Contrary to popular belief, text messaging isn’t just for teenagers. Believe it or not, it’s a great way to get quick information. I often use it throughout the day to stay in touch with my husband while he’s at work. He’s frequently in meetings or otherwise unavailable for a conversation. Rather than leave multiple messages for him, I simply send him a text such as “should I get a babysitter for Friday?”. Regardless of whether he’s on the phone or in a meeting, he’s able to send me a quick reply. It saves both of us time and helps us stay connected throughout the day.

Google is another great source for text information. Most of us use Google online to get quick information like business phone numbers, movie showtimes, directions, weather and misc. information. What you may not know is that you can get all that information on your phone as well. Why pay $2 for every 411 call when you can get it from Google for free? Simply send a text message of your question to 466453 (’GOOGLE’ on most devices). Generally within about 5 seconds Google will text you back with the info you requested. For example, if I want to know what time the movie ‘Catch and Release’ is playing at my local movie theater I text ‘catch and release 66062′ to Google. After a few seconds, I get three text messages back listing the show times of that particular movie in each of my three local theaters (as well as their addresses and phone numbers). For samples of what types of questions you can ask and how to format them, click this link. I think you’ll be amazed how much information is right at your fingertips.

Most cell phone plans include at least a certain number of free text messages. If you’ve never used it, you should check your plan and try it out. I’ve found it texting incredibly helpful and efficient. Anything that saves me time, keeps me connected, and doesn’t cost me a dime is a keeper in my book. Just thought I’d pass it on.

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December is a crazy month for our family. With three birthdays and Christmas all falling into a few short weeks, I’m forced to find creative ways to save myself time and money. One of my favorites, is our digital Christmas Card.

Christmas cards can take up tons of valuable time…getting the perfect picture, getting prints, tracking down addresses, you know how it goes. Last year, in an effort to save myself the hassle, I decided to create a digital version. I used the pictures I had stored in Picassa (see previous post) and another free program called Microsoft Movie Maker. The end result was a fun, 2-minute glimpse of our year in photos that I was able to email to my family and friends.

I’d never used Movie Maker before, but I found it really easy to work with. I simply imported 20 of my favorite pictures from Picasa as well as an instrumental Christmas song from one of my CDs. Once the photos were in the program, I arranged them into sections (I did a spotlight on each child and then a section of family fun). Next, I inserted some transitions between the photos (they’re built into Movie Maker) to help it flow from one picture to another. Technically, you can add video clips as well, but I didn’t want to devote the time to editing. I also used a graphic design program to add in title slides (like the one pictured here) but if you’re not tech savy you could skip those and just use the title pages that are included in Movie Maker.

Once I was happy with it, I saved it and composed a traditional Christmas card-type letter for the body of the email. I chose a Christmas-themed email stationary, attached the Movie Maker file, and added all the recipients. Thanks to the wonders of email, my digital Christmas card was instantly shared with over 50 family & friends. It was quick, efficient and best of all…free.

If you’re a little more traditional and would rather go with mail, Movie Maker can help you too. You can create a CD of your file within Movie Maker with a simple click of a button. Add a cute Christmas label and you can mail the CDs to everyone on your list.

I know this isn’t the right solution for everyone. I sure there are tons of you out there that love the whole Christmas-card making process. As for the rest of you…you may want to give this easy and free alternative a try. It worked for me. Just thought I’d pass it on.

If you have a newer system, you probably already have Movie Maker installed. If not, here’s the link.

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I’m horrible at journaling. It’s one of those things I’ve always wanted to be good at, but can’t seem to do consistently. In an effort to save my memories until I have time to jot them down, I take tons of pictures and videos. However, after awhile the hundreds of digital media files can be overwhelming to keep organized. I don’t have the time, budget or energy to scrapbook, so I opted for an easier digital solution.

About two years ago I discovered Picasa. It’s a clean, efficient, and free program available from Google. Essentially, Picasa searches your hard drive, finds all the image files and organizes them for you by date. Once Picasa adds them to its library, you can label them and organize them into virtual ‘albums’. Picasa also offers great tools to edit, print, email, or blog whatever you’ve got stored.

I love it because it doesn’t actually alter any of the original files. If I crop and lighten a picture, I can come back months later and undo any changes with a simple click of a button. They also have a great search tool which allows me to find specific pictures quickly and easily. For example, my daughter’s teacher needed a picture of her in her Halloween costume for a class project. I typed in her name and the word ‘ladybug’ and Picasa showed me only the pictures that had those two words included in the label. I was able to find the exact picture I was looking for in just a few seconds. I hit print, threw it in her backpack and she was good to go.

Earlier this year, I decided I wanted to filter through all my photos this way, so I bought a scanner and scanned all our old prints. Picasa added them automatically and I labeled them as they loaded. Now I’ve got all our family’s pictures in one place and they’re completely searchable.

One of the great things about Google programs is that they are always improving them. A new feature they’ve added in Picasa2 is called Web Albums. Web albums allow you to upload tons of pictures (you get around 1000 for free and can pay to upgrade) into albums that your friends and family can view, print, or download anytime. It’s kind of like having a digital scrapbook on your own webpage. It’s also a great way to back-up the photos stored on your machine. If for some horrible reason my laptop crashes I know that I can just click over to my web album and download all my photos instantly.

It’s no journal and it’s certainly not the beautiful finished product that you scrapbookers produce, but it works for me. It’s simple, efficient and free. It’s tough to beat that. Just thought I’d pass it on.

Here’s the link if you’re interested.

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At $20 a piece, DVDs present a problem. We buy them to keep our kids entertained while we get some much needed Mom time, but at that price we hesitate to let our kids touch them. Rather than be the constant middle man between the DVD player and my kids, I created this simple binder system.

The first step (and this is a tough one for some people) is to ditch all the plastic cases. The fact of the matter is that most scratches come not from using the DVDs but from kids trying to take them out or put them back in their cases. Save yourself the hassles, the space and the scratches by purchasing these inexpensive and compact CD cases.

I purchased three different colored cases to help keep my family organized. The first case is for kid’s DVDs. The second is for Mom & Dad movies. The third holds all the “bonus features” DVDs that we never watch but can’t seem to throw away.

The color coded cases and the easy flip-through, clear sleeves help them find exactly what they’re looking for. Better yet, there’s no particular order to the DVDs so when they need to put one away, they flip through the sleeves until they find an empty slot. The sleeves are made of soft, flexible plastic so scratches are a thing of the past.

We’ve also found them very handy for road trips. Rather than sort through which DVDs we want to keep in the car, we grab the entire case and slide it under the front seat. It’s also very handy when you want to keep your Mom & Dad DVDs out of the hands of little kids or babysitters. It’s not a fancy system, but it simple, cheap and makes life just a little easier. Just thought I’d pass it on.

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