The iPhone Mom

I’ve got ten easy tweaks that I’ve done to make my iPhone work for me and my mom life. Today I’m going to list the first five.

1. I got rid of the “Sent from my iPhone” message that shows up by default at the end of every email sent out from the iPhone. Did you know that was there?? You can customize what goes at the end of your emails in Settings. Tap the settings button, then “Mail, Contacts, Calendars”. Scroll down until you see “Signature”. Tap that and type in whatever you want to say. My signature is simply my first name but maybe I’ll shake that up one of these days.

2. I customized the apps that show up in the bar at the bottom of the screen. The ones that will be there when you purchase your phone are Phone, Mail, Safari and iPod. You can’t delete any of these factory installed apps but you can move them around. To do this hold down on the app icon in the bar that you’d like to move. Wait for it to start wiggling and then drag it to it’s new spot. Now you’ve got a free space at the bottom of your screen. Tap and hold on the app you want to move and drag it down to the bottom space. Because this bar shows up on every iPhone screen I like to keep the bottom space reserved for apps I use constantly. As of today they are Phone, Mail, Edibles and iPod. Although I’m not using Edibles as often as I should, it’s mostly there to induce guilt.

3. I arrange the rest of my apps according to what they’re used for and how often they’re needed. The apps I use most frequently are on my home screen. The next few screens are for apps that I use less frequently. Then I’ve got the ones for my kids grouped together. I’ve found that if I do this my kids are less likely to rearrange the apps themselves. Before iTunes 9 came along rearranging apps was a big, fat pain. Now that you can do it within iTunes it’s much easier. This link will take you to my previous explanation of how to make that work for you.

4. Since my kids are on my iPhone fairly regularly I’ve set up some restrictions as to what shows up. I’ve gotten rid of You Tube and disabled the installing of apps from the phone. I’ve also set up ratings for the music and podcasts that are allowed to be played. I don’t have restrictions on the ratings for TV Shows and Movies but that’s only because the videos on my phone are mostly for my kids anyway. If I did have a movie that I didn’t want them to see I’d set up the ratings and simply disable it when I wanted to watch. You can also set ratings for the apps allowed on your phone. When I originally did this I set it to not allow apps for 17+. I’m embarrassed to admit that I then spent over an hour trying to reinstall the Facebook app because it had disappeared. I’d download it and install it but it was nowhere to be found! It finally dawned on me that the app wasn’t showing up because it was rated 17+. So learn from me! Some apps have that rating because they have the potential to display material rated 17+ and they’ll be blocked whether they ever show that content or not. Because of this I don’t have restrictions set up for my apps. I wrote a post explaining more about Restrictions when the new OS 3.0 originally came out.

5. If your kids are on your iPhone at all then you know how quickly they can drain a battery! To conserve battery life you can turn off blue tooth, push notifications, and Wi-Fi, lower the brightness of your screen and lower the time until your Auto-Lock kicks in. I plug my phone in every night and generally about halfway through the day too. It is my only phone so I’ve got to keep it charged. Read more of my thoughts on this here.

Come back tomorrow for part two of my list!

The family and I have been earning Lego studs right and left as we try out the first Rock Band game I’ve dared bring in the house. Read how it’s gone.

Whirl’d has been on my iPhone for a little over a week and my son’s been playing it every time he “borrows” my phone. He’s been telling me how much he likes it and that he’s one this level or that and as I’ve been listening to him I’ve thought if the five year old is doing so well then I should have noooo trouble. Beware such thoughts.

The idea behind Whirl’d is to use your finger on the iPhone screen to spin a wheel that is filled with characters called Whirls. You then shoot another Whirl, trying to hit others of the matching color. Match them up and they’ll disappear. When all the Whirls are gone the level will be cleared. There are 99 different levels and they increase in difficulty with obstacles and enemies. The game begins easily enough but becomes increasingly tricky and I soon found myself outmatched. However, that’s not saying much because: 1. My gaming skills are not exactly stellar and 2. I find it hard to play games that involve spinning and movement on the screen. The motion makes me sick to my stomach and after awhile the spinning Whirl’d wheel got to me.  I’m taking this as a sign that the developers have succeeded in making the app’s spin motion very realistic. My son has had no problem with any motion sickness and he’s loved being Whirl’d around.

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: Play This! Studios

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this app for review purposes.

A while ago I posted about how excited I was to see the Lego video game folks joining forces with the Rock Band empire. We’ve never brought Rock Band or Guitar Hero into the house because I’m not a big fan of the avatars and the lyrics in many of the songs weren’t great for our kids. It seemed like each version would have a handful of songs we were okay with,  but overall this wasn’t worth the purchase.  So when I took to my site and proclaimed my excitement over the thought of Lego Rock Band the PR company behind the game read about it and asked me if my family would like to review it. This was a pretty easy decision but the difficult part came when I let the news slip to my kiddos. We had several weeks where my trips to retrieve the mail ended with interrogations over when the game would arrive.

