Don't Go Through Life Looking Through a Viewfinder

Our children's lives are extremely well documented.  Between regular cameras, video cameras, and camera phones, we could film every moment in our children's lives.  But that doesn't mean we should. 

Yesterday we went to a pumpkin farm and there were tons of families there with young kids.  Along with the pumpkins there were carnival style rides and other things for kids to do. The parents (my husband and I included) would give their kids tickets for the rides and then go find the perfect spot to get a picture of their kids reaction to the ride. 

Digital cameras obviously give you the freedom to snap as many pictures as you want and then delete later or edit them at home to create the perfect shot, but that doesn't mean you have to shoot constantly.

I do a pretty good job of putting our pictures in photo albums and enjoy looking through them with the kids later, but even more than that I enjoy the actual moments.  After we were done with the rides I tried to restrain myself from taking more pictures, and it was hard.  I wanted to get the perfect shot of all three in the middle of all the pumpkins on the good camera for the album, but then I also wanted a cute shot that I could post on Facebook while we were still there. Trying to get all three to smile gets tough and everyone ends up grumpy.

With the holidays fast approaching, I encourage you to put the camera down and enjoy the moment and create memories.  I'll do my best too.

Facebook - Why I love/hate it

As I've mentioned before I was a pretty early adopter of Facebook.  I started using it when we were getting most of our babysitters through a nanny service and I wanted to know a little bit more about the people who were taking care of my kids before they actually arrived.  In the days before all the privacy settings, I could see the persons full profile, and it always put me at ease.  I never delved too deep in their private stuff, I just liked to know basic stuff, age, primary occupation, stuff like that.  Ok, may did I did check out some of the photos but I never saw anything crazy.


Little by little the privacy settings changed, and I couldn't get as much info but my friends started joining, so I stayed on it.  In many ways I love it.  I finished high school at an international school and after graduation lost touch with lots of people as they moved away or back to their home countries.  Many I have reconnected with over Facebook.  My cousins are all on and fairly active so I get to keep up with them and their kids (who at this point I haven't met yet).

Also it's the perfect social crutch for an introvert.  There is no doubt in my mind that Zuckerberg came up with the idea, not those Winklevoss twins.  I mean really, their social life was probably fine, but I would think the computer geek needed some help interacting with people. I hate small talk and now I can skip it with anyone I'm FB friends with.  If I see someone I haven't seen in a while, I already know about recent vacations, proud moments they shared, silly things their kids did, whatever.  Jumpstarts the conversation. I have noticed that after the initial fun wears off of posting constantly it really is the introverts who post more than the extroverts. 

So what's the problem?  I'm addicted.  I don't post that often (maybe once or twice a week these days). I don't get into long discussions on other peoples threads, but I do find myself checking it more than I should.  I keep my phone with me at all times, I use the app and check it at spare moments.  Do I need to?  No. I mean honestly my friends' lives aren't that exciting that I can't wait to get whatever status they post. It's an addiction, which is why I hate it.

Having said that, I do feel that using my phone less for other apps has definitely cut down my FB time, so that's a good thing.  I also like that now when I open it up, it tells me how many new stories there are since I last checked.  I've noticed as the days go by there are more stories as I tend to go longer between checking.  I check it in the morning when I first wake up - my morning "news" and then I try to ignore it til after kids are in school.  It's those little idle moments in the middle of the day that get me though.  I've started keeping my phone in my bag so I don't check it when I'm at red lights like I used to.  My main checking time is actually when I'm cooking, those brief moments when you're waiting for something to heat up, stir or whatever. Again just like reading blogs in one or two chunks a day if I don't check in as often, I end up spending less time on Facebook over the course of the day, leaving me more time to enjoy life instead of living it vicariously through my friends. 

A Good Friday

Friday morning I dropped Little Man for his field trip to the pumpkin farm. He was so excited!! Maybe more excited to ride the big school bus than to actually go to the pumpkin farm. As we were waiting for everyone to arrive, I started to see that pretty much every kid was accompanied by their Mom. It wasn't required that parents chaperone but I was starting to feel a little bad that I hadn't volunteered. At the same time I knew that Little Man would be more independent and more likely to eat his lunch if I wasn't there. And this was going to be my only chance to go for a long run without any time pressure. He was perfectly happy to go off without me and soon enough has happily on his way.

