Category Archives: New posts

App to the Rescue! ‘Good Looks’ iPhone App Creates a Personal Style Catalog of your Outfits

Fashion & Style, iphone, New posts, , ,

Good Looks style app for iPhoneiPhone app to the rescue!

Choosing an outfit is a struggle for me every day. It’s pretty sad. I just got notice of a new app called Good Looks which allows the user to capture, sort, and plan outfits using her iPhone’s camera and based on what she already owns.

Here’s more about the iPhone app..

Good Looks app for iPhone Merges Fashion and Technology, Enables Users to Find Inspiration in their Own Closet!

Height & Hands, a Boston-based design and development firm, launched the Good Looks app for iPhone®, a personal style catalog that allows you to capture, sort and plan your outfits using your iPhone’s built-in camera function.  With Good Looks you can create new versions of your favorite outfits using what you already own or see what you’re missing to make your shopping trips more efficient. The app is built around the premise that it’s easier to see what works in your closet by keeping track of what you’ve worn and when you wore it.

“We designed Good Looks to be a fun and simple closet companion to use while you’re getting dressed in the morning,” said Good Looks Creator, Amy Parker, Owner of Height & Hands. “I was keeping track of what I wore every day using my phone’s photo gallery when I realized that I had no way to sort through them quickly.”

The app is easy to use: snap a picture of your outfit, then categorize it by season, rate it’s formality and add your own tags and notes. The outfit is then added to your gallery andcan be easily sorted using the info you’ve assigned. Can’t recall if you wore that outfit to your last meeting? Good Looks can help you remember.

The app also features a calendar with integrated weather forecasting, allowing you to plan your future outfits or view past outfits chronologically. Did you wear that last Wednesday? The calendar acts as your personal style journal to help you add variety to your looks.

Other planning tools within Good Looks include a “wear again” feature that allows you to schedule favorite outfits for a specific date in the future. The app draws from Height & Hands’ web design background to provide an intuitive and seamless user experience set against a simple and visually appealing design.

“With Good Looks, we want to inspire people to shop their own closets and evolve their own sense of style, simply by keeping track of what they wear every day,” said Parker.

Good Looks is available for download on the iPhone App Store for $1.99

Good Looks daily style catalog iPhone app

About Good Looks

Good Looks is a personal style catalog that allows you to capture, sort and plan your outfits, get inspired to shop your closet, evolve your style or get out the door faster. It’s easy to see what works by keeping track of what you’ve worn and when you wore it. Create new versions of your favorites with what you already have in your closet or see what you’re missing and make your shopping trips more efficient. For more information visit http://goodlooksapp.com/.

For style tips and fashion news, follow along at Good Looks Daily.

Win a Nokia Lumia 710 Windows Smartphone!

Contests, Gadgets, Giveaways, New posts, Smartphones, Technology, , ,

Nokia Lumia 710 Windows smartphoneWe are giving away another Nokia Lumia 710 Windows phone!

The winner of the Nokia Lumia 710 giveaway here on The Mommy Insider was Melissa T.!

If you didn’t enter our last contest and even if you did, you can enter to win a Nokia Lumia 710 smartphone on our gadget review blog, GadgetGoddess.com, here.

Past Nokia Lumia 710 blog contest winners not permitted for contest re-entry, and will be disqualified if selected.

Alicia Hagan, Editor

My Husband Has Swimsuit #Confidence Thanks To..

Dad, New posts, Summer Time Fun, , ,

Land’s End.

This week, May 21st through 25th, Lands’ End and SELF Magazine launched the second-annual National Swimsuit Confidence Week.  I reviewed a Lands’ End swimsuit a couple of years ago and still wear the same swimsuit.  Why? Because I feel confident in it.
This year I have seen a lot of blogs where bloggers are writing about swimsuit confidence.  That’s fabulous but upon reading the blog posts about swimsuit confidence, I realized that my husband is much like me in that he’s not anxious to slip into a swimsuit come summer months.

men's land's end rash guard shirts and swimsuits
Lands' End Rash Guard

We are going to Callaway Gardens, a local attraction with a lake beach, zip lining course, bike riding trails, and hiking, this weekend.  Because the lake beach will be open and it will be obvious to our kids that it is open, my husband and I have to suck it up and bring our swimsuits.. possibly even wear them!  You might hear me scream all they way in California.  I don’t know.

