Eggistentialism

I miss my husband. Lately we're just passing ships. He's been so busy taking additional courses for the life-suck also known as NCLB. I've bitched about it before. I'll bitch about it some more before it's all over I'm sure.

I've been busy keeping our toddler entertained or maybe it's the other way around. I love being with my little guy, don't get me wrong, but when I get the opportunity to go on a house call or do some freelance work, I jump at it. I neeeeeed to get awaaaaaay. STEP AWAY from THE CHILD. I need to go away where I can get the friggin Doodlebops songs out of my head!

I love to get in the car — just GET IN THE CAR, close the door, put my seatbelt on and drive off.

It's a nice change from: check the diaper bag to be sure it's packed and stocked with diapers, snacks that are something different than the previously disintegrating cheerios, cereal bits and crackers and oh gawd how long has this water been in this cup? Are those sea monkeys floating around in there? Lucian — bring me your shoes, we have to goooow — no, those don't fit you anymore — oh jeeze, how do you grow such huge rocks in your nose, that's just disgusting, could you please work on a diamond next time? Thanks. Come on! Let me brush your hair, it looks like birds abandoned their nest on your head. When did Flock of Seagulls get back together? What's that smell? Oh MAN! I just changed you 5 minutes ago and NOW the apple juice decides to work it's magic after 2 days? Ugh, come on, let's go, thank God these shoes don't have laces. Great, the diaper pail is full. Come on, yes you can help put the key in the lock, ok, ya know what sweetie, let me help you with that, yes, you must wear your sunglasses, ok you can close the gate, Thank you, such a big helper! (such a big, slow, methodical little perfectionist of a helper) No, come over to this side of the car, this is your door. Ugh! You're a piece of lead! Ok, this clips in here and that clicks and then this side clicks, errr, uh, ok, is that tight enough? Good. Here's your book, kiss kiss. Off we go! Yay! Car go vrooom vrooom! (tires go smokey smokey) (hah, in my dreams)

I've been taking on some more house calls lately because the snow birds are here. I like to take advantage of this opportunity to make some extra money for us since we plan on traveling out east this summer. I also just picked up some new clients since my evening class size more than doubled this year. It has been really really nice and I've made so many new friends so for that I am extremely grateful and happy. I just wish there was more freedom to do it more and make myself even more available. Needless to say, all this business in our lives has created a bit of a

divide

between the Mr. and I.

Lucky for us, we're soul mates so we're handling it as best we can.

Sometimes it helps to be a little creative.

We usually always keep hard-boiled eggs on hand because they make a good snack here and there. We usually hard boil half of the dozen eggs in a carton, so to keep the hard boiled eggs differentiated from the fresh, we always draw a little 'H' on the tops of all the eggs with a marker before putting them back into the egg carton.

I don't know what made me think to do this, but I started writing little love notes and messages on the bottoms of the eggs as I was marking them with an 'H.' I enjoy the opportunity now and again to use my fancy handwriting to pen an 'I love you' or our initials or 'You're the Best' and then put them back into the carton message side down. Hubby enjoys getting his little love notes this way — it's just something different and especially when he takes one off to school with his lunch for the day.

This past week, he decided to play along. I was delighted to find a half dozen hard-boiled eggs with little love notes scribbled on them. I was so proud of myself because I even resisted the urge to pick up each one and read it! Instead, I waited each day and looked forward to the next message.

Well, I just wanted to share that little story. I don't know if anyone else has ever done this, but I encourage you to try it sometime. It's fun and simple — low tech even! I think it would be fun for your kids' lunches too. Handwritten notes are always nice no matter what form. Once in a while I even put a post-it note on the door knob with a love note on it before going to bed so he sees it when he leaves in the morning.

I would like to know if you have any other creative ideas for putting a little somethin' somethin' in your marriage or relationship.

Share your ideas here in the comments. I'd love to hear about it and maybe try something new out on the Hubby. (or, since he reads my blog sometime, maybe a suggestion for him to try! Hey! Help me out here!!)

Who needs Valentines Day or Easter to enjoy some romantic egg notes?!

If you decide to participate, take pictures, email me or comment and tell me your story! Maybe you're looking for a way to propose to your girlfriend? Need to tell your husband you're pregnant? Write it out on the bottom of an egg. Just put the word "fertilized" on it and then ask him to go make you an egg sandwich or something. I would do this myself, except we already have a signal to let my husband know if I'm pregnant. I'll put the milk in the cupboard and the cereal box in the fridge. That's how we figured it out the first time!

