We're home. Sort of.

We might be back in the comfort of our home (and bed) here in Colorado, but my body (mostly stomach) feel like we're still at Powell on a boat. Like these ones.

I still pretty much feel like I'm about to dive into the water...like our boating buddy, Lawson.

.

We had a blast hanging out with the Anderson gang and some good friends. Like Tim Tebow.

Too bad the Tim Tebow we hung out with isn't a rookie QB for our favorite football team.

No, his name isn't really Tim Tebow. Nutter's been a little bit obsessed with Tebow lately and told us that Tebow was going to Powell with us, so of course we had to play along.

Nut's favorite part of the trip? Definately hanging out on the jet ski!

Chase's favorite part of the trip?

Mine? Just relaxing with this in the background.

Hunter's cousin is pretty amazingly cute.

So are these two.

The 7 hour drive didn't even seem that bad since Hunter slept the majority of it. Now, if only I could get rid of my motion sickness, we'd be totally back to reality. Including, Hunter's first day of school which we just got home from!

Vac-ay at the Lak-ay

Or something like that!

Our family is leaving this evening to spend the rest of the week at one of my husband's favorite destinations - Lake Powell! As kids, we both ventured there (separately) many times, and as a couple, we've been there a few. Hunter has only been once though and he was only 7 months old.

Okay, technically, he's been twice, but the first time he was still in my stomach.

So, we're very excited to head back to the lake! Hunter is going to try water skiing for the first time (supposedly, I'm going to try too, but, I'm feeling some severe headaches coming on...)

Anyways, we'll be out for the rest of the week, but I thought a blog post was in order before than.

Today, a topic has struck my Facebook community about people posting pictures of other people without their permission. What does everyone else think about this?

The pictures in question are not the most flattering pictures, and are in fact being used as revenge against this person. While I don't necessarily condone this behavior, I have to say, if you're out in public, doing things in public you have to know people have cell phones at the ready to take pictures and video. Our world has become so digital that a video can make it onto YouTube within minutes of being shot. Pictures can be uploaded to Facebook the second you take them. There are definitely advantages and disadvantages to this, but I think as a whole, we need to be conscientious of the things we're doing in public places knowing that the chances of someone having a camera on us are great. As long as we know that the things we're doing reflect on the person we want to be, than there really shouldn't be a problem with this.

Off my soap box now, and on to the road! Have a great week everyone!

The Sony Reader PRS-600

Chase and I totally had a $50 Christmas limit last year. In fact, I spent WEEKS pondering what he was getting me that was so "wonderful" for under $50. Turns out...Chase did not spend $50. In fact, he spent $300. That's okay honey...it's only 6 times what you were suppose to spend. Ya know. No biggie...just a few bucks.

He was however VERY right when knowing that this was a gift I would ABSOLUTELY love. What did he get me?? Are you silly enough not to read the title??

A Sony Reader PRS-600. Which just so happens to be the touch version. The very cool $300 touch version ($279.00 on sale at Best Buy actually + tax..soo...$300.)


And he even got it in red. Because he knows I love red. How about that for hubby sweetness? The pocket edition comes in pink though. I was a little disappointed when I figured that out. I love pink even more than red. Oh well. My Blackberry is pink. Review for that coming soon.


On to the Sony!

My first impression of it was WOW. Not only could I carry around ALL my books at once, but, I could do it in STYLE, look cooler than I usually do (hard to do, I know), and, have access to so many more books than I did before. Anyone who knows me knows that I live inside my books. And now to be able to carry them all around with me all the time so I'm never without something to read? Sweet hubby of the year award being awarded to my husband. It's been revoked since Christmas though, no worries.

My favorite features of the Sony Reader PRS-600:

*It's red (duh). It also comes in silver and black. But not pink.
*It has a touch screen allowing you to easily change pages regardless on how your positioned
*It has a built in dictionary
*I can easily and cheaply purchase books from Sony's massive library. It's very easy to transfer the books to the Sony, although, it did take me half a minute to figure out. People in my parent's crowd may find themselves trying for 5 minutes or so.
*Access to lots of free books, which change periodically. I really love this because I've gotten a bunch of free books from there (sappy romance novels, I know, I'm a nerd). Free is awesome for me though, and I've actually enjoyed reading sappy romances.
* You can hand write notes and transfer them to your computer. I just think this is cool. Although I haven't found use for it yet. Key word, yet.
*You can download books from ANYWHERE, not just Sony's website. I've downloaded Cosmopolitan actually. And Popular Photography. And 101 Uses for A Condom. Popsicle anyone?
*It's lightweight. Portable. Easy to carry in my bag. I even take it to the gym. To the drive-through. To the doctors. To the line at the grocery store. To the movies. I take it everywhere...can you tell? It comes in at 10.1 ounces and 6.9" X 4.8" X 4". The screen is 6", giving you plenty of reading space. I don't find that I'm ever constantly changing the page.
*The screen can change from portrait to landscape. I've used both depending on what format I'm reading.
*Did I mention you can get books from anywhere? It supports a gaggle of formats. Adobe^® PDF⁵, Microsoft^® Word, BBeB Book^® and other text file formats, as well as EPUB/ACS4 and connection with Adobe Digital Editions⁴ Like those ones. Mostly, I like that it supports PDF's.
*It has expandable memory using either a SD card or a Memory Stick Pro Duo.
*It has adjustable font sizes. I happen to like it pretty small. That irritates my husband.
*You can highlight and make annotations using the built in pen.