I drove over to Busse Woods in Elk Grove Village planning to run their 7.7 mile trail. I had walked the whole thing years ago when Little Reader was still in a stroller. Today was much colder 48 when I arrived but with the leaves changing it was really pretty. At one point I misunderstood the trail markers and ended up going the wrong way. I thought the trail would join up with the main trail, but it never did so I had to turn around and go back the way I came. In the end I ran 9.3 miles (with .1 mi intervals of walking every .75 miles). I managed it in an hour an half. I checked the results from last year's Hot Chocolate and that's about average for my age group so I feel a lot more confident about the race, knowing I can do it.

I ran the whole thing in a sweatshirt and shorts and while I warmed up some as I ran I definitely need to get some cool weather running gear.

After stretching out and warming up I went to IKEA for lunch and to take advantage of being able to be there without kids. They already have their Christmas section set up and I saw the greatest little "why didn't anyone think of that before" item? Those silver ornament hangers have always bugged me, these green ones are great.  I don't know how well they work since I haven't used them yet - obviously - but I wanted to buy them now in case I don't make it back to IKEA before Christmas.  I love/hate that big blue box. 


I picked up Little Man and he had had a great time on his field trip. A lot of the kids had fallen asleep on the ride home and looked a little groggy. Little Man came off the bus with a huge smile on his face. He had a pumpkin and a caramel apple and was in a hurry to get home to eat his apple. He told me all about the different things they did, and proudly said that he ate his lunch. He managed to bite all the caramel off his apple and only eat a tiny bit of apple.


After school we took his sisters to drive around and Hobgoblin their friends. We've been doing it for about 3 years now and they love it. If you aren't familiar with the Hobgoblin it's kind of a Halloween Secret Santa. You drop off Halloween goodies at 6 friends houses and then they are supposed to pay it forward to six other people and the chain continues til Halloween. You post the sign in your window so people know you've been "booed". They had a lot of fun picking out goodies to put in our bags (vampire teeth, Halloween pencil and eraser, glow sticks, and a couple of pieces of candy). Since it's supposed to delivered secretly, I drove them around and they rang the bell and ran back to the car to try to get away before their friend saw them (which caused lots of giggles).

My husband made it home for dinner after having business dinners a couple of nights this week. Little Man enjoyed telling everyone about his field trip. He got the new iPhone and we were all having fun coming up with silly questions for Siri.

Ok, on the surface this may not seem like a post that would go with my theme, but really it was a good day of managing to provide fun times for each of the kids, a relaxing evening with my husband and still a good day for me. See? Balance.

The ToDo List

I am a list fanatic.  Pre-smartphones I had lists everywhere.  I was a loyal FranklinCovey Planner user - remember those?  Then I got a smartphone and little by little the lists disappeared, and as I've realized little by little I had become less organized, and less productive but worst of all starting to get stressed out about the little free time I did have and how best to use it.

After I started using Pinterest, I found all sorts of organizational blogs, and while many had great ideas, none really worked for me.  So after a few different experiments, this is what I've come up with.

Yep, a good old fashioned one subject notebook.  Recycled no less.  The reason it says "Guided Reading" on it is that it's a leftover from my daughter last year.

Anyway, here's the system.  Starting in the middle of the book I fold a sheet of paper in half.  On the left side I write out my monthly and weekly goals.  On the right hand side of the page behind it, I write out the days to-dos but block them according to things to do during school hours, things to do after school and finally things to do when the kids are in bed.  Breaking up the timing of the tasks really helps, I used to look at my app to do list in the morning and see 10 things on it, feel overwhelmed and feel like I failed if I hadn't made it very far by lunch time.  Now I'm setting reasonable expectations based on when kids are around and when I have quiet time, and if I manage to work on something ahead of time, yay!!  Here's a shot of today's list.  I managed all my school time, most of my afterschool stuff (that Target trip took a little longer than I had hoped), and now I have a couple of hours of quiet to work on the bottom section before I call it a night.  Not too bad, if you ask me.

So far it's been great, I had never found an app that let me track everything at once.  On some days, I'll take notes on the left hand side of the daily page, and may fold it in to the folded page if I need to keep them, otherwise I rip it out and start fresh the next day.  That's why I start in the middle though, that way I can keep notes if I need to, and as the folded sheet gets crossed off I can rewrite it on a page in front. 

Ideally I write up the next day's list before I go to bed, but sometimes do it after dropping the kids off at school. 

Apps

As I was thinking of things I would write about for this series, I was planning a post about apps and the ones that help me stay organized.  For what it's worth these are the apps I have.  I love Cozi for the calendar but don't use any of the other features.

