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 OrganizedAt 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)In the holiday spirit of giving, this is a quick update to my post about Ultrabooks.  I mentioned that my Cast of Dads cohort, Michael Sheehan (@HighTechDad) and I would be presenting a chance for one of you to get an Ultrabook, courtesy of Intel, the driving force behind the Ultrabook platform.  Here are the details: You can …
Continue reading A Chance For You To Be An Ultrabook Dad (or Mom)(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)Some 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 am back from the 2011 Consumer Electronics Show (CES) with sore feet, weary eyes and more than a few gigabytes of images and videos of some cool (and unusual) technology and gadgets. Â I look forward to sharing a lot of that content with you here on Dad-O-Matic, and will try to focus on the …
Continue reading Bringing Toys To Life at CES 2011: Intel Labs OASIS(Note: If you and/or anyone in your family is dyslexic or suffers from any vision impairment, please read on for a chance to test an Intel Reader in your home for one month…Â Â Disclaimer: Product links below are Amazon Affiliate links. Â I am part of the “Intel Insider” program and am compensated and/or receive other value …
Continue reading Get Your Hands On A Digital Reader That Says It All: The Intel ReaderI’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)My 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 InsI 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 BookAs 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)Heritage 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!This past weekend we gathered the clan in the family room and plugged in the new comedy from Dreamworks, Kung Fu Panda. This film features the voice talents of a star-studded cast, Jack Black, Dustin Hoffman, Angelina Jolie, and Jackie Chan, to name a few. In our family, we like to find a film every …
Continue reading Kung Fu Panda – a Family Movie With a Mesage   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 KidsMealDealsPlayspace 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 Play