Things I'm less than impressed with:
*It utilizes E-Ink, which is actually pretty cool. It makes it look more like a "book." You can tilt it at weird angles and still read it. My problem? The touch screen on the Sony gives it a weird glare. I can't always tilt it at weird angles and read it. If I had a reliable book light, that would perhaps be remedied as it seems to do better the more light you have. But for now, reading in bed at night is almost a little annoying.
*There's no easy way to see how far you have to the end of the chapter. I'm sure this is with all E-readers. I'm a person who thinks she'll read to the end of a chapter, but not knowing that the end of the chapter is 100 pages down the line means I've had a few late nights.
*It's appealing to yellow labs named Miley. One day, she drug it out of the night stand, went "chomp chomp", destroyed the case that came with it and put a few teeth marks in the lower right corner of my reader. I was more than a little mad as I'm sure you can imagine.
*The battery life (on mine at least) is no where near what Sony claims it to be. They say it can go roughly 2 weeks or 7,500 page turns. I find I need to charge it every 2-3 days if I'm really reading. Maybe 600-1000 page turns. I would send it back, but...well, see above. I'm pretty sure they are just going to tell me to get over myself because my dog ruined the battery life. But, for the record, the battery was no better before Miley got her grubby teeth on it.
*You can put MP3's on it. It doesn't have speakers, but does have a headphone jack. I haven't actually had a reason to test this out, but I think it's cool that if my husband's Sony Walkman ever breaks, I'll be able to use this as a home to my Glee 2 Soundtrack.

Overall, I would totally recommend the Sony. The price and color are right compared to others on the market. The touch screen is totally a cool, usable, highly functional, fun feature that sets it apart from others.

And once you get it, download some Jodi Picoult books for me, because she rocks!



Overall? My husband is super awesome for getting me one of these.

Who Are We?

We're The Anderson Family - otherwise known as "thatcrazyfamily."

I'm Holly. I'm twenty-four, although I've felt like I've been in my thirties for quite some time now. My defining moment in life was meeting my son, Hunter, for the first time. Hunter has taught me everything about who and want I want to be. I'm a photographer, specializing in children and families (www.innovativeimage.org - mention this post, get 50% off). I'm a part-time nanny who loves kids and who will also admit that my head is usually pounding by the end of the day. I'm a "stay-at-home" Mom, meaning I do not put my son in daycare and babysitting is limited to occasional trips to stay with the grandparents. I do everything that I do because I love to do it, I want to do it, and I feel like it's all what I'm meant to do.




My husband is Chase. He's twenty-five. After a slew of jobs in his late teens/early twenties, he finally settled down and has been a part of the corporate world for the past three years. For the past two years, he's been embarking on entering into the sales world, and more specifically the online sales world (www.denverwindowinfo.com - mention this post, get 10% off any order).





Our son, Hunter Logan (who I typically refer to as Nut), is three. Nut could just be the coolest kid you have ever met. He's fun-loving, energetic, completely adorable, and a ham of a little boy. I might be biased, but I choose to think I'm not. He does completely crazy, out of control things every single day. And every single day Chase and I wonder how we were lucky enough to get to be his parents.



We also have two loving labs, Jetta and Miley and two croaking fire-belly toads, Ribbit and Rex.

We have been home-owners for the past two years when we purchased our town home in Aurora, CO. Month to month, we struggle to pay all our bills while allowing ourselves to have a little bit of fun, and spoil our son just a tad. We live frugally, always researching what we buy and buying things on sale or utilizing coupons. We live within our means and are working to pay off the little credit card debt we currently have and are putting forth the rare goal to not use credit cards in the future.

And now, we want to share our stories with you.

Welcome!

My husband and I were recently talking about the world of "blogging" and the effect blogging has on so many lives. I've always been a blogger - from journaling in spiral notebooks when I was kid, to a livejournal.com account when I was a teenager and finally to blogger.com with our family blog which has been going for a few years now. I enjoy writing and documenting, and until now, our blog has mostly been filled with tidbits on our family to keep those close to us "in the loop" as we progress through our busy lives.

Today, we're starting a new adventure though. Both my husband and I are young entrepreneurs. We balance family life with our three year old son (and of course our pets), two businesses, a full-time 40 hour a week corporate job, and a part-time 20+ hour a week "fun" job. We're both up and running in the world of technology, watching and learning as changing technology impacts our businesses and our lives. We thought it would be a fun adventure to not only start blogging about our family, but about our views on technology, our businesses, our jobs, our finances and perhaps even politics. We'll also be reviewing things from time to time as well as hosting give-aways! I might just even throw in some crafty tutorials and photography tips!

We're just an average American family wanting to share our story with the world.

We will also look for guest posts about anything that is interesting to YOU. Also, for an undetermined amount of time, we will offer free advertising on our blog. As small business owners with a non-existent advertising budget, we want to help others out there in similar situations!