It finally came a little over a week ago and we’ve been doing a very thorough job of  testing it out. The game is sold alone, not bundled with any instruments but my husband was thrilled to have an excuse to go out and make that purchase. I’m sure they’re selling the game on it’s own because they figure most everyone already has the instruments but I’ve got to imagine that there are some folks like us who haven’t hopped on the bandwagon until now. Or are we really the only holdouts in the world? After playing and playing and playing some more the verdict is that my kids have been completely sucked into this game. They’ve been playing every chance they get  and I’ve hopped in on plenty of numbers myself. It’s been a lot of fun playing a video game all together.

The Lego Rock Band premise is similar to the other Rock Band games – or at least what I know of them second hand, as this is the first version I’ve played. Playing the songs is just like Guitar Hero and the other Rock Band games so if you’ve done that before there are no real surprises. With this version we like being able to choose “Super Easy” as a level of difficulty. My son discovered that when you do this you don’t need to hold down the guitar’s colored buttons and strum at the same time. You can only do the strum and it will still count. This is a great feature for the younger players. Or for others like me who are somewhat rhythmically challenged. As you play you create a band and play songs earning Lego Studs to spend on things for your Rock Den, outfits for your characters, new vehicles, etc. The characters in the game are Lego people. They can be customized by changing up hair, heads, bodies and legs.  The better you get at the game the more customizable options you’ll unlock.  For fun, certain songs have set Lego characters that you’ll use. For example, when you’re playing a song by Queen you’ve got a Lego version of Freddy Mercury as your lead singer. My girls have been getting a kick out of trying to earn plenty of Lego studs to buy new outfits for their Lego people. My son was very pleased with himself when he earned enough to upgrade from a rock van to a rock mini-bus.

So what did we think about the song choices? Overall, most were pretty kid friendly. “Kung Fu Fighting” and “We Will Rock You” have been the big hits here but my seven year old has fallen in love with “Crocodile Rock”. We have run into a few with questionable lyrics but we’ve told the kids they’re getting a “set list” of ones they can sing. The rest must only be played with instruments.  Yes, we know we are mean. There’s a feature we haven’t tried out yet, but according to the product description you can download additional family friendly songs for the game.

Hardcore Rock Band players might not completely love the Lego version but I think it’s absolutely perfect for families with younger kids. The essence of Rock Band is here along with the fun and humor of Lego video games. This would be a great gift for Santa to slip under some trees this year.

My one suggestion is that since this version of Rock Band is geared towards the kids, drum silencers should be included with every video game purchase. After a week of having these lovely drums in the house I’ve put down my foot and they can no longer be played between the hours of afterschool and dinnertime.  The Rock n’ Roll lifestyle will just have to wait until mom’s nerves have made it through that grueling part of the day.  If I make it through those dreaded hours then the kids can go ahead and get crazy and rock on.

Disclosure: I received a free copy of this video game for review purposes.

This Itsy Bitsy Spider is described as a “musical coloring book”. As stated, it combines two kid favorites – music and coloring. The app shows a great big coloring page illustrating Itsy Bitsy’s adventures (or misadventures I suppose). Your child can tap anywhere on the coloring page and the app will zoom into that section of the illustration. Now they can choose a color and tap on the picture to color it in. When they’re done they can move on to another part of the page. Meanwhile they’ll be hearing an adorable, jazzy, child-sung version of “The Itsy Bitsy Spider”. The music is catchy and features lots of giggles. It’s hard not to be happy and want to color when you’re listening to it. I found this to be a very cute app and my son has enjoyed it as well. The above is a screenshot of his coloring work. I’m thinking it must have been “one of those days” because he appears to have been in a really red mood.

Price when Reviewed: $1.99

Seller: iMagine Machine

Do you have a little boy in your house? If so then this app is for them. Kero is a frog who’s just floating along the river on a log. But he’s a hungry frog and he needs to eat. Lucky for Kero there are plenty of flies buzzing around. Your job is to tap on the flies so Kero can shoot out his long froggy tongue and catch some lunch. You’ve got a set amount of time to see how many flies Kero can catch. When the time is up Kero lets out a big burp and out come the flies.

I know that Kero was designed for the young crowd and they wanted to keep it as simple as possible. They did a great job and it’s an entertaining app but I’d love to see an option to keep track of how many flies you help Kero catch. That along with a visual countdown of some sort would be terrific.  Maybe there could be a way to turn the countdown/scorekeeping on or off, keeping the app simple for the young users but giving an option for the older, more competitive ones.

All in all, Kero is actually a pretty humane app as no flies appear to have been harmed in it’s making. Simple fun plus simple humor (frogs plus burping! hooray!) and you have an app little boys (and probably girls too) will get a kick out of.

