Do you remember Steve Austin, the Six Million Dollar Man? Remember the catch phrase: “We can rebuild him…we have the technology.†Well, my wife may have met her “Six Million Dollar†labeler/organizing tool, the Brother P-touch Electronic Labeling System. And, she may have actually fallen in love with it. Well, that’s what it seems like …
Continue reading Label My Wife In Love With The Brother P-touch LabelerReviews
My wife has a favorite appliance: The Brother P-Touch Labeler.*  (Not what you were thinking was it?) For some odd reason, she really loves to label things in our home. Every container in our pantry (see: The Pantry Gets A Makeover) is labeled and if she could, she would have a Container Store credit card.  She really has …
Continue reading The Brother P-Touch Labeler: The First Tool You Need To Get OrganizedThe Cast of Dads (minus Max, who was at sea) whipped together a short video about our Mother’s Day experience with the Motorola Droid Razr. Â All the footage was shot with the Razr, and thanks to Danny Cameron and the DadLabs team for the great job editing. Â Enjoy! Â Disclosure: The Video above was sponsored by …
Continue reading A Not So Brady Bunch of Dads…I’m back from New Orleans and a whirlwind few days with fellow Cast of  Dads hosts C.C. Chapman and Brad Powell (we sorely missed our other two hosts Michael Sheehan and Max Kalehoff.)  We had a great time with the LG team, who were gracious hosts and made sure we had a fantastic experience both …
Continue reading Three Dads At The Final FourAt the 2012 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) there were literally acres of costly Las Vegas Convention Center booth space dedicated to a seemingly endless array of iPhone, iPad and iPod accessories.  From cases to keyboards to biometric monitors, dozens of manufacturers were baring their wares and showing off both ingenious and incredulous ways to accessorize your …
Continue reading Who Is Woogie? (Hint: An iPhone Creature For Your Kids)I think you’ll agree that computers are now a part of just about every family’s lifestyle (not to mention our business lives…). It has been fascinating to watch the rapid evolution of computers over the years.  Remember the first computer you bought for your home?  Chances are it was a huge desktop PC with a …
Continue reading The Ultrabook Has Arrived! (The #UltrabookDads Videos)(Note: this is a sponsored post, but the words and opinions are all mine.) It is fitting that Asus calls their new Ultrabook line “Zenbooks.” Just one look and you can see that it is a device that exudes a sense of calm and balance, purity and power.  An early entrant in the Intel …
Continue reading Zen and the Art of UltrabooksI’ve been thinking all week about a movie I saw on Monday night at the recommendation of my friend Clay Hebert and I still haven’t fully reconciled what I saw, heard and how to interpret the constant thoughts it’s generated. Transcendent Man is a documentary directed by Barry Ptolemy chronicling “the life and controversial ideas of luminary …
Continue reading Transcendent Man: A Look at Futurist Ray Kurzweil (Review)Last week 3/5ths of the Cast of Dads had the chance to get together for a road trip from Boston to NY thanks to the the teams at Ford and Sony who tried to be the first brands to get all of us together.  Unfortunately, crazy dad schedules (that is – crazy schedules, not crazy dads… well…) prevented …
Continue reading On The Road… AgainSome of my favorite childhood memories surround the fantasy of being a super hero. Spinning webs from your wrist as Spiderman, flying and x-ray vision of Superman. So I jumped at the chance to get my hands on a few toys from Mattel connected to June’s release Green Lantern. My daughter, the Harry Potter-loving, dress-up …
Continue reading Green Lantern Colassal Cannon Review
I love CostCo. I love getting a deal and I love that their deals cover everything from electronics to apparel, from books to food to a pack of batteries so large I never think we’ll go through them all (we always do). I love their return policy as well…in short, it’s satisfaction guaranteed. Always (ok, …
Continue reading My CostCo Love Affair…and My New Traeger SmokerI took the family to Disney World for spring break 2011 and it was even better than expected. Maybe it was because the kids were a little older this time (ages 12, 8 & 5) or maybe it was merely experience paying off, but all I know is that we had the times of our …
Continue reading Free Apps for Your Next Trip to Disney World
One of the interesting things about being a 40+ tech nerd is that I have what I think is a unique and different view of devices and apps than the usual 20-something. Â So when I go to a Tweetup (a meeting of Twitter users), I am usually the oldest or among the oldest. Â When I …
Continue reading Follow Me On the Yellow Brick (Road)Three of us Cast of Dads (CC, Michael and myself) were in Las Vegas for the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) and we got together upstairs in the Intel booth to record both a video and audio special episode of the Cast of Dads podcast. Â We invited Dave Delaney of Griffin Technology to join us as …
Continue reading Discussing Dadgets: The Cast of Dads At CES 2011As part of the Dad-O-Matic CES coverage, Chris Brogan shared a look at the Crayola ColorStudioHD iPad app and “digital crayon” coming soon from Griffin Technology. Â Cool as the Crayola app is, it wasn’t the only neat thing we saw from the Griffin gang. Â Dave Delaney also showed me the Griffin LightBoard, which is a …
Continue reading A Kid Friendly iPad Case That Lets You Trace!I had the pleasure of catching up with Dave Delaney from Griffin Technology at the Consumer Electronics show, and he caught us up on the really cool app that Griffin developed with Crayola, called ColorStudio HD. We shot this little review here: Can’t see this video, click here. Check out the Crayola ColorStudio HD and …
Continue reading Coloring for the iPad with Crayola ColorStudioHDBeth came home this year and, holding a receipt in her hand, declared, “I’m never shopping at Toys R Us again.” Maybe you shouldn’t either.
