Want to know what's going on with the Church or members of the Church in the news? Head on over to Google Alerts. With Google Alerts you can enter in search terms that Google will use to scour news and blogs all over the world for articles relating to the Church. Just type in "LDS", "Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints", or "Mormon." Google will give you news updates anytime something is posted with that keyword. Pretty nifty. Requires a Google email account.
Monday, February 26, 2007
Saturday, February 24, 2007
Make the Sacrament Less Noisy
This hack comes from back when I was a teacher preparing the Sacrament. Many chapels use the little plastic cups as opposed to the paper cups for serving the water. Ever notice how the plastic cups can make a pretty loud "click" when they hit the bottom of the tray? With lots of people taking the sacrament, the clicks can make a lot of noise that distracts from the the sacrament.
To silence these clicks, just before you put the top on the water tray, line the bottom with paper towels. Now, when the cup hits the bottom, the towel muffels the noise. Additionally, it makes clean up a breeze. The towel soaks up the water so there's less drying.
Now, if only we can figure out how to make babies stop crying.....
Date Hack by Elder Oaks
In May 2005, Elder Oaks gave a talk to young single adults giving an apostolic smackdown on the proliferation of "hanging out" as opposed to good old fashion dating. He partly blames the elaborate dates that young Mormons do, like having a picnic on the street median. If that's what you have to do take a girl on a date, no wonder men aren't asking women out.
Elder Oaks offers this nice little date hack.
Gone is the clumsy and inexpensive phone call your parents and grandparents and I used to make. That call went something like this: “What’re ya doin’ tonight? How about a movie?” Or, “How about taking a walk downtown?” Cheap dates like that can be frequent and nonthreatening, since they don’t seem to imply a continuing commitment.Simple as that pick up the phone and ask someone for ice cream. No fancy picnics. No planned kidnappings. Just pick up the phone and call.
Tuesday, February 20, 2007
Track your Goals with Joe's Goals
Joe's Goals is a neat little web app that allows you to keep track of your goals. You set out the goals you wish to accomplish and put a check by the one's you do. If you set a goal not to do a particular thing, every time you do it you put an "x". Checks give you points and x's deduct points. At the end of the week you have a tally to see how you're doing with your goals.
This is very similar to Benjamin Franklin's virtue tracker. I'm glad to see someone take this old technique and adapt to the modern world.
Joe's Goals is free to use.
Monday, February 19, 2007
Entertain your kids with Ze Frank
I stumbled upon Ze Frank the other day. It's a guy with a blog, but he also creates cool flash based games that are great for wasting time at the office or keeping young children entertained for hours
Here's some of my favorites.
- The Flake Maker
- Matrix
- Puppets. A puppet dancing to Beastie Boys. Classic.
- SNM#1. I thought this was the best kid game out of all of them. Let your 2 year old pound on your keyboard to create noises and visual effects without worrying he'll delete something.
Friday, February 16, 2007
Dear Elder
Dear Elder is an excellent service to get messages to your missionary quickly. You write a message at the site and send it. Dear Elder will then e-mail those messages to your missionary's respective mission. The Elders in the office will print them out, put them in an envelope, and deliver them to missionary.
It's pretty convenient. The only draw back that I noticed on my mission is that because the Elders in the mission office are the ones who stuff the envelopes, there isn't much privacy. So, don't plan on writing a Dear John to your missionary using Dear Elder, unless you want the entire mission to know.
Wednesday, February 14, 2007
Homemade Instant Oatmeal
Instructables has a demonstration for DIY instant oatmeal. Stop buying the prepackaged stuff and start saving money. This would be a good way to use the oats you need to rotate out of your food storage.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Related Posts