Sunday when I was planning my menu and grocery shopping for the week, I decided to go old school and use paper and pen. Ironically at some point while I was out 3 apps were accidentally deleted from my phone. I don't know how since it's a few step process. The worst part was it took me a while to figure out which ones they were. I took it as a sign from Steve Jobs that while I rely a lot on my phone, it's really not helping me.

After about an hour I realized the missing apps were CNN, Our Groceries, and a ToDo app. I reloaded them and of course all my data is gone.  I came up with a new ToDo list system which is working really well (I'll share that tomorrow), and I'm working on a better system for my shopping list and just plan on using Our Groceries for the mid-week stuff. Once I get the new system nailed down I'll share that too.

The big difference I have noticed though is my phone addiction has gone down drastically in just a couple of days. Before if I needed to check my todo list or add something to my shopping list, I'd end up checking Facebook, email or some other time suck as well. Now I'm not doing that, and it feels good. I used to run through my to do list while walking my kids to school, the past couple of days I purposely left the phone at home and made my list when I got home. Instead I talk to my kids or listen to them talking and enjoy the walk. This could be the start of something good.

Blogging

I enjoy blogging but I probably spend a little too much time at it. I wouldn't call it wasted time as it is time I enjoy but I do need to manage my time better at it.

The writing is easy enough as I often do that on an app on my phone, although I can't type as fast as I do on a computer. The time consuming part is links, pictures and layout.  Also with the app I have a hard time adding pictures if there is more than one picture. And there have been a few times where I finished a post that I was happy with but not quite ready to publish and it disappear cause I forgot to save.

Lately I've learned a few tricks. I used to just click and drag and hope that the pictures would fit and line up the way I wanted to (which they usually did not). Now thanks to Picmonkey laying out pictures is so much easier and the captions look so much better.

I used to read most of the blogs I follow on an Feedler on my phone. The only problem is that it would only show the post title and would take a a whole to load especially if there were pictures or links. Also, commenting is really annoying (especially those with word verification).

I used to check it every morning when I wake up. Yesterday we were running late so I didn't get to. Later I got on my computer and despite the fact that my computer takes forever to load, reading the blogs I follow in Google Reader was so much easier. Since it shows the first few sentences of the post and at least one picture if applicable, I can quickly see if it's a post that I'm interested in, and skip the ones I'm not.

Also linking up to blog hops is much easier. Trying to copy and paste URLs from my blog to the link is a pain, and adding images when that's an option is tough too.

Bottom line, my new norm will be to do most of my blogging and blog reading on the computer. Much more efficient, and really the only thing I may be missing out on is being early on a blog hop, but I don't think that really matters that much.

As much as my phone helps me in other ways, it's become my go to device even when it isn't the most efficient. Time to revert to some of the full technology ways of doing things (even if that does mean I won't be quite as active).

Yes I realize this may seem ironic since I just signed up to do a 31 day series of posts, but I also think if I'm more disciplined with my time I'll be more focused and wrote better.

Endomondo

I love this app! I used to run with a pedometer but since it was a relatively cheap one I was never really sure of the accuracy.

This tracks your distance and so much more. It saves your history so you can keep track of personal bests. When you reach each mile or a finish a run it tells the time difference between that run and the previous personal best.You can map out routes online and then save them to your phone. Some people are good at estimating distances, I'm not one of them. At this point I know that if I run continuously for 30 minutes I definitely ran at least 3 miles but I like to have something more accurate.

You can access routes posted by other people (nothing really great in my neighborhood, but a few a short drive away).

You can friend people and then compete against them (I've never done this as I only have a couple of friends and they are all in Europe). You can send peptalks to friends if you see that they are out exercising.

While so far I've used it exclusively for running you can use it for lots of other sports too - cycling and kayaking are popular among my friends but also team sports

You can connect to a heart rate monitor to get access all of that info too. Mine is too old to be compatible so I don't even wear it anymore.

But really it's the stats that I love. It even has some silly ones online. Since it tracks calories it also lists how many hamburgers burned. Since it tracks distance it shows your distance compared to running around the Earth, and to the Moon. Not sure how long it will take me to run around the world.  I know I could do the math, but I don't want to.  I'd rather just watch that number slowly increase.

I know there are plenty of other training apps out there. I started with this one as I saw it come up on one of my friends Facebook posts. You can share your stats on FB. I don't. Maybe when I get better, but not yet.  Right now I don't feel like I have much to brag about.