Continue reading Toys Aren’t Us: 3 Reasons My Wife Will Never Shop At Toys R Us AgainGameTruck is a new birthday party idea for video game-loving kids that kicks Pump It Up’s ass. My kids went nuts for it.
Continue reading If your child likes video games …I’ve long been a fan of homemade ice cream. Not homemade in the store…homemade in my home. It’s really one of the easiest recipes to make…as long as you keep the ice cream maker in your freezer, you’re always ready to go. But what about something a bit lower in fat? Say a popsicle? Every …
Continue reading Instant PopsiclesSummertime is often a time we catch up on reading and this summer is no exception.  I finally sat down to read a book I purchased last summer, Crazy for the Storm: A Memoir of Survival (Amazon affiliate link) by Norman Ollestad.  This is a true story, but written with the depth, pace, and strong characterizations one …
Continue reading Book Review: Crazy For The Storm – A Memoir Of SurvivalAn Alarming Situation Like most dads (and humans for that matter) I generally go to sleep at night and rely on mechanical assistance to wake myself up at the desired hour each and every morning. With that in mind I have been forever in search of the perfect alarm clock.  I have tried them all – …
Continue reading A Father’s Day Gift For The DASHing Dad! (and a chance to win one)I’ve been reading Robert Kiyosaki’s books lately. You’d know Rich Dad Poor Dad. I’ve read another six of them. In so doing, the topic of teaching your kids about money and even business came up. Now, most of us, when faced with thinking about teaching our kid about business, think about chores, or maybe a …
Continue reading Teaching Kids About BusinessA review of the new family-friendly movie, Secrets of the Mountain, brought to you by Walmart and P&G.
Continue reading Secrets of the Mountain – Review & Give-AwayMy daughter, Violette, and I received a spread of Iron Man 2 books from my friends at Hachette (who run Little Brown and a handful of other publishing houses). With the movie coming out, kids are going to be excited to see the latest exploits of their comic book hero come to life. Now, the …
Continue reading Iron Man 2 Has Lots of Kid Book Tie InsReadeo has unveiled something they called BookChat that uses webcams to allow people to read books via the web in real-time. The idea will not be received well by some folks who will complain that the best part of the reading experience is being together. However, this solution is not positioning itself as a replacement …
Continue reading Readeo Introduces BookChatShortly after the iPad was released Jeff Sass wrote a great blog about iDad. iDad is a great parody on the value of a dad over an iPad and a fun little read. There is another great DAD moment that was captured in a post last night Who Dad published by Doriano “Paisano” Carta. Last …
Continue reading What is a DADvocate?An apple a day… gives the media lots to talk about.  This week both the tech news and so called “mainstream media” was all abuzz about the long rumored, finally revealed, “tablet” device from Steve Jobs and his team at Apple.  When all the dust settled, as expected, everyone’s attention turned to the “core” of …
Continue reading The iPad vs. The iDad!Imagine having the entire first year of your child’s life in photographs, or maybe photos of the family for a whole year. Here is an suggestion of a Dad as family photo historian project.
