, just go look at your Accomplishments, and all your gold-star tasks will be there. At the end of the day, you can clear all your stars, and your lists will be ready for you tomorrow.
There’s also space for additional to-do tasks for the day, as well as notes for every day of the week. And of course, there’s a fifteen minute timer that plays a fanfare when time is up! Gold stars and fanfares might sound a little cheesey, but they really are motivating, and that triumphant music made me smile when I heard it go off.
This app works just perfectly for me. I work full-time, so the Flylady email reminders sometimes make me tense. If I’m sitting at my desk, I can’t exactly go put in a load of laundry or clean the cobwebs from the bedroom ceiling, and I can’t always remember all those little tasks by the time I get home in the evening. The only thing missing from HomeRoutines are 27 fling boogies and hotspot fire drills. It would be great if I could schedule events like those for the hours I’m home, and have them send me push notifications.
More control journal than to-do app, HomeRoutines is more about checklists and developing habits than sending you nagging reminders that can leave you feeling more overwhelmed than motivated. Even if you’re not an avid Flybaby, HomeRoutines will help you keep up with all those mundane little chores, and keep your home looking company-ready at all times. Set up is quick and easy, and once you’ve customized your routines and zones, all you have to do is open the app and tap those gold stars as you get things done. HomeRoutines is well-worth its $4.99 price, and earns five jars of applesauce!
Many thanks to HomeRoutines for kindly supplying an app code for this review!
Posted in productivity, review.
Tagged with checklist, chores, Flylady, home, HomeRoutines, routines.
By marne
– March 13, 2010
If you are a wearer of t-shirts, this is a fun one! Threads is the app for the Threadless website, home of the hippest hipster tees. Even for the non-hip, like myself, Threadless has a lot of funny and unique designs on their shirts, and it’s entertaining just to browse the images. They are a community-based design website, so anyone can join and contribute their designs. Which means that there really is something for everyone.
The Threads app is just as fun to browse as the website, and when you find a design you like, you can tap the $ to go to the website in Safari and purchase it. You can also tap the camera icon, and capture the screen and use the design as your home screen wallpaper. Bonus!
You just never know when you might need to shop for a new t-shirt, and with Threads, you’ll be able to do so, any time, anywhere.
Posted in fashion, free nonsense.
Tagged with shop, threadless, Threads, tshirt, wallpaper.
By admin
– March 12, 2010
There are a bunch of conversion apps out there, and having one on my iPhone is much more convenient than I ever imagined. I really like the Convert app. The design is perfect; using a scrolling wheel you choose what sort of measurement you want to convert. Then you select the unit types you are converting to and from, and enter the number using the keypad.
Convert has thought of every possible measurement you could use: besides the usual weight, volume, and area, they’ve also got currency (updated every few seconds, so you see the most current exchange rate), energy, force, typography and many more.
There’s also a built in calculator and the ability to copy the results of a conversion calculation and paste that number, along with the unit of measure, elsewhere on your phone.
Amazingly, Convert is just 99 cents. I think it’s a must have for your iPhone. I can’t imagine a better, more elegant solution for all your conversion needs!
Posted in honorable mention, review, utility.
Tagged with conversion, Convert, elegant, measurements.
By marne
– March 11, 2010
Taken with GorillaCam, edited with The Best Camera
Are my pictures too rural? I feel like I should have more gritty, urban scenes on a blog about technology. Or maybe I will just embrace the paradox of feeding the chickens while checking my email.
Posted in a photo a day.
Tagged with chickens, Gorillacam, The Best Camera.
By marne
– March 10, 2010
When I heard about the fCards app, my first thought was, “Really? Do we actually need another cheesey postcard app?” Well, it turns out there’s always room for one more, especially one that’s as well-designed, and easy to use as fCards. I’ll be honest, I don’t really send email postcards, but I do regularly send photos to friends and family. Using this app, I can add a message right on the photo itself, or on the back, like a, well, postcard.
Creating a postcard takes just a few seconds. Tap the camera to select an image or take a photo. If you don’t have any suitable iphone photos available, the app has one of the nicest selections I’ve seen. Tap the grid in the lower left corner to narrow your choices by category, or choose All. Just scroll through the photos on the main screen until you find one you like.