Have Fun! Write notes!

Hand-Made Mac Tips

[Edit: I just updated this post and re-embedded a shortened version of the previous video. At 9 mins., I thought it was a little too long so I decided to shorten it by making the slides go a little faster. This one is now just under 5 minutes. I hope you like this version better. If you like a slower presentation, you can still find the original here.]

How to Toddler-Proof Your Mac
This is the first presentation in a series I'd like to call "Hand-Made Mac Tips."
This is a tutorial slide show video that shows you how to create and configure a separate user on a Mac which will protect your personal data from being damaged by curious little fingers. The presentation is just under 5 minutes long and guides you through a custom user account setup and configuration from start to finish. The slides move quickly so you may need watch it a second time and pause where necessary.




Intended Audience: parents, educators, early childhood administrators
Difficulty: moderate, time consuming (but well-worth it!)
Goal: After following these instructions, you will have a separate child-proof* user account on your Mac that you can switch to instantly in 2 clicks. You can then allow your young child (kindergarten and earlier) to explore your computer and use it as an educational tool without disrupting any of your important files. Please note that this new configuration will only help to protect your software. You still must work with the child to protect your hardware, i.e. monitor or laptop screen and keyboard.
Total Time: +/-20 minutes to watch video and follow along
What you will need: A Mac running OS 10.4 x 'Tiger,' some patience and understanding, toddler to test the configuration
Notes: Contact me via comments with any questions. I realize the text may be hard to read, so I recommend viewing the video via the YouTube site where you can enlarge it to full screen. There is no sound, just text and video. (This is my second attempt at making one of these.)
Additional Resources: Please visit www.themacmommy.com and check out my learning links section where you can find lots of great references to educational software for young children from all over the web. There are even some Windows-friendly links as well!

Please let me know what you think of this presentation and if you would like to see more like it. This is my first tutorial using this slide show method and I'm currently exploring other methods and formats. Any suggestions and ideas would help me make this a better resource.

I hope you find this useful. Any questions or comments, just ask TheMacMommy :)

*Author assumes no responsibility for loss of data or damage. Be wise and supervise children while using the computer!
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Rebel With A Cause, Baby!

I am pleased to announce my very first blog comment give-away!

Leave a comment and win a prize!
Look at this cool t-shirt my kiddo is wearing!
Wanna know where I got it?
Tired of the same old pink and blue?
Make a statement with something fun and new!
Launch the rebellion!
Click on the button below and check out Rebel Ink Baby!
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Wanna send a message to a loved one?
Have something to say?
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You can win your very own
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Here's the kiddo to show you your prize. Even he can't believe it!
It's shocking, but, yes, it's that easy!
Just enter a comment on my blog post here
and this adorable onesie and black pacifier can be yours!
The onesie has "100 percent orgasmically grown" printed on the front.
Wait till you see where they print their logo!
C'mon, you know it's true! Why not just tell it like it is?!
Win it for a friend or use it for a baby shower gift.
Win it because maybe you've never won anything.
Win it because I said so! Enter a comment just to make me feel good.

Here are some other images of the items inside the box pictured.

This contest will end on April 17th.
At that time, I will pick a random
comment and ship the prize out
within 2 business days.

Enter this contest because it's way more fun than doing your taxes!

Be sure to leave me some way of contacting you.
I'll need to know who you are and where to ship your prize.
If you have your own blog, I can usually get your email address from your link
if you've set it up so you don't have to display your email address if you don't want to.
You can also leave a comment and then email me directly to be sure I have your contact information. My email is: themacmommy (at) gmail (dot com).
(Be nice to me, no spamming please!)
Put "Rebel Ink Baby Give-away" in the subject line so I'll know it's not a spammer.

Good Luck!

I've Been Googled by Google

Did you know that it's someone's job at Google to spend time searching the web, i.e. 'googling' information posted about Google? Sounds like fun to me because I love to research. Well, someone was doing their job and found one of my blog posts interesting enough to contact me about it! How cool is that? I have to admit, it was very exciting to have received an email from someone who has "Google, Inc. Global Communications & Public Affairs" in their signature.

