Webkinz Talk

We speak Webkinz-Ease in our house, that is how greatly Webkinz has embellished our lives.

The Webkinz world is entered by purchasing a cute and lovable stuffed animal made by Ganz that has a tag that contains a special secret code that activates a virtual pet that looks similar to your stuffed friend (my daughter reminds me to tell people to not accidentally purchase a Webkinz stuffed animal that doesn't have a tag, and please do NOT throw away your tag!). Once you own one of these little pets, you are given a room to decorate and a world to explore (complete with games, jobs, and even a Post Office). You are also in charge of feeding your virtual pet so that it doesn't get sick. At all times, the pet has a meter that reads his health, happiness, and hunger level. The range is 0-100, with 100 being the highest.

Our conversations can go something like this:
How hungry are you?
I'm starving, I think I'm at about 60.
Well, I'm at a 75, so I'll make us a snack.

Then later:
I'm about a 95 on my tired level (we've made this category [and others] up), so I think I could stay awake a while longer.
Not me, I'm a 40, I'm going to bed now.

Then, of course, the games and their unique vocabularies have entered our world, too. Once a day, everyone gets a spin on the Wheel of Wow. We, however, call it the Wheel of Mom since WOW is MOM upside down. The wheel spins the word WOW, making it look like MOM. I often hear, "Wow, Mom! Look what we got!"

One of our current favorite activities is to sit and play the games on the (muted) Webkinz site whilst listening to audio books. Our second favorite activity is to play our homemade version of Webkinz Trading Spaces. Both of my daughters have an account. We log in on two different computers, show each other 1-3 possible trading rooms, decide on a KinzCash amount (usually 1000-3000 KinzCash), then switch places for an hour or two. We can't sell each others items without permission, but we can reuse items in the rooms we've chosen and we can do whatever we want as far as decorating goes. I go back and forth between the computers and I probably have the most fun of all. :) We've come up with some awesome rooms!

Oh, how we love Webkinz!

Audible Books and iPods

My Unschooled daughters and I have become enamored with audio books. On a recent trip, we knew we had to finish listening to the last Harry Potter book (our consensus is that it is the best one of the bunch). Thus, we started looking into MP3 players.

Our criteria were (1) SUPER SMALL and (2) easy to use. Thus, the purchase of our iPod Shuffle version 2. We started with only two and now have three. These have become excellent purchases and we're zipping through books as we go about our daily lives. It is wonderful to be doing the dishes while listening to a book! I'd so frequently had to put my book down in order to do laundry. Not now. :) With the iPods, the best source of instant audio books out there is by far Audible.com. (Thanks to my friend, Andrew, for that recommendation). Not only is their product easy to understand and use, but their customer support is excellent. I highly recommend them, despite the fact that they won't allow Do Life Right, Inc. to be an affiliate of theirs.

Audible books, music, television shows, and movies can also be purchased through iTunes (an excellent free program). I've tried all of the above and found them to work superbly. The downloading process is simple and easy. Amazon's Unbox, however, still needs some work before I can recommend them. I struggled with attempting to download a video for weeks before I finally asked them for a refund (which they quickly did).