Lessons a 3 week-old newborn will teach you

In a sunny little cottage by the sea sleep a tiny baby boy & his mommy. I slip in around 8 and try not to wake them as I turn the door's lock with my key.

Turns out they were both kind of awake anyways, but I thought I'd be nice. :) 

For those of you who didn't know, I am now a "tia" or aunt! Well, sorta. As much of an aunt you can be without being related to someone by blood. 

Meaning I was around while he was being baked in the oven of him mom's guts and I am changing a few diapers, carrying him around on my shoulder and making sure he's happy while his parents get a few moments of reprieve.

Little Baby Jack was born on April 18th, so he's still pretty new to these parts, but he's already figuring out some crucial things:

• Boobs make food. Make sure there are always boobs around.
• Pooping is hard to do. Make sure you give it your all as many times as you can.
• Bouncing is awesome. Make sure to make people bounce you as much as humanly possible.
• Gas is super lame. Make sure to get rid of gas in as many funny ways as possible for maximum crowd shocking effect.
• I am adorable. Make sure to use that to my advantage.

Needless to say, I've already picked up a few tricks of my own in the few precious times I've been able to hang out with Baby Jack and his lovely mum, Katy.

Artificial Heart II felt brooch - by hanaletters - $50 USD

• You are growing at a ridiculous rate right now. Even if I started making your acorn cap that I promised your mum, it wouldn't fit you in a week!
• Sometimes you're just gonna cry cos you feel like it. If you ever feel like toning it down so that your mum can relax for a bit, that'd be a tremendous bonus.
• You totally don't even know how loved you are by everybody yet. One day you will and you'll start smiling on purpose!
• You got your dimples from ME! ...possibly thru osmosis.

I feel really lucky to be able to be a part of Katy, Kevin & Jack's lives right now. I've never been this close to a newborn or helped a kid grow from all stages of life, so this will definitely be weird. But I guess so long as we keep Baby Jack & his family fed & watered, everything will turn out all right. :)

Something else I learned from hanging out with Katy & Baby Jack is that if you feel like doing something awesome, do it! So one day when I felt poopy, I decided to do something awesome to make my friend feel better. Today I drew a gnome farting & framed it to celebrate Katy's birthday. A few weeks ago, I made a grumpy raincloud pee on everyone in shot of my friend's rearview mirror.

Mr. Pissed Off Cloud aka Mr. Tinkles - spur of the moment rear view mirror decoration
Custom awesomeness made for iCKY the Great

I will leave you in the knowledge that sometimes you just got make awesomeness: whether it's a whole baby that you made in your guts for many months, or a few random works of radness that you're excited about. Chances are that if you're excited about it (even if it occasionally frustrates you), it's totally worth doing.

Thanks for teaching me that, Baby Jack. ;)

Let's Dance - New Apps for my iPad2

"The View From Here" - by Steph Cortes on Instagram

As I sit here upside down at the edge of my bed, listening to a weirdly awesome cover of "Electric Feel" by MGMT (which turns out to just be a really well-done remix) on Pandora, I type my very first blog post from my iPad2. And it's kinda awkward... And it's even a little uncomfortable. But most of all, it's REALLY freeing!

This is sort of what I imagined my iPad would be doin' for me: change the way I live my life. I could be off having the most amaze-balls adventures on the planet and I'd be able to tell you about from there!

Though as amaze-balls as these adventures may be, they would be much better if I knew how to share them with you all a bit easier.

After having a lengthy discussion about my severe lack of the knowledge of the modern technological advances in social media with my new friend, Tammy from pUnK rAwK pUrL (who, funny enough, I met via Twitter), we concluded that I need help! So, here goes:

Can you all recommend some awesome new apps for my iPad?

So far, I've found a few new faves after some research, which include:

- Angry Birds

"A bit meta" - by Steph Cortes - shared on Instagram

Although I've stated that it was purely for my Research & Development (as I hope to release a line of Angry Bird amigurumi one day soon), I've gotta admit that more nights than not are ended with an hour of playing this game in the dark.

- Instagram
Hugely due to the fact that I've recently become obsessed with old cameras, this app was an instant recommendation from Tammy. She happens to be a fab photographer, too! Follow her: @punkrawkpurl & follow me, if you're so inclined: @nerdjerk

Screenshot Courtesy of Flipboard.com

- Flipboard
Although I enjoy reading through my social media updates, sometimes they feel liken obligation! Not so in Flipboard! Imagine catching up on all your friends' updates in a rad magazine-style interface. With pictures from posts combined with the blog posts being pulled from the sites onto your Flipboard... It's like walking into a social dream & I kinda never wanna wake up!

- Square
This app has changed the SF craft fair scene forever! And it's quite arguably the best credit card processing system n the market. Although I haven't had the chance to test mine out in public yet, Square is one of the reasons I had to buy an iPad! I'll let you know how it treats me at Maker Faire.

- Pandora
I've loved Pandora for a long time, but playing the Coconut Records channel (pretty much all the time, as I've only had to skip maybe one song an hour on average) and doing whatever I may be doing at the time makes me feel like I've finally arrived in the 21st century.

- iA Writer

A definite strike against the iPad, in my humble opinion, was the lack of a word processing application... that is, other then the "Notes" app. I thought it was some kind of joke. But, for what it was, it was helpful. Then Willo from Willotoons recommended iA Writer on Twitter. And when I read Stephen Fry's glowing review, I was SOLD! Simple, super clean & awesome.

Watch the following video for a demo of said awesomeness.

iA Writer for iPad from Oliver Reichenstein on Vimeo.

- BlogPress

And last, but not least, there's the app that I'm using ask we speak... BlogPress is pretty impressive for what it is so far. Although I can't do all the fancy stuff I normally can do in Blogger (maybe I can, but I just haven't learned how to do it yet), one can appreciate the novelty of being able to produce a blog post from one's iPad. So, just for the novelty, it's worth the $2.99!

So, now that you all know my taste for apps, have you whipper-snappers got any recommendations?

Any input would be greatly appreciated, as I'm the technological equivalent of an 80 year-old woman despite the nearly 28 year-old body.

- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad [but finally edited with Blogger]