The iPhone Mom

I bought Gello Doodle last week based on the sheer absurdity of it’s concept. How could I not be intrigued by an app that’s built around Jell-O? Actually the app is called Gello and I’m sure that’s because there would be legal trouble if they called it Jell-O. But Gello is like Jell-O and it all wiggles and jiggles, which is part of the fun of this quirky app.

Gello Doodle is for everyone who’s ever wanted to play with their food. Seriously. That includes me. You begin by choosing a Gello mold. Right now there are 22 molds to choose from. Molds include a monkey, a basic oval and even a kangaroo. Now you make your Gello by tapping on the Gello box at the top of the screen. The app gives you color levels that you slide and adjust until your Gello is the perfect color. The next step is to pour it into the mold. I’ll admit that it took me a few tries to figure out how to do this. You have to pick up your iPhone and pretend to pour in the Gello. When your phone goes through the pouring motion it will slide out of the beaker, off the screen and into your mold. Make sure you pour it all in so your mold fills completely. You can also fill it part of the way, then change the Gello color and finish off the mold with a new color. When your mold is full  you can add in some doodads. That is the actual Gello Doodle word for it. Doodads are the things that you add into your Gello. In real life it’d be things like pineapple, pears or marshmallows. Here you have fruits, nuts, gummy things (frogs, worms, bears), cookies, candies and crackers. Then you’ve also got wacky things like flowers, bolts and shoes. You can even take a picture from your camera roll, select part of the image and add that to your Gello. Choose which doodad you like and then tap on the Gello mold to add it. You can add as many different doodads as you like.

When you’ve made your Gello you’ll tap on “Demold” and set that Gello free. Your Gello will wiggle around the screen as you move your iPhone. The next step is to play with your food. You can pump the Gello full of air until it explodes or slurp it up with a straw. You can also adjust the gravity and elasticity of the Gello.  If you put your finger on the Gello and move it around the screen it will twist and turn and follow your finger.  What’s included now is fun but I’d like to see a few more things included for playing with the Gello.

Gello Doodle is pure, mindless fun. My kids are getting a big kick out of their molds. As for me, I quite enjoy slurping the Gello off the screen. I’m not sure if it’s the noise or the fact that I get a clean screen when I’m done. Clean counts for a lot right now because thanks to my sweet refluxing baby nothing in my house is clean for long. Whatever the reason, I’m finding Gello Doodle pretty darn  entertaining.

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: Shoe the Goose

I saw the Wee Mee Avatar Creator in the “What’s Hot” section of the App Store this week and had to give it a trial run. I use the Wee Mee creator to create my Windows Live Messenger avatar. Alright, actually my kids are the ones doing the creating. They love to get on and change up my Mee’s hair and clothes. Not to mention all the accessories that can be added on. Right now she’s wearing a pink cowgirl hat, sparkly shoes and standing by a windmill and daschund.  Random, I know but somehow it works. There is a website for the Wee Mees called Wee World but we don’t use it. It’s more of a social networking type site  so we stick with the Messenger Wee Mees and everyone is happy.

I got off on a bit of a tangent didn’t I?  Back to the Wee Mee iPhone app. You choose a body (and yes, they do wear undies, albeit skimpyish ones) and head shape. You can customize your skin color and then it’s on to facial expressions and hair. That is my daughter’s favorite thing to choose for me. My own brown locks are so boring that having the endless possibilities of long, colorful, beautiful hair is irresistible to her. The app lets you pick clothes, accessories and backgrounds. There aren’t as many choices as you’ve got online but I’m hopeful more will come in updates. (Online there are oodles of choices, so just because I say there aren’t as many in the app doesn’t mean there aren’t plenty. Make sense?) Go through all the avatar options and it’s just a matter of tapping and swiping until you get THE perfect look.

So having the Wee Mee Avatar Creator can be fun, like elaborate paper dolls on your iPhone, but what can you DO with them? Well, once you’ve finished an avatar you can save it to a Wee Mee gallery. And then you can email it out or save it as a photo for one of your contacts. The next time my kids tell me that they are bored I’m going to let them loose with this app and have them create a Wee Mee for every one of my contacts that needs a photo. Can’t wait to see what they come up with!

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: WeeWorld

Any app that has “a-ma-jig” in it’s name is worth a look, isn’t it? Slide-a-ma-jig is an app that gives you creatures and then lets you mix and match their parts. It currently features 30 different characters, each divided up into five body sections. (Hat section, head, mid-section, legs and feet.) Pick a character, touch on one of it’s sections and then swipe to the left or right to switch to a new body part. Each time you swipe you’ll hear a cartoony sound effect. Zoinks! The original Slide-a-ma-jig creatures are something else all on their own but things get pretty wild when you start combining their bits and pieces. You can make some disturbingly wacky combinations if you put your mind to it. And if you’re in more of a random mood you can also shake your iPhone to get a creature that the app creates out of various creature parts. There are also 20 different backgrounds that you can use to really mix things up. My thoughts on Slide-a-ma-jig?  I think it’s silly, icky totally irresistible. My kids agree.

