Not Blessed Mama's Unwanted And Unsolicited Product Review: Instagram

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I do not take nice pictures. I am not interested in taking wonderful pictures. I just want to take a picture, have my kids look good, and move on with my life. Sadly, it doesn't always work that way, and I'm stuck with a bunch of crappy pictures.

Fortunately, that life changing device that I like to call my iPhone has the perfect solution. What can't an iPhone do? Seriously, if you don't have an iPhone, it will change your life. Now that that's out of the way, if you have an iPhone, you need to check out Instagram.

Instagram is a free app that has been blowing up in popularity. It's a camera app that allows you to add different effects to your photos after you take them. Hipstamatic is a similar app, but I'm pretty sure I paid for Hipstamatic and you have to choose the lense and filter before you take the pic (and sometimes your choice is not ideal).

Here's a pic I took of Spawn#2 that didn't turn out too well. I wanted to get a pic of her cute new outfit, but she was in a rush and didn't feel like posing. The results were less than stellar.

After importing the picture to Instagram and adding a cool filter, the pic looked much better. Arty, defined, sharper. I love the results!

Here are a few more examples.

I highly recommend you check out Instagram so you can pretend to be an arty, farty photographer like me. Instagram also allows you to easily share your photos on social networking sites as well (like Twitter!), and we all know how important that is to bloggers.

As usual, no one provided me with any free products for this review- and since Instagram is free, I guess that wouldn't make sense anyway. Also, as usual, if anyone has any free cool stuff, send it my way, would ya?

The Bad Mom Movement

Tweet Not too long ago, I tweeted this:

When I wrote this, I was not joking. Spawn#3 was screaming at me for some ridiculous reason (maybe we were out of bread or something), and he stomped out the door and slammed the screen. It's one of his favorite new hobbies- super charming. That thought I had was so ugly and yucky, I hesitated before I tweeted it. Ultimately I had to adhere to the Not Blessed Mama policy of keepin' it real, so I tweeted my bad mothering skills out into the internets. 

And wouldn't you know- I got a positive response. And not just one, but several.

One mama sympathized that she had been there, done that. Another friend tweeted that she wished that every day about her dogs. I got a couple re-tweets. And this is why I love the bad mom movement.

Back when Spawn#1 was born (ten whole years ago), there was no blogging community or Twitter. I struggled through being a new mother mostly on my own. Well, you know what? Being a mom is hard. IT'S HARD. Every day, us moms are juggling 5 million things on our to do list, on top of raising and nurturing and feeding children, trying our best to make sure they don't grow up to be total assholes. Oh yeah, and don't forget trying to remain a person, not just a Mom. It's a lot of work. It's exhausting. And sometimes, it just sucks.

These days, when the Spawn are acting like baby jerks, I can jump on Twitter and get sympathy from my online friends. I can write a blog post and share the pictures of when Spawn#3 dumped red paint all over the floor so he could paint his body with it. I can talk to my mamas about how. it. sucks. And, they get it. You get it. You know. You know it's never ending, and it's tiring, and it's frustrating and sometimes you lose yourself. You get all that. You also know why it's so awesome, and why we do it. You just get it. 

Never again will I smile my way through a hellacious day just to pretend that everything is okay. I will share and revel in not only the joys, but the big fat disappointments and screw ups too. Thank god for technology!

Bad moms unite!

How Much Do You Rely On The Internet?

Tweet For about the past week or so, our internet has been spotty. Spotty as in, it doesn't work half of the time. I'm not sure what the problem is yet- something about a conflict of IP addresses, and we just don't know yet. Not Blessed Daddy is supposed to give it a thorough overhaul this weekend.

It's amazing all I've been able to get done when I'm not on the computer! The housework and laundry are getting done- the kids have been playing outside more- I've been reading! I had no idea how much technology was hampering our lives. Being off-line has been awesome!


I'm totally lying. Life without technology is NOT WORTH LIVING.


I cannot function without the internet. First of all, there are all the practical things I'm missing- monitoring the bank account, checking e-mails and browsing our school's vendor list to order our homeschooling supplies. Then there's the social aspect- I miss my tweeps! I miss my blog. I want to see what crappy pictures of me people are tagging on Facebook. I want my friends! Waaaaaaa. I want to be able to log onto Amazon and look for those books I've been thinking about ordering. I want to check the Crocs website to see if anything I like is finally cheap enough for me to buy. I want my internet!


And the children! Doesn't anyone think about the children??? The Spawn already fight over one computer. Fighting over one computer with intermittent internet? Freaking brutal. BRUTAL.

So, I must say farewell, my dear mama friends. I hope the internet is still working when I'm done writing so I can post this. I miss you.I miss you all. Someday, we will be together again. For now we just have to be strong. Don't cry for me Argentina, and all that jazz.
Goodbye.

Just Blog, Heifer!

Tweet A bloggy friend and I were talking about the blog boycott day that went on last week. We both agreed that it was ridiculous- to us, at least. We don't need an excuse to get off of our blogs- we need someone to kick our butts so we get on our blogs! So My Mamihood came up with the excellent idea of #justblogheifer day. Which was today, but as you can see I'm a little late! It's easy to think up excuses to not get on-line and write. I'm busy, my back hurts, my house smells like urine and I need to clean it. But we write because we love it. We love our readers, we love making connections, we love sharing our voice.
So the next time you notice a bloggy friend MIA, give 'em a shout out- just blog, heifer! When Not Blessed Mama hasn't been on-line in a week and your need your dose of wonderfulness (what?), shout out- just blog, heifer! Let's support each other and lift each other up in this wonderful blogging world- by calling each other cows.
Well, it seemed like a good idea.


Make sure you are following Not Blessed Mama on Twitter for when you need to tell me to #justblogheifer.

Sharing the Love

Tweet Recently the very sweet (and adorable) Kat over at For Love Of My Oceans was gracious enough to bestow upon yours truly, Not Blessed Mama, her very first blog award. It is such an honor Kat, and thank you! 

I've got my floor length gown on now, and I'm giving a very moving speech- thanking "all the little people" who helped to make this happen! Actually, that kind of fits, doesn't it? 

Now I would like to share with you some of Not Blessed Mama's favorite blogs- and you know she has very discriminating taste! 

1000 Reasons I'm A Crap Mom The title says it all.

Chronicles of Twitch and Meathead Because she said "Meathead". 

Kidlit's Korner A good friend new to blogging.

Las Vegas Mama 'Cuz she's sassy.

Sunshine SAHM 'Cuz she likes to be real. 

the little things A sweet little blog. 

Airing My Dirty Laundry Because dirty laundry is a big part of my life. And she's funny. 

The Pioneer Woman More of an institution than a blog. Check out her recipes. 

Mommy Wants Vodka Aunt Becky cusses. As much as I'd like to. 

The Diary Of An Indy Grrrl I like to think I would have been like this 10+ years ago. If I was cool.

Ok, the idea here is to link 15 blogs you love and let them all know, to get the bloggy love flowing. Alas, not Blessed Mama is lazy. I mean tired. I mean lazy. That was a lot of work listing those 10! So I am going to leave it at that, and say thank you to all the cool bloggers I love to read, listed or not. 

P.S. When I went to Google Reader to get my blog links, I had 666 "new items" to read. WHAT DOES IT MEAN???