The latest from our Heart and Soul

When I was in school, we worked on a stop motion film project and I loved it but the equipment wasn’t something we had lying around the house. The school provided the cameras and tripods and we worked on them during class. When I took my 9-year old daughter to see the Tim Burton exhibit in Toronto, she too developed a fascination for stop motion.

Thanks to the National Film Board (NFB), all you need to create your own stop motion film is an iPad 2 (you need the camera) and PixStop, the NFB’s free stop-motion app.

The app is easy to use, Set-up your shot and hit the camera button and repeat, moving your elements slightly each time. My daughter picked up on it right away. If you take a picture you didn’t mean to take (hand in the way or element in the wrong spot), you can delete it easily. At any time you can view your film and add more images. You can keep adding images to the end of your film or if you want to add a few frames in the middle of your film (after viewing it you feel it’s jumpy), just select the frame you want to add images AFTER and go back into camera mode. You can also add music from your iTunes library (make sure you have permission to use the clip), add a title and synopsis to your film, and adjust the frames per second your film. When you’re happy your film you can post it to YouTube save it onto your camera roll. It’s that easy!

If you want to edit your film, move images around, add overlays, titling and more, you can bring the movie into iMovie. Unfortunately I wasn’t able to import right from the iPad’s camera roll like other movies. I ended up emailing it to the machine and making the edit.

The NFB’s PixStop iPad 2 app is a lot of fun and easy to use and the price of FREE makes it one of those must have apps. Let your creative juices flow.

Here’s my daughter’s Christmas message to you, created by her using her iPad2 and the PixStop app.

Whether it’s back to school shopping, birthday gifts or just a treat for you, finding something on sale makes that purchase extra sweet. The new ShopCatch smartphone app (free), from TorStar Digital, puts finding those bargains, sales and exclusive discounts right in the palm of your hand.

The ShopCatch app lets you customize how you find deals: closest (using your location), category (such as apparel, books, electronics) or alphabetically by store name.

You can view deals in either a list form or if you are more visual, you can look at the deals laid out on a map. Finding deals near you isn’t where the functionality of ShopCatch ends. Users can get more information on a specific bargain, download a coupon (should one exist for the deal), share their find through their social media channels like twitter and facebook, bookmark the sale for easy reference later and even get directions to the store using Google technology.

I love that if you find a deal you like but it’s not at a store close to you, you can check where else the deal might be offered, one of the store’s other locations. And if you are planning on visiting a mall to take advantage of one of the sales you spotted, you can search what other bargains are available at that same mall. Now you can make your trip really worthwhile.

If you create an account (which you can do right from the app), you can bookmark sales that interest you for easy retrevial, plus you can follow a mall or specific store you like to visit to keep in the know about future sales. Creating an account does mean you’ll also receive weekly emails from ShopCatch. I could probably do without another e-newsletter.

Currently the ShopCatch app only highlights exclusive shopping deals, mobile coupons and in-store promotions throughout the Greater Toronto Area but it is in the process of expanding nationwide. UPDATE: ShopCatch is now national with plans to expand into the United States.

Next time you have the itch to go shopping, check your ShopCatch app first and you’re bound to find something on sale that you just have to have.

Disneyland offers families a trip into fantasy, full of thrilling rides, spectacular shows and favourite characters. Now families can experience Disneyland in their own living room with the new Xbox Kinect Disneyland Adventure game ($49.99 Cdn).

Explore your favourite areas within Disneyland on your own or with a friend (up to two players can explore the park together). Visit Tomorrowland and don your spacesuit as you take-off in Space Mountain. Walk over to Fantasyland sled down a snowy mountain at the Matterhorn Bobsleds. Pop into the Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique to done a costume from your favourite Disney character.

There are 18 Disneyland attractions offering you 100 challenging quests, from tossing snowballs at yetis to rescue Goofy to collecting autographs of your favourite characters.

Our family enjoyed this game on so many different levels.

VISITING DISNEYLAND

There’s the park experience. Your character can walk around the park grounds, just like you remember them from your own trip to Disneyland. You can meet characters within the park and interact with them: get their autograph, give them a hug, do a dance, take their photos. Just like in the theme park, there are photo stops in front of iconic landmarks, like the castle, where you can stop and grab a photo of yourself for your memory book. And of course there are rides and shops to visit.

The kids loved walking the streets, seeing the rides and recounting memories from their last trip. I must admit, I found myself doing that too. I love that the characters in the game give players challenges, like getting autographs or finding lost objects, but you were also free to explore on your own.

Along with collecting autographs (which you could view within your various autograph books – actual fun signatures like at the park), the kids were also excited about collecting pins. Pin collecting is something our kids do when visiting Disney in general so it was a nice touch to add within the game. Along with earning coins by participating in games, players earned pins when they completed certain tasks.

VISITING THE ATTRACTIONS

The kids were excited to see some of their favourite attractions included within the Disney Adventure game, like Space Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, and Haunted Mansion to name a few. Although the attractions looked like the ones at the theme park from the outside, the actual ride experience was different, and that’s a good thing. To be honest, sitting on a train car riding around Big Thunder Mountain or a space ship zipping in the dark, just isn’t the same on a TV screen as it would be in real life.