You may be wondering why my husband even needs swimsuit confidence.  Men don’t worry about appearance nearly as much as women right? Wrong.  I appreciate that my husband is concerned about his appearance.  It makes him more ‘real’ to me.  I have been known to joke that my husband has a narrower frame that I do and that he is as white as a ghost.  I only say it because he’s said it at some point too.  I wouldn’t just say that.  Just like my husband wouldn’t say “gosh Alicia, you sure are pale curvy”.

Because we are going to be in a potential swimsuit wearing situation this weekend, my husband went shopping for a swimsuit and rash guard that will hide “the stuff that hangs out everywhere”.  Apparently swim shorts don’t do the trick.  A rash guard is what makes him feel most confident at the beach.  Those are his words, not mine!

Why he chose a Lands’ End short sleeve rash guard

  • It covers “the stuff that hangs out everywhere”
  • UPF 50+ fabric blocks damaging UV rays
  • Fits close to the body, won’t “balloon” when you’re in the water
  • Keeps skin safe from abrasion
  • Four-way stretch for easy movement
  • Lightweight nylon/spandex blend

This featherweight cover-up is UPF 50+ which blocks damaging UV rays.  This is something we are all concerned about.  He would spend about 10 minutes spraying himself with SPF, before he started wearing a rash guard.  He still puts sunscreen on the rest of his exposed skin, don’t worry about that!  This rash guard dries with just a few shakes and protects his skin from harsh abrasives like sand which he inevitably ends up rolling around in with the kids.

This year when you are shopping for a swimsuit that will boost your confidence keep in mind that your husband might appreciate having swimsuit confidence too!

Alicia Hagan, Editor

Disclosure: I was not compensated in any way for this post. 

iPhone Photography for Parents: Apps That Will Make Your Life More Colorful Instantly

Gadgets, iPad, iphone, New posts, Photographs, Technology, , , , , , , , ,

The rapidly increasing photographic capabilities of the iPhone are beginning to rival those of standalone cameras. Apple’s flagship smartphone manages to pull off amazing iPhonography without the use of additional lenses and filters. That’s especially convenient for busy parents without a lot of time to fiddle with their camera equipment when trying to capture a moment in time. Here are four amazing iOS apps that will allow you to take stellar photos on the fly with your phone.

Instagram

While Instagram is more closely associated with nostalgic hipsters and the technorati, it’s really perfect for anybody who wants to take distinctive photos. It’s the kind of app that’s tailor-made for taking photos of the kids at the beach. Vacation photos just look better for some reason when they have a washed out, analog color palette created by a custom filter and some post-production effects.  A newer feature of Instagram is that you can import photo from your iphone’s photo album and edit them in Instagram.  I love this! Sometimes I just can’t get to Instagram quick enough to snap a shot using the Instagram app, but now I can snap the shot with the native camera app then import it into Instragram to edit and publish online.

Pros: It is very easy to view your photo with many different filters in just seconds.
Cons: As of now, there isn’t a way to access your Instagram photos via an online interface.  With the number of iPhone users using Instagram, this would be a great feature.

Instagram iPhone photograph example
Instsagram photograph - Click to enlarge

Hipstamatic

Much like Instagram, Hipstamatic allows parents to tweak the look of their family photos to achieve a timeless feel. The stock installation of Hipstamatic costs a mere $1.99, though the base functionality can be extended with “HipstaPaks” comprised of custom filters that run $0.99 a piece. I spent about $5 on “HipstaPaks” for purposes of this story.  Users can preview the add-on HipstaPaks and download the right digital lenses before a photo shoot or family trip, ensuring that you get the perfect look to match any given occasion.  The one thing that I wish Hipstamatic did like Instagram, is allow us to import photographs into the app.  That’s not in Hipstamatic’s plans for now though.
The photographs in the image to the right were all taken with Hipstamatic.  I just changed the film for each photograph. Unlike with Instagram, I couldn’t see the filter being applied to the photo as I lined it up so I didn’t know how the photograph was going to turn out.