I started with the free version and recently upgraded to the premium. Free is pretty good, but premium allows you to do interval training, which I need to do more of if I want to increase my distance.That's my next step, and I like that along with preprogrammed interval training programs, you can also create your own interval training program.  I've made one that I need to try out - we'll see how it goes.

Running

As I mentioned in a previous post I recently started running again. I was in a pretty good groove in July, but the past week has been tough with kids being home, and my husband getting home too late for me to run in the afternoon.  Still I am determined to keep at it, and have signed up for my first 5k.  Ok it's technically not my first - I did run the Corporate Challenge in Boston, but that was in 1992, and I haven't run a race since.  But it was a pretty crowded course so basically was a slow jog that ended with a night of drinking.

This will be a bit different.  It's in my town and starts at 9am (very civilized start time unlike all the downtown races that have lots of traffic to contend with.)  A friend of mine who lives in DC has been posting on Facebook about all these great races that she has signed up for, and I've found a few cool ones on my own too.

Hot Chocolate
A 5k or 15k in November where you run for chocolate

Color Run
A early summer 5k where you get sprayed with colorful powder at each checkpoint and at the end you look like a sunning Jackson Pollock painting.

Glo Run
A nighttime race where you get outfitted with glo in the dark shirts run through black lights and other "extreme glow". There's a dj on the course as they discourage ipods, so you can hear what's going on around you.

Overall my hope is to run a half marathon within a year.  My Mom was diagnosed with MS 6 years ago and for a while I was considering walking the Chicago Marathon as a fundraising effort.  I have never wanted to run a marathon but figured I could probably walk it.  Of course there are time limits on the course, so after two many cons I decided to do a half marathon instead and just do my own training and fundraising rather than being part of a team.  It'll make a it a little harder to stay motivated but I think I'll be able to do it.  The problem is picking a good one.  The Chicago half happens to fall on my Mom's birthday next year so that's a possibility, but would be tough to train unless I become a good morning runner.

Any with any big goal, the best way to go about it is baby steps.  I have added a page of running goals to keep me on track.  I also love my endomondo app.  I'll do a separate post on that - but it keeps great stats (including some goofy ones) and tracks my course by GPS.  I also have a few friends on it who occasionally send pep talks as I am out which is always fun.  But what really keeps me going is my kickass mix of Bon Jovi music.  Their tempo is perfect for my pace.  So far this list gets me through my run.  I cool down to Just Older ; )

Screen Free Week - my version

Giving up TV was no big deal for me.  I prefer books to most of the crap on TV at the moment, and was in the middle of 11/22/63 at the beginning of the week and was eager to finish it - review to follow. 

As I was planning what I would do with my evenings once kids were in bed, most of my intended projects were a no go as they included a screen - updating photos online, updating playlists on my husband's iPod now that mine is officially dead, blogging etc.  I ended up reading, sewing a little and cleaning my house with that free time, not so bad.

Giving up my phone was harder, especially since I had to check my inbox for any Screen Free related emails.  Still I tried to only open the pertinent ones, and didn't read any of the blogs I follow and tried to not check Facebook.  I have to admit that even though I moved the FB app icon to the final screen on my phone I did find myself checking it a couple of times a day - but far less than usual. 

So what did I learn?

Email
Most of my emails are crap - no big surprise there.  From Monday to Friday I received 148 emails.
One a day from the Gap even though I can't remember the last time I shopped there, unsubscribe
I get daily emails from Michaels and while I only shop there occasionally I still want those.
I did unsubscribe from quite a few other services, but had technical issues with some I tried.
When all was said and done I had 38 emails that I considered worth saving.  Pretty crazy.  I have disabled the new message notification on my phone, as up until now I feel the need to check every message as they come in - even though most obviously are not worth saving.  I figure if I designate certain times to check my messages, rather than checking throughout the day it'll go much quicker and I won't be wasting as much time checking my phone.  

Blogs
I had 27 blogs that I followed.  Some are the type that post daily others more sporadic.  After a week I had 138 posts to read (or probably 118, one blogger had the unfortunate problem that one of her posts reposted about 20 times).  Of those 118 I have 7 that I kept as I want to comment or print something.  The rest not so interesting.  I've unsubscribed from a couple, but also have moved the icon off the front page of my phone so I won't be as tempted to check for new posts.

