Have you ever been out trying on a new dress, in the bathroom trying a new hairstyle, or in the mirror trying on makeup and wish you had a second opinion? Or a third? Or, possibly, a thirty-eighth? Well, I just downloaded a brand-spanking new app called Fashism and I think it may be your answer! The app was made as a companion for the website which allows users to upload photos of themselves trying on their new gear or a new 'do (or something else new and shiny). Then, like any other social site worth its salt, it allows users to ask all of the other inhabitants of fashism.com what they think about their look.

This is me asking about my braids that I wish I could leave in longer, but I'm certain must be taken down this week.

I posted the original look and a pic of the look as it is now after wetting it approximately six times since I first styled it. I asked whether it was time to re-braid or re-twist again. I would love to get another week out of this style, but I am 99% sure that is wishful thinking. The remaining percent I leave to the fashismists while I cross my fingers and hope for the best.

You can also play the role of fashion advisor. I found myself commenting on other posts as well. There were questions about everything ranging from hair, a new outfit, bangs, jewelry, etc. You can ask practically every superficial question you could imagine in a world where it's not frowned upon! All opinions welcome! Well, maybe not all....get your big girl face on...But it's all in the name of enhancing your hotness factor, so, don't hate-appreciate!

Note: Most of the commenters are not educated about kinky, natural hair, so beware. I have found that you can delete disrespectful posts, if necessary. However, I would recommend that those who are still establishing their confidence in their looks in their natural hair journey should think about this site as a possible tool later on in their journey.

The companion app was originally made for (and makes the most sense on) the iPhone. But it works on the iPod Touch and on the iPad if you upload your pics to your photo album and then to the web. A perfectly viable, yet less streamlined option. Take a look at the screen shots below to get an idea of how the app works out on an iPad.

As you can see, the interaction is pretty standard as far as social networking goes: posts and comments. So, it's very easy to pick up. Other fashism users can vote on whether they like your look or not so should you get a lot of votes, you could be featured on the front page of the site. Hope you're not camera shy!

If you're one of those discerning ladies that doesn't trust the opinion of your significant other as he is trying to rush you to make a decision already, you might give this app a try!

Pros: New, interesting way of asking, "How does this look?"

Cons: Just a touch buggy. First iteration of the app. Closed out on me once while checking it out. May need to be updated to fix that. Seems to cater to the younger set, but facebook started out that way too and boy, did that change! Also, please see the note above. Again, you need a thick skin to participate on the site. Remember, you can delete and still play nicely. You have been forewarned!

Recommend: Yes, if you like other opinions on your look and want a good dose of honesty. Until there are more naturally kinky ladies participating on the site, you may not get altogether accurate responses about your hair as they will mostly be from more mainstream voices. Nevertheless, for the pioneers out there, you can have a ball with it! Also, clothing, jewelry, etc. can be discussed if you'd like to keep folks outta your hair. This app would also be nice for you if you fancy yourself part of the fraternal order of fashion police!

The Fashism App is free in the App Store.

My husband loves Spades. Every Friday night, the hubby goes to play Spades with the guys. Whenever the guys have a party, they play, what? You got it. Spades.

I never learned how to play Spades when I was younger. This is what makes iDevices SO educational (chuckle). I have been practicing my Spades chops on the iPod and the iPad with iSpadez.

You can play Classic, Deuces High, Suicide, etc. If you look at the screenshot above, you can see it's a pretty extensive list. But, I'm still on Standard because I play on the virtual baby table. Which reminds me...You can also set the degree of difficulty. I stay in the middle ground myself. But if you can stomp with the big dogs, you can fast forward to Advanced!

The trick of the game is deciding how many bids you actually have and not cutting over your partner which I am still learning. See? We could have won this game a long time ago.

So far, I've only played the computer. But the game can be played online with players who can access the game as well. It's available for the iPod Touch, the iPad, and Android devices. Very fun-and you can practice your trash talking while you're at it!

I have two children-a girl child and a boy child. The boy is on his way to towering over me, is one test away from a black belt, and his voice is getting to be as deep as the late Barry White's. But, it's the girl child that scares me. Five years old, slight of frame, and as cute as a button, her sticky prying fingers scare the bejesus out of me!

I give her my iPod/iPad to keep her occupied at times. Sometimes while doing my hair or cooking dinner or something else time consuming. There are a slew of games that are very educational for small children her age. What gets me is that she gets....curious. She wants to click the home button and go galavanting all over my apps! Now, I really don't have anything obscene to hide or anything. But, the possibility that one of my babies...I mean my apps could be mistakenly deleted sends chills up and down my spine! Hey Apple! How about a baby lock feature for apps? One that turns the deletion feature off so that a parent can manually turn the feature on when their child is playing all willy nilly like? Help me out a little, 'kay?

