Five iPhone apps I can't live without

These are my favorite apps for the iPhone and iPod Touch. What are yours?

1. Google Mobile - Google is my life. I use Google for searching, gmail for email and even Google Apps to host my website. Plus there's Blogger, Calendar and Google Docs. I love them all. The Google iPhone app lets me get to all those services and then some. The voice search is just cool. And locating business near your current location is so helpful and quick. [iTunes store link]

2. Remember the Milk - The best online task management service I've ever tried. In combination with the website, rememberthemilk.com, Remember the Milk stores tasks with due dates, priority, repeats and time estimates. It can also be seamlessly integrated into your Google Calendar. Use of the website is free but the iPhone app requires the purchase of a Pro account for $25/year. I think it's worth every penny for keeping my business and personal tasks organized, easy-to-use place. [iTunes store link]

3. Twitterific - I love reading Twitter when there's nothing else going on in the world. (Twitter is the online social network where you post short snippets of your life.) Twitterific makes flipping through Tweets simple and fast. It even has a built in web browser to make life easier. [iTunes store link]

4. Chess with Friends - Want to play chess with your best friend but can't because they live on the other side of the country? Chess with Friends is the answer to all life's problems. Challenge a friend to a game and your move shows up on the opponent's phone in a matter of seconds. My dad taught me to play chess when I was about 10 but then I didn't play much through high school and college. This app has renewed my interest in chess and it's also renewed my husband's interest in whooping someone's ass at chess. [iTunes store link]

5. WikiTap - Sometimes Google just isn't enough. Sometimes I want to know the answer to a question right away. That is why I love WikiTap, it searches the giant wikipedia.org. Look up words in the dictionary, bizarre topics of conversation or just read random articles for fun. [iTunes store link]

Howdy!

It's been a busy week and a fun weekend here at the Heatherinkery. I've been working on some very exciting new things that I can't wait to share with you. I just stopped in to say hi! More tomorrow.

Join me

I have a huge and underwhelming fascination with the idea of doing chores around the house. Laundry makes me crazy. The dishes can make me cry on any given day. And don't even talk to me about scrubbing the toilet. Did I mention I am known among family to have an immense hatred for the vacuum cleaner? I enjoy being at home, cooking and doing domestic hobbies but please, never, EVER accuse me of keeping a good house. I am not a housewife, a homemaker or other such female pejorative. I am allergic to housework. Violently.

Which leads me to my new website, Housework Rules! (to be said with the thickest sarcasm you can slather on). Go, check it out. Find new ways to avoid daily chores with inspiration and products from your favorite hobbies including knitting, cooking, gardening, scrapbooking, sewing and paper. I know I'm not alone. I know you hate housework too.

Ahh.

After a much needed long weekend with no plans I feel happy and refreshed. We spent both Friday and Saturday wandering around asking each other if the other had any plans, anything fun they wanted to do, any place they needed to go. The answer was always no. We relaxed on the couch, tidied the kitchen and best of all we spent lots of time updating and organizing files and programs on my new laptop. I know a laptop is nothing new, I've even had one before, but this laptop means freedom. I work from home and with a machine that is stationary I felt I was always locked in the same place.

My office had become a place of work not a creative space for enthusiastic bouts of creativity. Aren't some of the joys of working from home things like having the ability to go to the gym at whatever time of day I feel like, walk the dogs at lunch or make a phone call from the patio? Why was I stuck in the smallest room of the house for the longest period of time? No more. I am free! Free to roam. Free to email clients from my kitchen in my bathrobe while sucking down three day old leftovers with a questionable fork. If the kitchen becomes too confining I can sit on the couch or better yet the patio.

Forget that. You'll find me on the deck under the new offset umbrella.