Internet Safety

Ugh. So my daughter, who previously had been content on sites like Webkins, Disney and Noggin, has now discovered the world of YouTube and music videos of her favorite singers (Selena Gomez, Hannah Montana / Miley Cyrus). We monitor her usage as carefully as possible. She knows not to talk to strangers, even online. We keep her computer next to ours so we’re aware of what she’s doing and where she’s going. And of course, we’ve discussed with her the various dangers and levels of appropriate content we’re comfortable with. But I know this is just the start of a whole world of issues.

I probably walk more on the dangerous side anyway by including pictures of my kids even in the header of this site, but when I made the blog public again, I toyed with the idea of using pseudo-names but I just couldn’t keep that going. It’s not natural for me and just wasn’t going to work. I don’t expect to blog about the details of their lives to the extent that I used to. And you will probably not find many pictures of them other than the ones at top. It’s a fine line.

In any case, what steps do you take with your kids to ensure their safety online? Do you let them have access to YouTube? Where do you draw the line?

Hip Hop Hustle!

My 24 Hour Fitness just started a new class for Tuesday nights: Hip Hop Hustle. I take the Zumba class on Thursday nights and have been loving it – so another dance-style aerobics class was definitely something I had to try. It was totally awesome. In fact, I may even like it better than Zumba, which is really saying something. I wear a Polar F7 Heart Rate monitor (HRM) when I exercise, and even when I run, I struggle to get it to read a 300 calorie burn. When I’ve gotten it to read 400 – I know I’ve really pushed it. Well, in Hip Hop Hustle, I didn’t even feel like I was working that hard. There’s definitely room to work harder, but with my workload recently, I just wasn’t up to more than coasting through the class. Even still, my HRM had me burning over 400 calories. That was with me not even feeling that tired after the class!! When I’m up to working harder, I wonder how high that calorie burn is going to be!

If you have access to a Hip Hop Hustle class, and you like dance-style aerobics, definitely check it out. I know that how much fun a class is can really be dependent on the instructor. So if you don’t like one class, try another one with a different instructor to see if you might like the class better. (That goes for Zumba classes too – which I still plan on going to on)

Balloon Festival 2009

In town here they do a yearly Balloon Festival. Here are few pictures. The first few are ones we took from our street. (Friday morning they had a “Balloon Launch” just down the street from us). I’d totally forgotten about it until Zach started going crazy screaming about Balloons floating by the window. LOL!

Learn to Run – Week 3 finally complete

If you’re not a runner, you have no idea how hard it is to run. And if you ARE a runner, you probably don’t remember how hard it is to START running. I don’t think I know many people who are in this middle training stage that I’m in. When I say “hey! I ran for 3 minutes straight without wanting to die” – to either of the groups above I’m sure it must sound so pathetic. Either way – I am now able to run for at least three minute intervals (for at least 45-50 minutes) without the kind of strain I experienced the first few times I attempted it.

In fact, last night, I wanted to exercise, didn’t want to go to the gym, the evening was so cool (and the yucky air quality finally cleared out) so I went back to the park for my run. I’d actually completed the 3rd session for the week the night before – but I didn’t want to start on week 4’s sessions – so I figured I’d just run and test myself. How far/long could I run before I really felt the need to stop? The first few times I did the three minutes. Then 4. Then I still felt good so I tried to see how far I could push myself, and ran for a solid mile without stopping once!!! I stopped looking at my watch and started gauging distances instead. 1/3 of a mile became no problem. I was only able to do the mile once last night. The rest of the times I would just do 1/3 of a mile, then walk for a minute or two and then run another 1/3.

Still, I can’t tell you how empowering being able to run that mile was. I’m planning on taking a rest day today to give my knees and legs a break. Then Week 4 starts on Sunday!

Here are a few pictures from my run:

15 More iPhone Applications for Kids (Part II)

And now for our next installment of “There are so many kid-apps on my iPhone that the kids think my phone actually belongs to them”… (If you missed the first post – I originally listed 20 games my kids loved playing on my iPhone)

1) Carrie’s Dots (Free version)
Do you remember when you were a kid, and to pass time waiting at a restaurant, you used to draw this grid of dots – each person took a turn connecting the dots with vertical or horizontal lines – when you made a box – you got a point, and also got to take another turn… That’s this game. Kids love it. Still does a great job of passing time while waiting in a restaurant.

2) Koi Pond (Full Version)
I’m kind of surprised I didn’t mention this one in my first listing. I think this was one of the very first apps I downloaded when I bought my phone. Cute little app. Has sound effects in the background. The fish swim around. Touch the pond to scare them away (my 3 year old son loves doing that WAY too much) – shake the phone to feed the fish. The graphics and interaction are well done.