I may as well admit it. I am an adult closet gamer. I don't play enough to be hard core. But I do play enough to have a problem, and Sims 3 World Adventures gives me a problem. I have burned so many hours playing it that I'm near ashamed of myself!

I first fell in love with the Sims with Sims 2. I made a Sim for every one close to me...annnndddd some not so close. In the game, I lived out all my fantasies, dressed any way I wanted to, bought anything I wanted with cheats that could expand my bank account thicker than I've ever seen in real life, and slapped around-er, I mean...played around less than nicely...with, uh, some of the other, uh, Sims. Ahem. Moving right along, Sims 3 only made my love of the game that much worse with the ability to travel all over the game in a breathtaking virtual world, many more responsibilities, more custom personalities, beautiful homes that you can alter (or create your own), more life paths, etc. Sims 3 World Adventures is an expansion pack that I did purchase but haven't used. However, the port to the iDevices was faithful to the point that you can get some semblance of the game when you are in desperate need of a Sims 3 fix.

Meet my Sim, Trina. Notice her fly haircut dyed a beautifully smoldering red (I love red hair). You can change the appearance of your Sim to suit your sense of style or to go completely against your own grain. It's all up to you! Go on and get that haircut you're to chicken to do!

Oh, she is a little bit preoccupied with her fiancée....We'll catch up with her, uh...later. While playing any of the Sims games, you have to make sure the Sim's needs (hunger, hygiene, bladder, etc.) are met. The Sims games were built from this whole idea. You can keep your Sim pretty satisfied with life by keeping up with just those basics.

Trina lives in Sunset Valley in the States. She has her own home, neighbors, and a job which she uses to afford new items for her home and trips abroad. Trips abroad make her eligible for promotion! Don't you wish you could take an imaginary trip and then go demand a promotion from your boss for it-and actually get it?! Well, in Sims 3, you can do it! For a small fee, Trina can visit China, Egypt and France. Each destination has a featured historical place, souvenirs to buy and sell back in the States, markets and new friends. Today, Trina went to China to see The Great Wall!

Isn't Sim China beautiful?

A sista likes to eat!

Catching some trivia!

Strike a pose! Like my crouching tiger?

And make new homegirls! This one loves all my geeky jokes! (snort)

All throughout the game, there are mini-games and such to gain simoleons (Sim dollars), gain skills, and to fulfill wishes. Do favors for friends and strengthen relationships. Offend other Sims, and make enemies. You can make your Sim totally love life or make her thoroughly understand your plight. You are The Sim Master!

Why Sims 3 World Adventures? Because TGIF! Take a virtual trip! Pull out one less hair, release some stress, and let your inner wild child free!

Pros: Very nice complement to the Sims Series! Great time killer!

Cons: Not the whole game.

Recommend: Yes, if you like light gaming.

Sims 3 World Adventures is $6.99 in the App Store. Have a fun Friday!

Piggy-backing off the post from yesterday on the Kindle App, I would simply love it if ForeverCurlyCatrina (a fotki natural hair goddess*) did a book (especially an e-Reader version) showcasing how-to's of her cornrows and flat-twist styles! I'm SO serious.  I wrote her about it on her YT channel, LOL! And she has two videos already which would make great additions to a multimedia Kindle version.

What's wrong with me?  I have no shame.

*I hear fotki has been having trouble lately (I read about it here and here)  so be careful and wait until the coast is clear if you want to go search for her there.

There's a rumored version of a smaller iPad coming out this year or early next year.  I want one!!

I just read on CNET (one of my favorite geeky sites), that there is an iPad case called the KeyCase with a bluetooth keyboard built into it that converts the iPad into a portable laptop! Isn't that beautiful? It's already sold out, but according to the site, should be back soon.  This KeyCase raises a question for me...I wonder if you can go back and forth easily between touching and typing....Hmmmm....

Although I love my laptop, I also love not having to lug it around anymore.  I have emailed on my iPad and even edited and sent documents like my resumé on it.  But I'd probably never use it to type an entire paper!  This KeyCase could change that! I may have to go back to school too in which case, I'd be writing a lot of papers.  And, should I become heavily business-oriented, I might really need it! This process is called gross justification and is really effective for supporting a gadget habit.

Should be about $90 if you wanna pick one up.  That is, whenever it becomes available.