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: Lucky Radish Amusements

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

If my baby’s fingers weren’t a slobbery, sticky mess from teething I’d show her BalloonMaker. It’s brightly colored and simplistic and I think she’d be intrigued. So much so that she’d be reaching for the phone even more than she already does. Which I can’t have given the state of her fingers. Death by slobber is not the way my iPhone wants to go.

Here’s the rundown on BalloonMaker. It gives you a screen full of blue sky and fluffy white clouds. Tap the screen and a balloon appears. Tap again and again to fill the screen with balloons. If you hold your finger on the screen the balloon will blow up larger than if you simply tap. If you keep your finger on the screen you can drag the balloon around. The balloons  will float to the top of your screen and if you turn your phone they’ll readjust and float to the top again. They move around and bounce off each other. You can pop the balloons by tapping on them. They make a satisfying pop sound and explode with sparkles.

That’s the extent of the app and it’s perfect for young toddlers with short attention spans who love balloons. Which is just about every toddler I’ve ever met.

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: Troy Tegeder

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

Emily’s Girl Talk is a collection of games, some of which I played when I was (much) younger. It includes MASH, The Lemon Game, Cootie Catcher and Love. Back in the day I played them with paper and pencil but things have come a long way. Since my girls are the perfect age for this app I asked my 7 year old do the review. She gave me a great run down and what follows are her words. I put my comments in blue. Take it away Miss S!

Emily’s Girl Talk has four games that are girly. The first game is MASH. There are different categories that you have to fill out. (crushes, cars, cities, jobs, wedding dress colors and numbers) If you press the plus sign you can pick one of the words that are already there. If you tap on the line you can type in your own. (The app comes with a list of preset things you can choose from to fill in the categories. These are seen when you tap the plus sign. If you want to enter in your own tap on the line next to the plus and you’ll get the keyboard.) If you tap “Emily’s Pick” the app fills in the things for you. At the end you pick a number and it does something with that number and then makes a prediction. The prediction is of one thing from each category. It tells you who you’re going to marry and where you work and what car you have and your city and number of kids.

The Lemon Game – You type in girl names, boy names, body parts, cities and things you can do with a lemon. (Again, plus sign brings up preset list, tap on line to type.) Or click on “Emily Picks” and she picks things for you. Touch a lucky number. Like MASH it uses your number too but it takes your things to make a silly sentence. It’s kind of like Mad Libs. My sentence when I showed my mom was “Victoria will suck Kevin’s ear in Lima”. (I’m not so sure about that sentence!)

Cootie Catcher – Type in a question that you want a yes or no answer to. (There are no preset questions.) Then tap on a number on the cootie catcher, then on a color, another color and then you get an answer to your question. The answer is not always true. I like this version of Cootie Catcher. My girls can play it and now I don’t feel guilt because I threw away all the paper versions that were lying around the house. Plus there are no mean results.

Love – Enter your name and the name of your crush. I did my sister and Obi Wan Kenobi. It does some sort of calculation and comes up with your chance of love, like 23%, 38% or even 100%.

The Journal – The journal keeps track of everything (your results) for the games you’ve played.

Emily’s Sticker Album – When you finish a game it gives you a new sticker for that game.

Email Emily – You can email Emily by clicking on “Email Emily” on the front page.

Options – Has background music, sound effects, something called Twitter settings and a clear button for your journal.

Emily’s Girl Talk has been a big hit with my girls! I think it’s perfect for tween aged girls. I’ve been given two promo codes to give away, if you’d like one leave me a comment. The codes will only work in the US app store.

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: Broken Thumbs Apps

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

Here’s another great Dr. Seuss app from Oceanhouse Media. The Dr. Seuss Camera – The Cat in the Hat Edition is a follow up to the Grinch camera app that they released at the the end of 2009. This version lets you take pictures and then liven them up with some spunk courtesy of of the Cat in the Hat. You begin by picking a Cat in the Hat themed card. (My favorite card features Thing 1 and Thing 2.) Next you choose to either take a photo with your iPhone or select one from your Photo Library or Camera Roll. I’m so glad they included the ability to do that! You can drag you image around the screen and resize it until it fits  into the card. Now you can add a silly frame to the card, stick on some Suess-y stickers or text. When you’re all done you can email the image, save it to your photo library or copy it to the clipboard.  Dr. Seuss Camera is a great app for the kids to have some fun with.

*For more Dr. Seuss fun check out Dr. Seuss Camera – The Grinch Edition

Price when Reviewed: $2.99

Seller: Oceanhouse Media

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

Elmo’s Monster Maker wasn’t what I was expecting at all. I knew that it had something to do with creating Sesame Street monsters but I was expecting the monsters to be cartoons. Instead, I found “real” Sesame Street Monsters. The developers have taken video of the different puppets and used it in the app. The monsters move and talk just like they do on T.V. It makes for a very cool app.