Continue reading Photo Related Dad ProjectWell, we did it. My wife and I made it to the one-year mark. (Oh, and so did Lucy.) The first two weeks seemed like a millennium, the last fifty seemed like a millisecond. So, what have I learned, if anything? • It sounds so dang cliché to say, “It’s harder than I imagined, but …
Continue reading The First Year of Fatherhood: One Dad’s ReviewI was recently given a review copy of Ripley’s Believe It or Not! Seeing Is Believing. The problem is, I’ve never done an official review of anything before. I guess the first thing to determine is my unit of measurement. That seems to be the thing that really brands you and makes you popular, ensuring …
Continue reading Believe It Or Not: A Review of Ripley’s Latest BookI was a 70’s baby. When I was a kid we often played with our favorite Star Wars action figures. Each one stood about 5 inches, yes “stood”. Maybe I’m getting old, but the Star Wars action figures today suck. I remember the GI Joes from the generation before me seemed massive in comparison. The …
Continue reading A rant about new Star Wars action figuresAs the latest mission for the Sony DigiDad Project, we were loaned a Sony VAIO P Series Lifestyle PC mini laptop and told to go record a class trip or some other family outing. My kids are too old for “class trips” and I wanted to do something that actually included the VAIO P, because …
Continue reading The Sony VAIO P-Mercial: Family Fun With VideoImage via Wikipedia The adventures of Max and his wild, woolly friends has always been a favorite of mine. The unique visual style of Maurice Sendak‘s images mesmerized me as a child, and again as I frequently read WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE to my own kids, living vicariously through them my own fond memories …
Continue reading Where The Wild Things Are (Or Aren’t)“Words, words, words.” – William Shakespeare (HAMLET) I love words. I love to read and write. I was an English Major in college. Thus, as a word loving self proclaimed gadget geek it should be no surprise that I have been an eBook aficionado for nearly a decade. I started buying and reading eBooks on …
Continue reading The Sony Reader: Black and White and Shades of Dorian GrayThey say a picture is worth a thousand words, yet as my task for this latest installment in the Sony DigiDad Project I am asked to write about a bunch of pictures.  Such is the life of a SonyDad.  They (who the heck are “they” anyway???) also say that the best camera is the camera …
Continue reading 100 Faces of Fall: A CyberShot In The ArmHeritage is a powerful word. In its truest sense it implies all the things we are made of and all the things that make us who we are. Family heritage is deeper than DNA, and thicker than blood. Our heritage is built upon people and personalities, characters and culture, history and hysteria, stories and legends, …
Continue reading A Family Defined (In High Definition)My entire family was blown away by Nelson Mandela’s Favorite African Folktales. I got a copy from the folks at Hachette, and my kids stole it. They wouldn’t let me listen to it by myself. But little did I know, I was going to get to hear it for the next several weeks, every day, …
Continue reading Folktales for the Whole FamilyFor as long as I can remember, Sony has been a premiere consumer electronics brand. I can clearly remember getting my hands on the original, ground-breaking “Sony Walkman” personal cassette player. I can remember my first “color TV’ being a 13” Sony Trinitron, because my grandfather insisted it would last forever… and it practically did. …
Continue reading Sony’s DigiDad Project… Cool Gadgets, No Baloney!To say my daughter is a reader is an understatement. Recently at her 3rd birthday party, the opening of the presents came to a screeching halt because she opened a book and had to “read” it right then. It made my heart swell with pride right then. Danni, my daughter, can’t read words but loves …
Continue reading I'm Your Bus Review and Back To School GiveawayMy family enjoys many children’s performers such as the Wiggles, Dan Zanes, and Raffi. Recently we were introduced to Buck Howdy. My wife was working so I decided to load the boys up and take them to our local zoo for the day. The zoo’s barnyard area is contained and I can let all three …
Continue reading A Kiddie Roundup with Buck HowdyI’m the cook in our house. Whether it’s an elegant gourmet meal or hamburgers and hot dogs, my wife is not ashamed to say that I do all the cooking. For my daughter, who’s approaching six, making ice cream is something she’s always loved and now it’s something we can easily take out of the …
Continue reading You Scream. I Scream. We All Scream for Ice Cream!It’s summertime!  (Duh!)  For many families that means it is time for lots of “Rays and Zees” spending time outdoors with activities and relaxing in the sun.  For all of us that also means thinking about protection from those burning rays, and for parents it is yet one more thing for us to worry about. …
Continue reading Protective Wear For Fun In The Sun!My daughter Katie and I recently discovered a website I thought worth sharing. Heck, you don’t even NEED kids for this site, it’s cute and guaranteed to make you smile. ZOOBORNS is a site where they post pictures of baby animals born in zoos and wildlife preserves around the world. There are some oddball critters …