Now, the size of the case may be an issue depending on if it will work with my brand new 7-inch iPad.  A geek has gotta plan ahead...

Did you hear the bell?  You know what that means.  It's back to school time!  I thought I'd kick off the school year with an app fave that also doubles as an educational tool.  It's Amazon's Kindle App.

By now, most every geek knows that Amazon has had it's own digital reading device called the Kindle for quite some time.  But with the addition of other e-Readers and devices that have e-reader capabilities,  Amazon was kind enough to expand the app to be used on non-Kindle/Kindle-compatible devices like the iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad, PC, Mac and Blackberry.  Books can be bought and downloaded from the Kindle Store directly to your device!

I am a bookworm.  I have books galore.  In fact, I have so many books that my husband is currently installing a bookshelf unit that encompasses a whole wall in the office of our home.  Needless to say, I love it when I can save space by purchasing a digital version of a book.  Plus, I don't have to carry a backpack to do it! And, for you spend thrifts out there, it saves money too! Most e-books that I've purchased I've found to cost considerably less than it's physical counterpart.  A book that costs around $35 at my local bookstore often costs between $9.99 and $15 on my device.  There's no shipping and handling or waiting.  This may be the only time when instant gratification is both acceptable and educational.  You get your book in seconds! If you're into penny-pinching (or hiding your book spending habits from the hubby who just can't fathom why any woman would need so many books), this might be the app for you!

I have this app installed on three of my devices and the sync is seamless. I can begin reading a book on my iPod Touch and when I open it up on my iPad or my Macbook Pro, it opens up to the page where I left off. That's a nice trick! You can also highlight, write notes and bookmark on any one of your devices, open up the app on another device and your highlights, notes and bookmarks are still there.  Pretty cool!

Take a look at one of my newer purchases.

It's Teri from Tightly Curly! Thanks Teri for a great digital hair book! Many of you kinky-curly haired ladies out there may know her as the lady who introduced the method of combing conditioner through wet hair for easier detangling and setting by leaving the conditioner in for maximum curl clumpage.  This book is brimming with information on her method and how to cultivate curly hair and the Kindle App delivers it all splendidly.  It retains the pictures and the text so well that I really didn't miss the actual book.

There are even some features that are (gasp) better than an actual book!  Look below.

The Table of Contents has hyperlinks! Whichever spot I want to jump to in the book, I click on the title, and off I go.  Once inside the book, I can also call up a menu where I can jump to other spots in the book such as back to the Table of Contents, a specific location or to one of my bookmarks or notes.  Nice, huh?

By tapping and holding on a word in the book, the dictionary function is called up so that any term I'm not familiar with can be searched.  There are links within the definition that will take me to google or wikipedia for further information on the term.  That rocks!

For my viewing pleasure, I can change the font size.  I can also change the background and text colors from the usual white background and black text to black background with white text or cream background with sepia text.  So my reading can be easier on the eyes with just one tap.

Page turning feels very natural as well.  I can drag the edge of the screen and the page flips over just like a real book! So, even the feel of reading a book is retained.  You can change this setting however, if you totally want to diss it.

Sometimes, I just want a sample of a book before I have to buy it.  I can't stand it when I go to a bookstore and as I'm thumbing through, the attendant is peeking over my shoulder and then I get, "Can I help you?" Umm...no, can I help you?  With this app, I can sample a chapter and put it back on the shelf if I don't want it and I've saved myself from attendant angst for another day.

And there are tons of books to choose from!  A whopping 630,000+ and counting as more and more publishers are attempting to get into the e-Reader business.  I have cookbooks, de-cluttering books, prayer books, workbooks, fiction, non-fiction-and the list goes on.  I love having choices, don't you?   I'm one of the many consumers that believes that both physical books and digital books are valuable.  But I am leaning over to the digital book as my book of choice for pain-free portability, price and perks.   Publishers, are you listening?

And best of all, Amazon's Kindle App is free! That's right.  You can save your pennies for your first book purchase.  Go ahead and download it for your Kindle-compatible device!

Click here for a geeky comparison of the text resolution on a Kindle vs an iPad.

Pros: Carry your whole digital library with you (well up to about 3500 books, I believe).  Jump to anywhere within the book, instantly.  Change the font and the background to suit your reading. Highlight and take notes on anything in the book.  Read on any of your Kindle-compatible devices-from the place you left off.  Look up terms in the built in dictionary.  It's free!

Cons: Some books don't transfer very well-sample first (although out of my 36 books in the app, I've only found one like that). Currently, you cannot subscribe to magazines or newspapers, etc, on non-Kindle devices.   While you do not have to be online to read previously downloaded content, you must have internet access to purchase books.