It's a good thing I check my junk mail folder regularly to see what it catches. I had to read the email twice because I thought it was spam at first. Then I realized, whoa! she really is talking to me! Cool! It turns out, Google is really interested and invested in learning about positive user experiences, so much so that they actually read blogs and contact people to talk to them. I just find that really really impressive. A year ago Yahoo! contacted me but it just wasn't the same. It wasn't a real person. It was a survey approach. That didn't go very far with me. Here's a secret: it's not going to go any further if M$ gets the deal.

She was particularly interested in my January review of Flickr vs Picasa. It seems like she's not alone as it's the most popular link referenced from my blog. I just find it amusing that so many people have taken an interest in it — for which I am extremely grateful. I really enjoy reviewing products and giving my most honest opinions. I appreciate it when others do the same. To me, it's the best and most entertaining form of marketing there is. I like to make educated decisions before investing any time, energy and money into any product simply because my time, energy and money are all on the short list these days. I need and want to do more reviews and I have many in the works. (Looking forward to Spring Break here and maybe I can crank out some more soon.)

So, we exchanged some emails and arranged for a phone call and then chatted for some time about my user experiences with Google products. She seemed to be very impressed with what I described to her about how I use Google apps on a regular basis in my personal and professional life. I think it may have even been a little overwhelming for her because I use so many of Google's products, I could just ramble on and on about it. I've been boasting for sometime now about how much I love Picasa web albums, but that's not the only Google product I use. I told her some other stories about times when I've used other Google apps and it sounded like she was really interested in knowing more. She wanted to know if I would be a case study for Google apps. Of course, I agreed so I'm looking forward to that, whatever that means I'm not completely sure but it sounds like fun, so I'm game.

I've lost track of how many times I've used a Google app for something useful, but now I sound like a total Google commercial. So, let me clarify. I am a very busy, fun-loving, sleep-chasing, insomnia-powered Mom/Wife/Instructor/Technology Coordinator/Blogger/Webpage-Layer-Outer/Graphic Artist/Daydreamer/Geek/Chick who likes to take advantage of technology tools in my [cough] spare time [cough]. If that technology helps me solve a problem, is fun, useful, intuitive and free (or really really inexpensive), I will use it and love it and feed it and tell people about it any way I can. I will even go as far as to test it and put it through the ropes and share a review and or recommendation. It doesn't have to be Google, but it should work on a Mac (because that's how I roll) and should also be able to be accessed by my PC-using friends on the receiving product end of the service.

I have to say though, I've played with a lot of Google stuff and I think there are some really great products that are worth sharing my experiences in hopes that someone else can achieve the same positive user experience I have. For me, Google products are the benchmark I use to compare other (web) products against. Google happens to be my sandbox of choice and I like to share my toys so come on over and build a sandcastle with me. (Queue up the Air Supply or Styx soundtracks now.)

So, people from Google are watching with their googly eyes and it's really exciting and I wanted to share that little tidbit. It's been motivating so I'm going to work on doing some more reviews and tutorials to share on this blog and on my website. I'd like to see what you think about some of the toys I've found and how they relate to some everyday issues, so please leave some comments when you can. Stay tuned for some new posts in the near future and thanks for checking me out. I really appreciate having a little bit of an audience and knowing my reviews could help someone learn something about technology.

To be continued...

Logo Tweak

It's been bugging me for a while now, so I've decided to tweak my logo. I haven't yet ordered business cards and my website and blog is only beginning to get some traffic, so I figure now is the time. There was just something about the space in between the 'T' and the 'he' in the 'The' that I didn't like. Plus, The top of the 'T' kind of reminds me of a tree top. So, to keep with the whole apple, apple tree, apple seeds = learning symbolism (which also works nicely with Apple products for which I am a major cheerleader), I decided to make the top arm of the 'T' green to reflect that feeling. I also decided to extend the 'Y' at the end of Mommy to make it more prominent. Lately as I've been giving out my email address, the question I always get is a rather silly one "that's mommy with a 'Y', right?" Well, I suppose you could spell Mommy with 'IE' as in Mommie, but that's just awkward, isn't it? Stranger things have happened. The other reason I wanted to tweak the 'The' was to make it a little more prominent as well since it's very important that the article 'The' be recognized or else you'll get the wrong Mommy on the internet. (just plain old macmommy was already spoken for in various forms from screen names to email and web address, so that's why I chose to put The in front of it, not because I'm a conceited know it all. I know about as much as any other Mommy knows out there so, and Mommy knows best, so take that however you want to.)