3) Memory Match (Free version | Full Version – Child Development | Full Version – anime match)
A simple memory game with cute little cartoon animals to pair up.  I’m not sure why there’s the different full versions. We’ve been using the free one and have been happy with it.

4) iZoo (Free version | Full version)
This is a cute little app that plays various animal sounds. My one complaint is that some of the animal sounds are quite a bit louder than others. So randomly, my son will be playing with the phone and scare the crap out of me because I wasn’t expecting to hear a Baboon screech at that particular moment. Also – if you start to fumble to turn the volume down – you will discover that the APPLICTAION’S volume is only controllable WHILE IT IS MAKING NOISE. If you start turning the volume down when it is not screeching – you are only turning down your phone’s ring volume. The baboon will still be screeching just as loud the next time you click on the picture. If you are quick, you can turn down the app’s volume while it is making noise. So yea, it would be nice if there were more easily accesible volume controls – and if the animal noises had been processed so that one isn’t whisper quiet – while another is deafeningly loud.

5) Four Free (Free version | Full version)
Remember that Connect-Four game? Same thing – without all the little chips to lose.

6) Morocco (Free version)
Remember Othello? Again, same thing, without all the little chips to lose.

7) Toddler Teaser Shapes (Free version)
My 3 year old son loves this game. It calls a shape, you have to click it – do that enough times and you get a “sticker” to paste on the page. This developer also makes a number of other cute toddler games I’m tempted to download.

8 ) Sneezies (Free version | Full version)
This is a cute and weird game. There’s these little fuzzy guys floating around in bubbles. You get one chance to click in a spot on the screen and it starts a chain reaction. If one of the fuzzy guys is within range – his bubble will pop. His popping bubble will cause nearby bubbles to pop and so on. The goal is to clear as many of the guys on the screen as possible. Like I said, weird. (But fun)

9) Butterflies (Free version | Full version)
You can change your background, and which butterflies will appear on the screen. Touch the screen and some butterflies will “land” on your finger.

10) Dino Mixer (Full version)
Kind of like a slot machine but with different dino parts. You can mix and match and make your own dinosaurs. If you find the correct matching parts to the dinosaur, it will tell you the name of the dinosaur. I could see some ways they could expand the app – like actually SAYING the name of the dinosaur when you get it (sometimes those pronunciations can be tricky!) or giving you a random factoid about the dinosaur. Or for fun – giving you the made up name of your mixed-and-matched dinosaur… But it’s still a cute app even without that.

11) Preschool Arcade (Full version)
3 games are included with this one. A “claw” like game where you have to pick up the shape that matches the silhouette. There’s a toddler space invader type game, and a pinball like game. (The pinball game is weird, and I just don’t get it. My son plays with the claw game mostly) The main reason I got this game is because I liked the next one so much that I wanted to try a few others from this developer.

12) Make a Martian (Full version)
This game is VERY cute and simple. There are various martian body-parts you can change, you can also change the martian’s colors to create your own unique martian.

13) Pet Playpen (Full version)
My (almost) 9 year old daughter liked playing this game. You can pick three animals to have as pets. Feed them, play with them, clean up their poop. Can it get more fun than that??

14) Spazzle (Free version | Full version)
Basically whack-a-mole. The twist with this game is occasionally other animals pop up that you are NOT supposed to whack – so you can’t just go whacking animals willy-nilly. Well almost. Download the game at your own risk, and hopefully your 3 year old won’t bang his hand on the screen in an attempt to whack as many creatures as once. (Disturbing on many levels.) Hey, there’s also an alien version.

15) Colorama (Full version)
I saved the best one for last. This is my favorite of the list. The drawings are adorable, and there’s lots of them. The color picker is really cute. You can save your colored drawing, or go back and edit it (when you complete the drawing, it plays a little fanfare) Definitely worth the mere $.99!

I should also add, that I finally caved in and bought the full version of the Balloon Animals game. The kids have just loved this game, and really wanted to see some new animals. The additional animals you get with the paid version are very cute and the kids have been having a lot of fun with them.

BONUS APP:
Have2Pee (Free version)
So this isn’t a “kid-app” exactly – but if you have kids, you’ve probably been in the situation of needing to find the nearest bathroom as soon as possible!!! I haven’t yet had to put this app to use, but I have it now at the ready should the emergency arise!

There’s still a ton more apps on my phone that I didn’t mention yet – so another iPhone apps for kids review post will be coming again soon. Stay tuned!