Day 360: 12/27/13- Heyday App

Day 360: 12/27/13- Heyday App
New Thing:  Heyday App 
Inspiration: iphone, journaling        
Time: Very little time.
Bottom Line: Helps me take away the sting from failing at journaling.  

Reflection: Today, I found a new app to try out: Heyday. Here is the discription: 

Effortless Journaling - Heyday transforms the photos and videos on your iPhone into a beautiful journal, presenting you with a delightful way to rediscover your most important memories. And since life happens when you least expect it, Heyday automatically chronicles the places you go and the things you see so you’ll never forget a meaningful place or moment again.

So far, I like it and it does help me to see everything in a great timeline. Journal failure no more! 

Day 289: 10/17/13- New Running App

Day 289: 10/17/13- New Running App  New Thing: New Running App
Inspiration: New phone
Time: 45 mins.         
Bottom Line: Hey guys, did you know there are these things called "app" that are applications that you can put on your phone and use them to do things. Check them out. I have a feeling these things might have a chance to stick around. 

Running: For real. I like this.

Day 288: 10/16/13- Get a Smart Phone

Day 288: 10/16/13- Get a Smart Phone 
New Thing: Get a smart phone   
Inspiration: Ken, my old Fred Flintstone phone   
Time: A life time       Bottom Line: Wait, you can check your e-mail on these things???!!!

Reflection: Well, it's happened. I have finally joined my fellow humans by getting one of these "smart phones" of which you all speak. Did you know that you can go on the inter-webs with one of these things? whoa. 

Day 252: 9/9/13- Take a Virtual Pilgrimage to the World's Largest Cave

Day 252: 9/9/13- Take a Virtual Pilgrimage to the World's Largest Cave    
New Thing: Take a virtual pilgrimage to the world's largest cave    
Inspiration: Friend's facebook page     
Time: A few mins.       
Bottom Line: I want to go to there. 

Reflection: Do yourself a favor and read this post/watch this video from the Huffington Post, of the recently found world's largest cave, The Son Doong Cave in Vietnam. Here is the description:

The Son Doong Cave in Vietnam is the biggest cave in the world. It's over 5.5 miles long, has a jungle and river, and could fit a 40-story skyscraper within its walls. But nobody knew any of that until four years ago. The newly discovered cave has been touted as the largest in the world, although other caves vie for the title of longest (Mammoth Cave in Brownsville, Kentucky nabs that title with about 400 miles of passageways) and deepest (Krubera Cave in the nation of Georgia). 

I have been to Mammoth Cave and was just amazed. But the thing about this cave that almost had me in tears was the rain-forest that it has inside. And we just found this thing! Just watch it and try not to be awe-struck. God is so cool! 

Day 248: 9/5/13- New App for Interpreting and Meditating on Christian Art

Day 248: 9/5/13- New App for Interpreting and Meditating on Christian Art
New Thing: art/y/fact.Xn
Inspiration: The eFormation Conference               
Time: About 20 mins. 
Bottom Line: Good stuff. 

"The Last Supper" Nikolai Ge 1863

Reflection:I decided to try out a new app for my evening meditation tonight called "art/y/fact.Xn. Here is the app. description:

art/y/fact.Xn is a tool for interpreting and meditating with Christian art. What is the difference between one painting of the Crucifixion and another? Users will be able to figure this out for themselves with the aid of this app. Christian artworks are found in museums, churches, books, magazines and web sites but often users are at a loss to understand the rich meanings of these works. The app offers interpretive tools for artworks about Jesus, Mary, other figures and stories from the Bible, Saints, Angels and Demons. The 100+ articles about themes common in Christian art include Basic Info, a list of What to Look For, and questions that guide General, Personal, and Historical Interpretations of the artworks. In addition, the app provides tools from the worlds of art, history, and theology to help the user dig deeper into the meaning of an artwork. Because a user sometimes wants an inner experience of Christian art, the app also contains six audio meditations. The user selects an artwork to meditate with, plugs in their earbuds, and chooses a meditation that connects to their experience of the artwork chosen. The app is for Christians and anyone else who wants a richer experience of Medieval, Renaissance, and Baroque art, or the Christian art of any other period.

I was pretty impressed with the the app once I figured out how to use it. I chose to meditate on the above panting of the Last Supper and listened to the guided meditation to help the Spirit show me things that I might not have seen by only looking at it with my eyes instead of gazing on it with my heart. 

The first thing that stuck me was how dark and disfigured Judas was as Jesus seems heavy with the weight of the moment. Secondly, I noticed that there was a disciple in the background that seems to have fainted. I wondered why. Then I noticed the bowl, towel and jar that Jesus must have used to wash the disciples feet--a tender moment between them all now over. It lasted a while and was very dramatic. All that without even touching the interpretation feature of the app! I imagine that using this with the actual painting in front of you would be even better. 

Day 170: 6/19/13- Dance Dance Revolution

Day 170: 6/19/13- Dance Dance Revolution      
New Thing- Dance Dance Revolution           
Inspiration: Ken & Little D.         
Time: I wasn't great--so not that long really.                 
Bottom Line: Dance, Dance!

Reflection: We headed out to the North Eastern PA today for Eagles Mere and on the way we stoped to get dinner and played a few arcade games. D. and I tried Dance Dance Revolution for the first time and it was fun! I was almost good enough to work up a sweat. 

