One second, every day

I'm probably late to the party on this one but one of my favorite apps lately is 1 Second Everyday*, a phone app that helps you take little video snippets of your life and stitch them together chronologically to make a movie. (If you saw the movie Chef, the son used this app in making the movie of his dad's food truck.) 

You might be thinking that the last thing you need is another app or reason to take more photos/movies but I promise this one is easy peasy. No need to think up cleverly worded posts, no fiddling with things at the time you're filming, no need to pose or think about likes or followers. Just take a few frames of video now and then (the more candid and random the better) and later (you don't even have to do it that day) you choose which clip to represent the day and upload it to the app. There's something magical about capturing the lovely, mundane everyday moments as they fly by--and then seeing them in one cohesive movie.

You can also create other projects not based on the one-a-day format. When we went away this long Easter weekend (Australia takes a four-day holiday), I decided to do one to remember our time together:

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• 1SE founder Cesar Kuriyama's TED talk
• His 1 Second Everyday video from Age 30
• A sampling of other 1SE movies

*not a sponsored post, I just love to spread the joy

App happy

Okay, ready for a little Monday sharing time? Help a girl out. I feel like I'm just scratching the surface when it comes to the apps I use on my phone and I'm definitely in a rut. I think a little clean-out is in order to get rid of tired old unused ones and to refresh with new ones. What are your best and favorite apps?

Here are my tried and trues:

- Mailbox : this is my favorite email app. Its clean design and intuitive functions just please me. You can delete, save, reschedule, and file emails with a swipe of your finger. And if you empty out your inbox, there's a lovely reward photo to inspire you, a new one each day!

Mailbox

- Instagram (of course) : Okay, this is an obvious one but maybe you haven't taken the Instagram leap yet?  Such a simple, elegant way to capture daily sights and stay connected with friends & family. Sometimes (most of the time?) a picture really is worth those thousand words. I also recommend using Printstagram to print photos, books, and magnets from Instagram photos, too. I sent Lauren off with a couple of little books and a bunch of printed square photos for hanging on her walls. They're great quality and not at all spendy.

Prinstagram

- Flipagram : Okay, I'll admit this is my one new app lately; I just got this a week ago after being intrigued by a couple of examples on Instagram. You can create a slideshow/stop motion video in three easy steps: Just choose the photos from your phone photo library, select the speed (or time frame for the video; if you want to post it to Instagram, keep it under 15 seconds), and pick the music soundtrack (optional). Though it has relatively low ratings, they recently overhauled the app to fix a couple of bugs and I've had nothing but a good experience with it.  Here's one I made to celebrate our one-year Aussiversary this last weekend.

- Instabackground: This is a fun way to personalize your home screen on your phone. Instabackground helps you create a custom wallpaper from your Instagram and camera roll photos. Not necessarily an essential, day-to-day app but definitely a fun one.

- My Fitness Pal: I'm currently watching what I eat and monitoring my exercise activity in an attempt to get more fit and lean. (This is a post for another day but I am currently on a quest to (a) feel more happy to see myself in photos and (b) feel more energy and more like jumping into fun activities without feeling self-conscious. Or tired. Or lumpy.) This app is terrific at tracking food and activity and scale numbers plus it allows you to connect with friends to cheer each other on. I also like that it allows you to choose metric units or pounds. Love it. 

- Pic Tap Go: This is, hands down, my favorite photo editing app. It combines some of my favorite features of other photo apps (whitagram, VSCO, Snapseed) into one app. And it allows you to upload non-square photos to Instagram, too! Win-win. 

-Run pee: This app gives you approximate times (and descriptions of the scenes when to leave) to, well, take a bathroom break during a movie. Maddy and I swear by it. Seriously. It's a moviesaver! 

- Living Earth: I like this one for keeping track of what time it is around the world. (This way I avoid making that pesky middle-of-the-night phone call when I miscalculate the time difference. Awkward!) Plus it's just gorgeous with its interactive globe featuring different maps of weather, up-to-the-minute cloud coverage of the globe, and other cool features. 

Living Earth

Okay, now it's your turn. What am I missing? What apps are your top shelf favorites? 

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No apps were harmed in the creating of this post nor were any bloggers paid. These opinions are my own, un-recompensed ones.