The games uses elements of the live experience but adds more of a challenge spin to them. On the Matterhorn Bobsleds you are on a snowy hill zipping around a mountain, but you have to steer the car with your body to collect coins  as well as avoid obstacles (and yeti attacks). After you complete a level you can move on to the next level, a big snowball fight with the yetis.

The same was true with Space Mountain. You rode your ship through space, dodging astoroids and black holes, collecting coins. In Alice in Wonderland, you were the croquet ball, having to steer it through the card arches. In Pirates of the Caribbean, you were paddling through underground caves, avoiding dead pirate attacks.

All the games had you ducking and jumping and leaning to play which is the great thing about the Kinect game system.

OTHER GREAT GAME ELEMENTS

Players could collect coins walking around the park and playing games. These coins can be used within the various park shops to buy clothing, costumes and other accessories (like autograph books). I was please to see that the costume prices weren’t ridiculous. Within a few hours of game play the kids were able to grab enough coins to buy one of the higher priced costumes. Nothing can be more disheartening in a family game than not being able to get the prize.

Players can walk through the park, from section to section, to explore or find their next attraction just like they would at the actual park. But a park map is available should you loose your bearing or want to jump right to a specific part of the park or even a specific ride. I loved that the digital map, as well as the game insert map, are all modeled after the actual maps you get in the park. It’s a little thing but it really makes a connection back to the real park experience.

Although we all love the game, from the 4-year old to the 40-something year old, there were a few frustrations with the kinect system. Although my son and I didn’t really care much about what our digital characters looked like, my two daughters spent a great deal of time crafting their characters (the customization is a little limiting). This was great, until they fell off the game space (ducked too low or stepped away). When they signed back in, the game didn’t remember their character (heaven help us if it loaded a boy instead of a girl too). You do have the option to change your avatar but it’s kind of inconvenient when you’re in the middle of game play. We just had to remind everyone to stay within the game zone unless they were done playing, but this did seem to happen quite a few times to us.

And about the game zone, the character issue aside, it was great to have the options to drop in and out during the game. You could switch from one player to two back to one without interrupting the game. A nice feature when you have finicky kids playing.

Disneyland Adventure is rated Everyone 10+ due to mild cartoon violence, like the yetis or pirates attacking you. My 4-year old played most of the game except the Haunted Mansion as she thought the ghosts were a little scary.

Of course there is another drawback to the Disneyland Adventure game. I joked that with this game there would be no need to visit Disneyland again, that Disneyland would be in our living room. However, I’ve discovered from playing the game that I now want to go back to Disneyland. The recreation reminds me so much of our great experience I want to relive it again. But even if you’ve never been to Disneyland before, you’ll have just as much fun exploring the park, interacting with characters and participating in the attractions.

I’ve come to rely on my iPhone. I use it for calls, email, calendar, finding directions with the built-in maps; I’ve even used it to entertain my kids when I’m out. My iPhone goes with me everywhere.

But it can become cumbersome when pushing a stroller. Walking the kids to school with the stroller, my iPhone sits in my pocket, not very helpful if I’m trying to use it.

Then I was introduced to a neat little gadget (and you know how I love my gadgets). The Texthook is designed to strap on to the handle of your stroller and holds your iPhone (or whatever smartphone you have. It’s compatible for a variety).

The Texthook is a black plastic devise that has a Velcro strap on the bottom. The Velcro strap is what holds the Texthook onto your stroller handle; being Velcro means it can also adjust to any handle thickness easily and also makes it easy to remove, though most times I just removed my phone and kept the Texthook strapped to the handle.

The Texthook itself comes in a fixed width but the height is adjustable to work with a number of different smartphones. I found the Texthook a little wide for my iPhone though the top part of the Texthook cradle has a lip to hold the phone in place. The height adjusts with a simple squeeze of two pieces in the back, like pinching them together, and it has some preset locking heights. I did find with my iPhone that the phone started to wobble back-and-forth after a few minutes of walking. It never fell out, I don’t think it ever would because of the top clip, but the back-and-forth movement was a little annoying. I think wider phones that fit in the fixed width wouldn’t have this issue as much.

Sadly I wasn’t able to use my morphie Juice Pack battery case with the Texthook; it was just too thick.

As for functionality though, the Texthook did the job. I could get directions on my map and have it right in front of me while I was walking versus stopping and pulling it out of my pocket. I could check text messages with an easy finger tap. I even took a hands-free call (though I’m sure a headset would have been a little clearer).

The other advantage of the Texthook was using it to entertain my kids. Instead of worrying about my daughter dropping my iPhone, I had it resting in the Texthook and my daughter could play a memory matching game while we walked and shopped. I could only use programs in the vertical position since the device, although it rotates slightly left and right, it doesn’t flp to the horizontal position. I only tried the Texthook on our stroller, but you could probably attach this to any handled item like a bike or shopping cart.

* Product was provided for the purpose of this review

The folks at Texthook want to make your mobile life a little easier so they're offering one (1) EverythingMom member their own Texthook (value $25.99 US). To enter tell us how the Texthook would make your life easier.

This contest is only open to EverythingMom members. Not a member? It’s quick and easy to join. Contest is open to Canadian and United States residents and ends May 31, 2010. One (1) EverythingMom member will be randomly chosen after that.