Elmo introduces the monsters and explains how you play. First you’ve got to choose a monster as they walk across the screen and say hello. Each one has a different look and personality but they are all missing their eyes and noses. Once you tap on a monster then you’re taken to a screen where you can choose a hat, eyes and a nose. You do this by tapping on the monster’s face where his eyes would be. Each time you tap a new set of eyes will appear. The same is true for the noses and hats. When you’ve got your monster just right then you’ll tap on the triangle/play button at the bottom right of the screen.

Now Elmo asks you to play with your monster. There are three buttons on the bottom of the screen to choose from.  When you tap the camera button Elmo comes out and takes a picture of your monster. I didn’t realize what this meant until I looked in my camera roll and discovered pictures of monsters. When Elmo takes the picture it’s placed in a frame and actually saved to your iPhone. When you tap the button with Elmo on it then he’ll come play with your monster. When he’s done you can tap the button again and Elmo comes back to play something different. Finally, if you tap the music notes the background on the screen changes, music plays and your monster begins to dance. Each time you tap the screen the background and music change. Your monster will dance differently depending on what he’s listening to. You can also not tap any buttons and watch your monster do silly things. He’ll also react when you tap on his body

We’ve had a great time playing with Elmo’s Monster Maker. I love how the monsters interact with you, it’s like being part of a Sesame Street episode. The app is on the more expensive side but if you have an Elmo (or a monster) fan in your house you’re definitely going to want this one.

Price when Reviewed: $3.99

Seller: Sesame Workshop Apps

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

The idea behind the FunMail app is to take an ordinary text or email message and turn it into a picture. All you need to do to begin is type in your message. FunMail will pull up several images that relate to your message. Your text will be worked into them somehow. Next you choose the image you like and then enter in the number you’d like to send the text too. You can also send it as an email, just enter in an email address instead of phone number. The app works with your contact list which is helpful. Something to note is this – if you send a text you will first get your own text asking for verification that you are the one trying to send this message.  Within this text there is a link to tap and once you’ve done that your Fun Mail text message is sent.

FunMail is a cute app and I really like the way it takes your words and fancies them up a bit. However, I don’t have unlimited texting so using up two text messages to send one isn’t going to work for me on a regular basis. I usually go over my text limit as it is. Maybe if I’m near the end of my billing cycle and I’ve got something really special to say I’ll send a special text. Thankfully FunMail lets you send emails and since those are free I can jazz up my messages to my hearts content.

Price when Reviewed: Free

Seller: Fun Mobility, Inc.

Funny Flashcards-Morphing Alphabet is brought to you by the same developers behind the Morphing Animals app. In this one an object morphs into the letter of the alphabet that the word begins with. For example, a dog morphs into the letter D. You can also tap the “sing” button to hear the ABC song sung by a high pitched, silly voice. Once the song starts there’s no stopping it until it’s over. Kids will love it, I honestly don’t know if I could listen to it over and over again. There’s also a “fact” button. Tap that and you’ll hear a random fact about letters and the alphabet or an encouraging statement. (“Dad starts with the letter D”, “The alphabet has five vowels” or “You’re learning fast!”)

Funny Flashcards: Morphing Alphabet doesn’t have the same silliness as the Morphing Animals app. But it’s a fun and unusual way to look at learning your letters.

Price when Reviewed: $1.99

Seller: FunVid Apps

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

Experimenter is a collection of fourteen science experiments. To give you a small idea of what’s on this app I’ll tell you that some of the experiments involve Pepsi & Mentos, dry ice, glowing water and fireproof balloons. The app gives you a list of the supplies needed to conduct each experiment and then a list of written instructions to follow. There’s information on safety and an explanation of how the experiment works. There’s also a video demonstration to watch. I found that the experiments made more sense to me  if I read the instructions, watched the video and then read the instructions again. The videos don’t come with narration, they’re just a visual demonstration set to music, so you’ll definitely need those instructions. Narration would be a nice addition I think. Finally, there is also a blooper reel that shows footage of experiments gone wrong. Nice to see the mistakes but the song they chose to accompany the footage has some questionable language in it. There I go being a prudish mom again. (Song changed in update)

I wouldn’t recommend that you let your kids use Experimenter unsupervised. This is an app that needs to be watched over or you might find your house filled with instant ice…or worse.  You must be 17 to download this app and I believe that’s probably due to some of the supplies needed.  Several experiments call for things that you probably don’t want your kids handling. For example, whiskey and the “balloon alternative” the app suggests for the fireproof balloons. And that’s all I’m going to say about that. 

So, if you’re looking for a few science experiments to try with your kids and you’d like to have the instructions and video right there on your phone then Experimenter appears to be a good source. I personally didn’t try out any of the actual experiments because there’s enough experimenting going on in my kitchen on a daily basis. It’s called dinner and it’s usually much scarier than anything else could be.

Price when Reviewed: $.99

Seller: Cramzy

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