So here are the results. I'm just going to update my blog and take some time to reflect on it before updating my website and Twitter pages. I want to see if it grows on me. (I think the seeds still need some refining.) I'm really not super crazy about using red and green either, but it just works so well with the contrast. Green is very techie and the deep red is passionate, warm and highly visible. The two colors together are organic looking which is such a contrast to the technology I use. It also works because it goes with my philosophy of uniting people with technology. Well, I hope the new logo will be liked by others even though it's me who has to live with it.

New Logo:Old Logo:


[Edit] I've decided to edit this post to add a few more details about the logo design just because I'm waiting for 200 photos to finish uploading and can't really work on the next project till they are done.

Another subject I want to note in this post is about the fonts I chose to use. 'The' and '.com' as well as the tagline are set in Bossa Nova Plain. Bossa Nova is a highly stylized font so I don't intend to use it for much else except for maybe an accent in type design on other pieces. 'MacMommy' is set using Tekton Pro Bold. I had considered other fonts for this like Chalkboard, Marker Felt and dare I say even Comic Sans.

I couldn't bring myself to use Comic Sans though because I have a thing against M$ and that is a M$ font. It just wouldn't be true to my Mac roots if I used it for my logo design. In my warped little mind, it feels almost sac religious to use it in any design when I'm discussing the Macintosh platform. The only reason I even considered it is because it's a very popular font among those in the teaching field. I do currently use Comic Sans as the text font on my website only because it's readily available on PC and Mac so the chances of having it load properly to view as I intended it are high. My intended target audience for that website is really parents and educators and so Comic Sans is a font their eye is accustomed to viewing when it relates to an educational resource. I don't have too much of a problem using it for body copy or even my email signature because it is cross-platform, but for my logo or something that I personally identify with, no, I won't use it.

There is a time and place for certain fonts. Different fonts are appropriate for different pieces of a design. Some function better than others and some flow with a theme better. Overall, readability is my main concern.

I decided to go with Tekton ultimately because it was a more technical looking font yet still has an organic feel to it. (Makes sense since it was originally created for use with architectural design.) The original Tekton family as well as the newer Adobe Tekton Pro release shows promise and expandability for using it with larger amounts of body copy or text since there are several weights available. I'm still experimenting with different fonts for larger amounts of text, so the colophon is still in development.

First Screencast

Ok, so I have been messing around with this free app called Jing. Everyone knows I like free (mommy geek on a tight budget) otherwise I would love to use SnapzProX but I can't yet spare the 70 clams to purchase it. Plus I just want to practice my hand at this whole screencasting thing before committing to it. I teach classes using a projector and this method, so I thought why not record some video and create an archive for my students to sort through. So here is my very first screencast for your viewing enjoyment...or not.

Right now, I am messing around with this post because for some reason I can not intuitively figure out how to get the resolution scaled down. The video is way too large. Not to mention the file size is honkin huge. I tried tinkering with the code, but I have no clue what I'm doing in there. I tried changing some of the sizes but then the video container box got small but the rest of the video remained large. I'll keep investigating this.

I've tried creating several different versions on the same theme but I really don't like my voice. Well, my voice isn't horrible, but I have to work on the uhhhs and places where I screw up. Maybe I need to write a script or just practice a little more first. The other thing is that I'm using the built in microphone and so you can hear my fans running and my fingers hitting the keys. I discovered I'm a very heavy hitter when it comes to typing. So, I decided to forgo the whole sound thing and find a way to get instructions in there. Watch for yourself and see what you think.

This is not what I would pick for a final, but I wanted to at least start testing how posting this sort of thing to my blog might work out. I welcome any comments or feedback if anyone knows more about this stuff. I would loooove to learn how to do this better. It seems like a lot of fun and I really want to teach people how to do things visually.

[Edit] I ended up abandoning Jing for the time being to try out Screenflick. I really like it. I'll post more on it later but for now, I wanted to test it some more by replacing the prior Jing screencast with this Quicktime movie. Testing here to see if the code embeds the movie in a nicer size. I think the file size is larger though. Will work on reducing that but for now, I'm just embedding the code.

[Edit] I had to remove the embedded code because it made the page load way too slow. Clicking the link in the post title should go to the file where I uploaded it.

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