Continue reading Nothing Bonds Like Baby AnimalsWe all worry about our kids and how they use the Internet. Thanks to a safety filter application called littleye, however, a lot of our worries and fears are now taken care of. Put together by a community of parents and teachers, littleye takes the concept of existing online safety filters on step further. The …
Continue reading Online Safety Made Simple with LittleyeIt is one week from Father’s Day! Do you know where your gift is? It’s time for procrastinating sons and daughters to unite and get off our butts and focus on something that will make dear old Dad smile. If you are also a Dad (or Mom) yourself, it will be even easier to put …
Continue reading Photographic Father’s Day Gift TipsThe good folks at Griffin Technology have partnered with Dad-o-matic for a special Father’s Day series of giveaways featuring some of their best products. For the next four weeks, starting on May 24, 2009, someone will win a Griffin Prize Package that includes all of these cool prizes. Simplifi Powerjolt SE SmartShare USB AirCurve NuForm …
Continue reading Father's Day Giveaway from GriffinZiggy Marley‘s new “FAMILY TIME” CD hits stores on May 5th! In honor of his first album featuring songs for children and the family, we are announcing an exciting little contest with several prizes. All you have to do is: 1. Subscribe to Dad-O-Matic 2. Share this post on Twitter 3. Leave your contact info …
Continue reading New Ziggy Marley CD Give-AwayI still get chills when I hear the theme from Finding Nemo (2003). Thomas Newman always does that to me with his scores but this one touches me deeply as a dad. I think it’s because it reminds me of the opening scene when the father discovers his Nemo as the lone surviving fish egg …
Continue reading Lessons Learned from Finding NemoI just came across a post from LifeHacker a couple of days ago on a YouTube player for children called Kideo. I always cringe when I play a video to my 2 and 3 year olds. You never know when something terrible might appear in a video. I’m really impressed with the ones I’ve seen …
Continue reading YouTube Safe For KidsWelcome to the world of Freakatars, a place designed to inspire your imagination and expand your creativity. Whether you’re three or thirty, creating and collecting Freakatars is freakishly fun! Read more about Freakatars Kid’s love to create. It’s built into us, and when we are young, it’s clear. We draw, paint, play. We make up …
Continue reading Freakatars Review: Dr. Frankenstein Meets HensonWe are always buying things because they look cool, or sound cool. What we are not big on, apparently, is thinking things through. When you see a book that says Guinness Book of World Records longest bubble was made with this, and that book is attached to a few pieces of plastic and some mesh, …
Continue reading The Giant World Record Bubble Wand…Thanks to everyone that entered the first Dad-o-matic giveaway which featured Flowers from ProFlowers. All of the entries were dropped into a hat and the following five names were pulled out randomly. The winners will need to contact me before midnight Tuesday night to claim their prize (Paisano@Dadomatic.com). In the event that a winner fails …
Continue reading Winners of the ProFlowers Giveaway!In Dad’s Life Lessons On The Wall, I shared an easy and loving way to teach your child important life lessons. Perhaps one of my lessons is one of yours? Rule #2: Negative thoughts eat away at your brain. Don’t let this happen. On seven-year-old Zachary’s wall is a picture of an acidifying apple. A …
Continue reading Dad's Life Lessons: Rule #2The following post is a sponsored post, brought to you by ProFlowers. The opinions are my own. Just in time for Valentine’s Day, ProFlowers has given Dad-o-matic five $70 gift codes for our readers. We could have setup some elaborate contest for you to qualify to win one of these gifts but decided to make …
Continue reading Sponsored Post: $70 Flower Gift Certificate GiveawayI just came back from having a few drinks with a close friend. We didn’t know each other five years ago – we met when our oldest children were in kindergarten together – and have managed to build a strong friendship since then. It always amazes me how difficult it is to form close friendships …
Continue reading Is My Marriage Solid?SecretBuilders is a virtual world game going after the kids market currently dominated by Disney properties like Club Penguin and ToonTown, on the one hand, and commercial tie-in sites like Webkinz on the other. My boys (6 and 9) like to play games online. Unfortunately, the games they like to play aren’t always the games …
Continue reading Review: SecretBuilders.comThe first thing I realized when I took at look at Eat, Shrink, and Be Merry was that this wouldn’t be a book for guys. The tagline of the book reads “Great-tasting food that won’t go from you lips to your hips”. I mean please. Then I realized that while my hips were fine, my …