Recommend: If you have a voracious reading appetite, yes! I mean...duh, it's free!

You should give yourself a gold star right now!! And in a second, you're going to know why.

But first, I just realized that I haven't given my iPod Touch any lovin' since I started this blog! Poor baby! Well, as I sit here, with conditioner and a plastic cap on my head, I will put off my beauty routine a little longer to tell you about one of my favorite apps on the iPod Touch. Of course this means, that will keep me from getting my little gold star for a moment longer.  But what can I say?  I love you guys!!

With that, I give you HomeRoutines.

I came across HomeRoutines while a newbie trying to keep up with FlyLady decluttering strategies.  Let me tell you, HomeRoutines is a keeper!

In the app, I enter my daily and weekly things to do around the house.  When you initially download the app, you will get some sample things to do.  But, you can add more tasks or edit and tailor the items you're given to suit your own home and your own needs.  Who knows the hectic craze of your life better than you, right?

As you can see in the pic above, this is "Renew your spirit day", today being Sunday and all...But even that can be changed to anything you like from studying for an exam (like my Philosophy exam I had in May) to girls' night out...to family day...to implementing a spa day so you don't forget to give back to you for all this hard work!

You can also see that this week I was in Zone 3 which was a focus on the laundry and the bathroom.  The Zones rotate so that you complete a different Zone every week.  In a month's time, you've hit your whole house! If you are the help in your house, you can't beat that! As for me, I still have a couple more loads of laundry.  But my bathrooms are glistening!  Check out what I have to do to complete my weekly tasks:

Yeah...gotta get that hurr did girl....I actually clean my bathrooms every week.  Every morning I "Swish and Swipe."  But beyond S&S, cleaning the bathrooms every week means that I use Lysol wipes on the sinks and floors and clean the toilets once every week.  But, when it's up for my focus week, the bathrooms get the bizness! That's using the sponges, the heavy duty cleansers, the bucket, and some old fashioned elbow grease.  Whew! I'm tired just thinking about that. Anyway, take a peek down at the bottom of the screenshot.  There's a timer with 15 minutes on it just waiting for ya! You'd be surprised how much you can get done in 15 minutes though. I turn the clock on, bump to my favorite playlist, dust the furniture and get my sun room vacuumed in no time!

At the end of the day, I have an evening routine.  Looks like this.

The boys are away and the baby girl and I just ate dinner.  The dishes are in the dishwasher and the kitchen is all wiped down, so I'm about to get another couple of stars! Now, that "Put away clean laundry"....Yeah, still working on keeping that consistent, especially since I have a whole laundry room now (love that).  There's a screen kinda like this that goes along with my Zones too.  For instance, because my Zone for this week was the laundry and bathroom, there is a focus tasks screen just like this evening tasks screen that shows all the steps it takes to get the Zone completed.  It tells me to scrub the bench and the sink, disinfect the trash can, clean the shower tray and doors, and clean the cobwebs (which wasn't an issue at my old house, but is now), etc., etc.  That way, I don't forget anything (including the etc.'s)!

Now, back to that whole star thingie.  Along the side, you can see stars that you can award yourself with when you've completed a task.  I love getting stars!! Such a nerd! So at the end of the day, I can review all of my accomplishments.

At the end of the day, this will have my stars for getting my vacuuming, dusting and getting the hurr did in the house too!

Once you've collected your stars, you can manually clear them or have them reset.  Mine are due to reset at 3 a.m. to be ready for me to collect all over again tomorrow! There's no negative reinforcement.  It's all just good vibes! This app helps clutter bugs to build discipline in setting one's house in order.  And it's just a nice way to reward yourself for keepin' it movin'.

Now, you have the info you need to go give yourself a gold star!

Pros: If you're into decluttering, this app leaves nothing out! Works with a number of decluttering programs.  Let's you get things done in an encouraging way.  Check out their info site for more details.

Cons: HomeRoutines was initially built for the small screen of the iPhone and iPod Touch.  While it will work on the iPad, there is no native HomeRoutines iPad at as of yet.  For micro-managers, this app will not allow you to prioritize anything or get at minute details and is not intended to be the go to to do list for your professional job outside the home.  Click here for more details.

Recommend: If you are clutter-challenged, or would just like to put your house on a schedule, definitely yes.

Currently, HomeRoutines is 4.99 in the App Store.

Check out this WSJ article about the upcoming LG tablet, complete with claims that it "will be better than the iPad."

What do you think about that?