Day 152: 6/1/13- eFormation 2013

Day 152: 6/1/13- eFormation 2013       
New Thing- eFormation Conference       
Inspiration: Eileen, Virginia Theological Seminary, Ministry in the Virtual Age  Time: All Day  Bottom Line: Ministry on the inter-webs  

The first place that Traveling St. David was spotted this summer- VTS

Reflection: Eileen and I traveled down to Virgina Theological Seminary today for a great ministry conference called eFormation 2013. Here is the description for the mulit-workshop day: 

More and more, the work of Christian faith formation and discipleship is happening online, or at least with help from social media and other Web technology. Parishioners are forming support groups on Facebook to extend their communities’ mutual care beyond Sunday morning. Christians are tweeting if they ♥ Jesus. Digital disciples are praying and serving with help from Mobile content, and apps nurture their spiritual practices and encourage them to bring their Christian faith to bear on the many aspects of their busy lives. Although our proclamation remains the same, the world is changing very quickly; our ideas about ways to form disciples for that world need to change with it. A follow-up to last year’s successful e-Formation Learning Exchange will once again convene Christian formation practitioners who want to discover and share ways that technology can support discipleship. 

There was just SO much to learn about how to help people connect with God and the Church in new and creative ways. Our heads were spinning with ministry ideas as we left for the drive home. We also had an awesome dinner as well! Thanks, Eileen-you rock! 

Day 149: 5/29/13- Take a Solar Walk

Day 149: 5/29/13- Take a Solar Walk          
New Thing- Use the Solar Walk App          
Inspiration: Little D.         
Time: Almost an hour                              
Bottom Line: Cosmic. 

Reflection: I had read about the apple App "Solar Walk" in a parenting magazine and since D. has shone such an interest in space recently, I decided to download it. Here is the description:

Have you ever built a Solar system model? Cups, bowls, and papier-mache balls are in the past, because Solar Walk is a time-sensitive accurate information-packed interactive model of the Solar system and the Milky Way galaxy. This 3D Solar System model lets you navigate through space and time, see all the planets in close-up, learn their trajectories, inner structures, history of their exploration, points of interest and more. It even has detailed 3D models of the most interesting man-made satellites. Use 3D mode to get a more realistic experience and zoom out to view and spin the entire Galaxy!
 
 MAIN FEATURES:
• GALAXY view - absolutely magical zoom out to view the whole galaxy option.
• TIME MACHINE - set any date you want including even minutes and take a travel through space and time.
• MOVIES - explanatory movie collection about the Earth’s phenomena.
• SATELLITES - real-time trajectories of the most interesting artificial Earth's satellites.
• INFO about all planets - general info, its name, its mass, radius, distance to the sun, internal structure with the picture and science missions.
• MOONS of DIFFERENT PLANETS: select a planet like Earth, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars or Urano and observe how many moons they have and their track around the planet. Select one of the moons and learn.


It is really cool and very memorizing. But he best part was hearing D. tell me all the things that she had learned about in school about space. She knew things that I didn't even know! Warmed this mother's heart. 

Day 27: 1/27/13 - Celebrate National Tea Month

Day 27: 1/27/13 - Celebrate National Hot Tea Month             
New Thing- Make my own ginger, mint honey tea and use a new App.                
Inspiration: National Hot Tea Month            
Time: About 20 mins.             
Bottom Line: Tasty and warm on a cold winters night.

Reflection: January is National Hot Tea Month! As you may know, I love hot decaffeinated lose-leaf tea (and if you didn't know, now you do ;) But I have never made my own tea from my own herbs. So, I deiced to try out a new app. called "Snapguide" (which has tons of free tutorials at your finger-tips) to find a tea recipe. I found a delicious fresh ginger, mint & honey tea which was both delicious and healthy. Enjoy!

• Heat up your water as you slice up a little piece of fresh ginger into thin sections.   
• Taking a larger piece of ginger, make some slices into it without cutting it all the way through and crush it with you knife so the juice comes out. 
• Put some mint leaves and smaller ginger slices into the water as it boils and some into your mug. (I used dried organic mint from my garden).  Let it simmer for 10 minuets.
• Then put smaller pieces of ginger into your mug.
• Let it steep for a bit and then add honey to taste. 

Day 341: 12/8/11-Positive Parenting Webinar

Day 341: 12/8/11
New Thing: Positive Parenting Webinar                      

Inspiration: The Six O'Clock Scramble    
Cost: $0  
Time: One Hour   
Bottom Line: Good tips, but could have used a little more.

Good Tip.

Reflection: Tonight, Ken and I attended a webinar given by the founder of "Positive Parenting." It was pretty good and gave alot of good advice for why normal parenting techniques do not work. But then it only gave one suggestion to change that followed by a commercial for their online guide. So, it was only pretty good.

Day 123- 5/4/11 CREDO Day 3, Health, Money, & Pure Barre Method

Day 123: 5/4/11
New Thing: CREDO Day 3, Health, Money & Pure Barre Method  
Inspiration: CREDO, $$, & Andi    
Cost: $0
Time: All Day                   
Bottom Line: Learning Day

Apparently, this is not the way it happens.

 Reflection: Before I  tell you a little bit about today's new things, I want to mention something that I did after posting yesterday--I Skyped with Ken and Delia. This is an online video call that let me see and talk to them in real time. I loved it and it really gave me the second wind that I needed since I miss them a ton.

The first new thing of the day was trying out a new work out DVD that my step-mother Andi gave me. It is called "Pure Barre" and wikipedia describes it as"a total body work out that burns fat and tones the body. Pure Barre's is work out that was created around ballet, Pilates and weights." Essentially, it uses ballet moves with a work out band and concentrated, isometric exercises. It was a real burn which was great becuase I have been getting bored with a few of my other DVD's. Thanks, Andi!

Today is also our financial and health day and I have already learned alot. My "new thing" in this respect will be to sit down with a financial adviser for the first time and try to get some things in order.Wish me luck!