Continue reading Book review: Eat, Shrink & Be Merry!Twilight has a major following among teen and tween girls (like my 12 year old niece who spent all Thanksgiving plowing through the books or my 17 year old niece who went to a midnight showing when it opened and told me it was “incredible”), but I think it’s also a movie that boys and …
Continue reading Becoming a Man: A Father of Boys watches "Twilight"   In this day and age, many a social networking site has sprung up. A few of the most popular are Twitter, Facebook and Flickr. There’s a new player in town though that brings us elements of all three with a touch of blog thrown in, wee-web.com.    Wee-web is all about your …
Continue reading Wee-Web, A Family Social Network?I was sent a LeapFrog Didj to evaluate, for my six year old daughter. She was already a Leapster user, and enjoyed it, but she’s clearly getting a bit too old for the content there. She aces all the games, and that’s no fun- not being challenged. So, getting into the Didj was a cool …
Continue reading LeapFrog Hops Up to the DidjAs parents, we’re always looking for ways to save a buck when it comes to eating out with the family. This has become especially important these days because of the current state of the economy. The more kids you have, obviously the more that restaurant bill will be. That’s why it’s critical to know which …
Continue reading Find Free Places to Eat for Your Kids with KidsMealDealsAdjustafresh did a great post on bedtime books back in October, and I noticed a bunch of people commented on it. I found a few new ones there for my older kids, including the hilarious and genuine Diary of a Wimpy Kid. I thought I’d do another one, this time focused on a different kind …
Continue reading 5 Mystical Bedtime BooksIt makes no difference where we put it, what precautions we take or how much we don’t want them to get into that candy cache, my kids are like thieves in the night. Not only are they good at it, but they change their tactics as they learn them. Like the machine that teaches itself, …
Continue reading My Kids Are Ninjas For Halloween CandyWelcome to my regular Friday feature, Worst of the Week. As a white, suburbanite husband and dad of two kids, there’s a lot that can go wrong and this entry is all about how to fix it. I hope you enjoy it! As a stay-at-home (and in desperate need of a job) Dad, it’s my …
Continue reading Worst of the Week: “Dad, dinner sucks!â€ÂMy wife and I have always made it a priority to read to our children–I’m sure most of you do the same, and yes, I do the voices. I would like to think that this habit has helped lead to our second grader’s ability to read at a 5th grade level.  Every night, before bed …
Continue reading Our Favorite Bedtime BooksFirst, we both love superheroes. Second, we both love cereal. Third, we both asked Bill Gates to do the robot. Okay, well those first two are true. I’m writing this while eating a bowl big coffee mug of Kellogg’s Frosted Mini Wheats BLUEBERRY flavor. Yes, you heard me, blueberry. Okay, the label says “blueberry muffin,” …
Continue reading What Jerry Seinfeld and Chris Brogan Have in CommonGreat news today for parents and their children that enjoy playing online. Parents.com and KidZui.com have formed a partnership to enhance the KidZui experience and bring more families to the kid-friendly site. For those of you that aren’t familiar with KidZui yet, it’s geared for kids ages 3-12 and provides a free browser and online …
Continue reading Parents.com and Kidzui Form Healthy Alliance for Parents and KidsIn this age of financial crisis and mega billion banking bailouts, it hardly seems worthwhile to be concerned with $ 5, $10 or $20 a week. However, if you are a kid, and that 5, 10 or 20 bucks is your allowance, you are allowed to be concerned. More importantly, if you are the proud …
Continue reading The BUXX Stops Here!Recently I came across a site called Glubble. Glubble is a FREE parental control system for the FireFox browser that once installed you can have complete control over your kids online browsing experience. The system is geared for children up to the age of elementary school and may (in my opinion) be pushing it for …
Continue reading Glubble, a New and Safe Way for Your Kids to Play OnlinePlayspace Finder is a resource that mashes on top of Google Maps and gives parents a place to mark down a playground, notate what’s there, provide pictures, ratings, reviews and more. It’s a really great idea (and by great, I mean “simple”). I did a quick scan of some areas around my house, and there …
Continue reading Find a Place to PlayIf you are reading this blog, you more than likely understand technology, Web 2.0 and actually use the Internet. And if you do, you are may be like me and have a lot of articles and post you really want to read. The problem, not enough time in the day. However, there might be an …
Continue reading Dads — Take Your Reading With YouI have three kids. My wife, mother and I all have iPhones. This is not a coincidence. It didn’t take long after the introduction of the iPhone to realize that the iPhone was a great tool for entertaining youngsters and buying parents some peace… provided said youngsters are not fighting over the device itself. If …
Continue reading iPhone Apps for Kids