A Few of my Favorite Mom Apps

May 30, 2013

written by Cathy Baker, mom of two sweet tweens, who couldn’t even name half the things in the photo below

I saw this photo on a friend’s facebook page awhile back, and again on pinterest recently.  How far our world has come with technology is amazing.

A smartphone really is smart.

It has de-cluttered our lives.

It is also quite a financial deal when you think about all the electronics it replaces.

And yet it slightly scares me how much of my life is wrapped up into this tiny little device. This device that could so easily be lost, stolen, or dropped in a puddle.

But I do enjoy all those fun little things called apps! I have an iphone, so I know the following are definitely available through itunes, and may, or may not, be available for other smartphones.

TimeHop — My newest favorite app. When you open it up, it says, ‘let’s time travel‘ — and that’s exactly what it does.  This app will take a look at the history of your twitter, facebook, instagram and other social media accounts. It will then post all the things you have previously posted this day in history.  I have loved going down memory lane for a brief moment every day!

Countdown apps – Chose any day in your future and it will count down the days, hours, minutes, seconds for you.  We do this for upcoming trips. Last day (or first day) of school. Upcoming birthdays. I even have my daughters’ 18th birthdays in here – because it’s a subtle reminder for me to cherish these days, because they are indeed, numbered days. I also put in my husband’s retirement eligibility date.  Several different countdown apps available.

Find My iphone – If you are an ifamily – you definitely need this app.  Set up all your devices.  Your kid lost their ipod? Just page it and an alarm will sound on it until you find it (as long as it still has power) – this has saved us hundreds of minutes searching. And if (or when) your kids are driving…you can pull up their iphone and it will show you exactly where they are at, it even shows them driving down the road! It’s the ultimate spy gear for today’s parents! 🙂

RedStamp — I’ve just recently been playing around with this, but I really like the concept.  It lets you use your photos to create cards you can text, email, etc — or they will actually print up a real postcard and mail it for only $1.99! Like I said, I haven’t tried it yet, but I think this would be fun to try on our next vacation to send a postcard to the grandparents!

White Pages — It’s a phone book for the entire United States! Need I say more?! I also like that you can just click a button and it adds phone numbers and addresses automatically to your contacts!  It searches home addresses, businesses, and it will do a reverse number/address lookup too!

 

ShopKick –  My sister uses this app a lot!  In less than 5 months, she has already earned $20 free cash to both Target and Best Buy.  And all you have to do is open this app when you walk into the store to get free points. When you get enough points, you get free cash to stores!! woohoo!

Cozi — What I love about this family calendar is that it will show up on all of our devices, iphones, ipods, computer!  We can look at everyone’s schedule and add new dates wherever we are at. It color codes each member of the family.  I love that if I need to schedule something, I can see if my husband already has a commitment that day or not. I automatically put all our doctor appointments in the phone while I’m standing at the checkout desk. And if you have the same commitment week after week, it will automatically repeat it for you, so you only have to put it in once! It has a lot of other options too, like to do lists, shopping lists, journal — all that can be shared between family members.

I will save all my favorite photo, store, and game apps for another article!

So.much.fun…So.little.time.

If you still don’t have a smartphone, don’t forget about this great deal Heidi wrote about a few weeks ago: Straight Talk Wireless.

And if you wan’t some more great apps for kids, check out Sarah’s article from last Spring.

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Category: Random and Fun
Tags: apps, smartphones |