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: people operating technology

Here is an intriguing app. StoryBoy is an ebook reader for kids. It’s like a mini Kindle of sorts. You download the app and then from within it you can go to the StoryBoy online store and purchase additional stories to read.  Right now there are two stories that are included in the original app download – Three Little Pigs and First Words. For a limited time you can also download four additional books for free, from the StoryBoy online store.

The app is easy to use. It opens up and you’ll see two buttons at the bottom of your screen: My Library and eBook Store. Tap “My Library” and you’ll be able to access the books that you’ve already downloaded. Tap the book you want and you’re off to read the story. If you tap “eBook Store” you’ll be connected to the online book store. Here there are several different options. The “Preschool” button will show you preschool books that are available.  “Kids” lets you view titles for older readers. “Parents” gives you access to articles geared towards mom and dad. And “What’s New” wasn’t available at the time of this review but I’m going out on a limb here and guessing it will display new items at the book store.

I like how StoryBoy allows you to download additional stories without having to go through iTunes. Right now the available titles are all free so it’s a fantastic deal. I am wondering if there’s going to be some sort of parental control feature that will prevent kids from being able to download stories. I hope so!

Price when Reviewed: Free

Seller: SKYVU PICTURES, inc

Every once in awhile I like to pretend I’m in touch with what’s going on in pop culture. That I’m hip to the peeps in the news. Word. I can’t stomach too much though…just enough to know what’s going on with Robsten but not enough that I feel like I need to go read Shakespeare for two days straight to balance it all out. For my occasional forays into the world of celebrity gossip I can now get it all in one shot with Gossip Junkie. This app brings a plethora of gossip news to your iPhone in one handy browser. All the greatest sites are here. E!Online, Gossip Magazine, Star, TMZ and People – plus a bunch I’ve never heard of. Now if that’s not enough for you or if your favorite gossip site has been overlooked you can easily add it in. The way Gossip Junkie works is simple. Tap the gossip source you’d like to visit and it will open up within the app. From here you can read all the dirt you want, moving backward and forward between articles. If you’re looking to avoid using Safari when you visit these sites then Gossip Junkie is a good way. It works very smoothly and everything shows up iPhone friendly. No need to zoom in.  These type of websites aren’t really my thing but now there’s no excuse for me to be behind the times.

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: Steve Parker

Here’s another app from Drew. Drew is the 14 year old developer behind the app X-Ball. He’s just come out with another app called iMoticon. iMoticon lets you turn your iPhone screen into a giant emoticon so you can let everyone know how you’re feeling. You can change the color of the emoticon and the background. This is a basic app but the fact that a teenager is developing multiple apps really impresses me. Right now there are ten emoticons featured in iMoticon. I’m hoping Drew adds some more because my knowledge of emoticons is limited to & :-{. But just this week I learned how to make a heart <3. I know, I’m so progressive.

** I just heard from Drew- to see more emoticons go to the iPhone settings, iMoticon and then choose the large list. He says there are 200 there!
Price when Reviewed: Free

Seller: DREWSE

Here’s another app that has the potential to spice up mealtime at the iPhone mom’s house. (Tacos are getting a little bit redundant.) AllRecipes.com’s Dinner Spinner is easy to use and you can search for recipes by using either the “dinner spinner” or a more traditional search.

When you use the dinner spinner feature you select your dish type, one ingredient and the time you want your dish ready in. I really liked seeing that they have a “slow cooker” option for this. After you’ve made your selections you tap “View Matches” and you’ll see what recipes matched up with your requests. From here you can view the recipe and the reviews about it. If you like what you see you can add it to a favorites list or email it out. Now if you’re feeling a bit adventurous about the spinner you can just shake your iPhone and see what it selects for you. This could be a fun way to discover some new recipes that you might not think of yourself.

If you choose the regular search route you’ll type in an ingredient or recipe that you’re looking for. The app then pulls up a list that matches your request. At the top right of this screen there is a button that says “Filters”. Selecting one of these filters will narrow down your search results. You can filter by the following: vegetarian, vegan, no dairy, no wheat, high fiber, low fat, low sodium and low carbs. Another option for finding recipes is to tap the “Featured” button. This will show you a list of recipes that AllRecipes.com thinks are great. I looked these recipes over and found the yummiest looking Snickerdoodle Chex Mix recipe that I can’t wait to try out with my kids.

This app doesn’t contain all of the recipes from AllRecipes.com but I don’t see how it could without taking up all the space on your iPhone. I suppose it could link out to the website but personally I like having everything contained in the app. I’m excited to delve even deeper into Dinner Spinner and create a list of new things for my family to try.

Price when Reviewed: Free

Seller: AllRecipes,com, Inc.