Facebook
This has been my worst addiction for a while, and really I don't know why.  I don't play any of the games, but I find I check it compulsively, and post a couple of times a week.  So what difference did it make when I only checked once a day?  Really, none.  The same posts were still there, some interesting, some not so much and most I didn't comment on.  So the moral of the story, move this off my main page and check at a budgeted time just like the emails. 

So now that I've dealt with the trees, what will this do for the forest? Looking back I often found myself checking my phone instead of interacting with other people - my kids, other parents at pickup, etc.  Not good.  If I want to enjoy my kids, and give them the attention they deserve, I need to put the phone down.  If I expect to make any new friends, which I would like to, I need to be approachable, not be attached to my phone. As with any addiction, it won't be easy, especially since there are legitimate reasons to use it, but I definitely have a love/hate relationship with my iPhone

iPhone and Mommy apps

For a long time I put off getting an iPhone because I loved my Palm Centro. It wasn't fancy and didn't really have any apps but it was really sturdy and withstood a ton of abuse from my kids before it finally died. Last spring I made the switch to the iPhone 4 and now I wonder why I waited as long as I did. I am a list lover at heart and can't live without this wonderful device that I occasionally use to make actual phone calls :)

I don't have any games on my phone as I don't want my kids playing with it too much (I don't want them to break it) but I have a lot of apps that make being a Mom much easier. I use the Blogger app a lot, to write on the go and then I edit or add links from my home computer.

Cozi is my new favorite. Last year I would complain to my husband that I never was able to take time to myself as I didn't have access to his calendar. Now we have a family calendar on Cozi and he puts any evening or weekend appointments on it. I've added a couple of "Mom's Day Off" to it, and plan to try for at least one a month.

SplashShopper is a good grocery list app, but it was better when it was on the Palm. Still it saves all the items you have bought in the past so you can just check off items as needed instead of having to rewrite it every time.

Pinterest is a new favorite.  It's great for recipes, crafts, decorating ideas, things to do with the kids, and just something fun and inspiring to look at when waiting for kids at pick up.

I'm always on the lookout for new apps and wish I knew how to program because I have an idea for one that would make life easier.  I would call it "onestopshop" or something like that. My kids are pretty good about coming with me to run errands but their patience wears thin the more times they have to get in and out of the car (as does mine with all the buckling and unbuckling). With this app you would enter your errands, and then it would find the strip mall where you could do the most (or all) of your errands in one place. For example, if you need to go to Target, the supermarket, Bestbuy and a bookstore - would you rather drive to 4 different places or go to one place get one cart and hit all the stores in one go and be done with it. I'd even be willing to drive further if it would make me more efficient.  At this point I know what stores are at most of the strip malls around me, but it took a few years to figure it out.
 

Iphone leads to Mommy ADD

I got my iPhone about a month ago and while it is cool and helpful I also feel like it's giving me ADD or at least popcorn brain as I have heard it called. Being a mother of 3 young kids is hectic enough. I often find myself having 3 conversations at once because everyone is talking at the same time.


The main problem of course is Facebook and email. I don't get a lot of important emails. I don't work outside the home so the majority of what I get are from all the various deal websites, coupons from real stores, and once in a while a real message. Still I feel like I have to check it multiple times a day (when I have a free minute at home, when I'm at a stoplight, when I'm waiting for kids). I do not check it when I'm driving and if I need to text I pull over. I even told the kids how dangerous it is to text and drive knowing that they'll call me on it, if I try.

Now that I've started this blog, I find myself obsessed with my stats. I don't know why. I'm not really publicizing it, so don't expect a lot of traffic. I am writing under a pseudonym so am not sharing it with my friends.  No one is following me yet, but I have had someone in Germany and someone in Canada read my blog.  Not sure how they found it, but it's kind of cool.

I find myself having thinking that I need to look up something and then getting sidetracked when I unlock my phone and check FB before getting to google and then I forget what it was I going to check.  I guess these are signs of addiction.  I have recently unliked a bunch of pages to cut down on the number of updates I get, it's mostly back to friends again, which has helped.

Now that I have everything in my calendar, I feel like I can't remember any simple dates without consulting my calendar.  With school out for the summer and the camp schedule pretty relaxed, it gets worse as I don't really need to know the day of the week or the date most of the time, but then I also haven't really been planning ahead in terms of activities for the kids.  We just had my inlaws come to visit.  They left today, and today I'm spending getting the house back in order, and getting caught up on laundry.  Camp starts for all three kids next week which will allow me some free time, and hopefully let me tackle some of the smaller projects I need to tend to so I can get my life organized.