Next you can add a personal greeting by tapping the text and replacing it with your message. Drag it around the screen to position it, and tap the T square to change the font. fCards has five really nice fonts to choose from. You can change the color from black to white. Then just flip the card over with the blue arrow, and fill in the back of the postcard. You can email it or send it to facebook.
There are a few things I would like to see, however. It would be nice to be able to pinch and zoom on the text to change it’s size. A color picker for the text would also be nice, rather than just black and white. I’d also like to be able to move my own photos around, and zoom to make them fit. Most of my images are portrait, rather than landscape, but the app only works in landscape mode, so when I use an image with a portrait orientation, it’s inserted so that it’s upright, but therefore much smaller and only covering one side of the card. You can tap it to move it from one edge to the other, but can’t position it anywhere in-between.
I have been looking for a way to add text to my photos with a nice font, so I really like this app for that. If you are an email postcard sender, this is a really nice app, and worth the very reasonable $1.99 price tag. I’m going to give it three jars of applesauce!
Thank you to fStop for kindly providing an app code for this review.
Posted in photography, review.
Tagged with fCards, photos, postcards.
By marne
– March 10, 2010
Taken with GorillaCam, edited with Lo-Mob. I think this was the Postcard 3 filter.
The storm clouds are finally starting to break up and let the sun through. It was quite dramatic.
Posted in a photo a day.
Tagged with clouds, drama, Gorillacam, lo-mob, sun.
By marne
– March 9, 2010
I don’t know if I can really recommend that you download this app. It’s just killing me. See that puppy? How cute is she? If you tap the Details button, you can read all about her, and ohmygosh, I want to take her home right now, and I’m not even all that crazy about little dogs. She sounds so sweet, and she’s blind. Blind! Are you crying yet?
Okay, back to the app; Petfinder is free, and it works just like the website. It will search with a zip code, or use your current location. Choose to look at dogs, cats, or other. You can further narrow your search by breed, age, gender and size.
If you’re looking for a new pet, Petfinder is the way to go. It will save you from driving to every shelter in town, and help narrow down your search. Many of the pets have detailed information about their past and temperament. All contact information is included, so you can call or e-mail the shelter or rescue organization to learn more, and hopefully make an appointment to meet your new pet!
Petfinder is a great little app, easy to use and really nice looking. It can take awhile for your search results to fully load, but you can start browsing as soon as the first page is visible. So, go give a deserving pet a new home!
Posted in free nonsense.
Tagged with cats, dogs, Humane Society, Petfinder, pets.
By marne
– March 9, 2010
I know this isn’t an app, but if you’re looking for some new music for your iPod, I recommend this ep, and not just because the artist is my brother. I promise, it’s good, you won’t regret the download or spending the $3.96!
Here’s a little more about Cary, in his own words:
“From the time I was very young, I knew that I was here to be a musician, and I am always up to the challenge of creatively bettering myself with each new song and project,” says Judd. “I’ve learned over the years that there’s no substitute for a great song, because a great song is something anyone can listen to and has universal truth. It can be deep and personal yet the average person can say, ‘I know what that guy or girl is going through. Now that I’m really where I want to be as a writer and artist, my goal is to expand beyond the regional touring I’ve done and develop into an artist whose songs are heard and appreciated throughout the country. I’m grateful that I’ve been able to make a living purely from making and performing music for many years and it’s freeing, and I am at peace, just knowing that I’m doing what I am supposed to be doing.”
Posted in music.
By marne
– March 9, 2010
Taken with GorillaCam, edited with Photoshop Mobile and Tiltshift Generator.
Spring is coming! I found this while out for a quick lunch-hour walk.
Posted in a photo a day.
Tagged with flower, Gorillacam, Photoshop Mobile, spring, Tiltshift Generator.
By marne
– March 8, 2010
I like and use Things for my to-do list. It works well for larger projects, and changing tasks. When it comes to household chores, however, I try (not always successfully) to follow the Flylady philosophy, which is all about breaking your chores into small tasks, and working on larger chores for no more than fifteen minutes at a time. Oh and shining your sink before you go to bed, of course. For most of the to-do apps out there, that would mean entering a whole lot of stuff every day, which would take more than fifteen minutes for sure.