Pros: Hipstamatic allows users to share a photo on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram,Tumblr, Flickr, and a Hipstaccount.
Cons: Not easy to switch between films (essentially filters).  You can’t import photographs from your iPhone photo album in order to apply Hipstamatic ‘effects’ to them.

Hipstamatic iPhone photo examples
Hipstamatic photographs - Click to enlarge

moreBeaute2

If you’re a busy, sleep deprived mom who still cares about looking good, moreBeaute2 should be right up your alley. Like a lightweight, mobile version of Photoshop that works automatically, moreBeaute2 snaps amazing pictures while removing wrinkles and dark under-eye circles immediately. In order to get rid of dark under-eye circles and wrinkles, just take a picture and tap the auto-correct button to look flawless in your photos. Like a mild form of airbrushing, it makes everyone look their best. This is one of my favorite iPhonography apps.. for obvious reasons!

Pros: moreBeaute2 can make the most tired mom look awake and fresh, instantly.
Cons: You can’t adjust color or contrast within the app.

moreBeaute2 iPhone photo app
Before | After - Click to enlarge
Software has an impressive ability to make up for the limitations of the underlying hardware that it’s running on, which is especially true when it comes to mobile photography. That’s not to imply that iOS devices are weak when it comes to the quality of their lenses. However, you can take far better pictures of the family with these programs by your side. For weary parents who rely on their trusty iPhone to act as their primary camera, these worthy applications are all you’ll ever need.
Do you have a favorite iPhone photography app?
Share with us in the comments below.  We love to learn about new and interesting apps!
Alicia Hagan, Editor
I was not compensated from any of these app companies, for this story. I purchased all of the apps mentioned above and all opinions are 100% my own.

Skype and FaceTime: The Differences

Gadgets, iPad, iphone, New posts, Technology, ,

[simple_series title=”All posts in the Skype Series”]

 

Do you wonder what the differences between Skype and FaceTime are?  Why should you use Skype over FaceTime?

When I was approached about becoming a Skype ambassador, I thought to myself “why would I want to use Skype regularly instead of FaceTime?”.

Skype Ambassador programJust by asking myself that question, I realized that I had subconciously blocked all of my PC owning family and friends, from my video call list.  Most of my family members own PC’s and do not own an iPhone or iPad.  Let’s just say they live simple lives.  Therefor, I can’t FaceTime with them.  I have cousins who have children that my kids would love to video chat with but until it clicked for me that we can all use Skype, I didn’t even consider it.  With Skype, my kids can chat with any family member who owns a PC, Android device, iOS device, or Mac.

While I love FaceTime for video chatting with my Dad and Sister who both own an iPhone, iPad, and MacBook, FaceTime does not allow me to chat with my PC loving friends and family.

Skype vs FaceTime Feature Comparison

Skype FaceTime
Video chat from PC/Windows Yes No
Video chat from iPhone/iPad/Mac/iOS Yes Yes
Video chat from Android Yes No
Let’s you know who’s available Yes No
Chat function Yes No
Group video calling Yes (Premium feature) No
Send files while you chat Yes No

These comparisons are valid as of May 2012.

Situation when using Skype rocks!

  • If you have a child who is graduating school soon,  Skype is a great way to help grandparents celebrate with you!
  • Include relatives in your child’s birthday celebration
  • Your kids can video chat with Mom or Dad when they are traveling
  • Read a bedtime story to your child when you are traveling
  • Bloggers, catch up with your blogging buddies between events via Skype!

 

Connect with Skype:

Alicia Hagan, Editor

Disclosure: While I am a Skype Ambassador, this post was not required.