tips and tricks

Leave it to the kids to figure out cool iPhone tricks before we do, especially where emoji are concerned. Turns out, there's a fun way to insert emoji into your texts without toggling back and forth between keyboards -- something that ca…

If you've been concerned about the amount of screen time your teens might be consuming, you've actually got some cause. According to a new study, teens who spent more time on their devices were less happy than those who invested more tim…

Last year, I fell in love with the A Color Story app for photo editing, and named it my cool pick of the week on our Spawned podcast . Just this weekend, they launched A Design Kit , their equally fun, friendly, and really wonderful app …

It's not always easy for us parents to find time to focus on our mental and spiritual health, but it's critical to being good parents for our kids. So, set aside the guilt about "me time" and download these free self-care apps now. They'…

Thanks to Twitter user Red Long , who describes himself as blind in his bio, I found a terrific tip to use a feature in your Twitter accessibility features to help your visually impaired readers. However in digging deeper, turns out ther…

It might seem counterintuitive to use technology to get sleep, especially since so many sleep experts remind us all that tech before bed is a major offender. Over the years, we've featured some fantastic sleep gadgets and sleep apps to h…

Over the holiday break, I took my family on a trip to Sedona, Arizona and the Grand Canyon, and thanks to my fantastic iPhone 8+ camera with Portrait Mode, I've got some fantastic photos. But, as I quickly discovered after some trial and…

From scary apps your kids might be using to the solar eclipse of 2017 (remember that?), we rounded up our top 10 most popular posts here on Cool Mom Tech from 2017. 10. Is Unroll.me safe to use ? After the controversy over their use of d…

We've covered a ton of topics on our Spawned with Kristen and Liz podcast in 2017. From kids and social media to vagacials (yes, it's a thing), we've had a blast chatting with each other, and our esteemed guests, about parenting and pare…

At my house, we use our Amazon Echo every single day. I ask Alexa to place orders, find the proper cooking temperature of pork, or play my favorite playlist, just to name a few. So with the holidays here, I thought it would be fun to sha…

By now, everyone knows about Snapchat and kids right? It's like Snapchat has come to epitomize the "watch out for kids and their apps." But the truth is, there are so so many apps that can get kids into trouble, and it's hard to keep up …

We're all learning about new technology right along with our kids, which can put us at a bit of a disadvantage. Darn those growing brains. And if you've ever gotten a new cell phone and seen how much more your kid knows about it than you…

We know lots of people who would appreciate a Hulu membership, or a subscription to Netflix over more stuff.

Okay, so please tell me I'm not the only iPhone owner who's had an iPhone for literally years ...and never knew this super basic time-saving iPhone trick. Turns out, your clock -- you know, the little digital display of the time at the v…

There's a glitch in the matrix! Okay, not really, just that there's a bug in iOS 11 that for many people turns their letter "i" to a weird symbol. Thankfully, there's a quick fix until they come up with a fix in the next iOS version, whi…

We know that parents of teens (us included!) are always searching for ways to help teach them responsibility, and slowly gain more independence. That's what they want, and well, it's what we want too, which is why we're so thrilled to te…

Last year, I was having some issues with neck and shoulder pain, along with a side of vertigo (ugh!). After a discussion with a chiropractor and a yoga therapist, I decided to make some changes to my work set-up, which was probably causi…

The TBH app has been blowing up over the past few weeks and just hit #1 in the App Store for iOS following the announcement that Facebook has purchased it. I've seen multiple articles referring to it a "kindness app" or an "anonymous com…

When we were Apple newbies, my kids racked up quite a collection of paid apps before I realized what was happening. And I wasn't the only one. Apple ended up refunding lots of parents money for apps their kids bought . Then they set up t…

If you've upgraded to iOS 11 , then there's a good chance you've stumbled upon the new Control Center. Well, given it takes up almost the whole screen now, it's pretty hard to miss. And if you haven't, we'll I think you're in for a treat…

As someone who uses Instagram on an almost hourly basis (hey, it's work, too!), I was pleased to discover that just yesterday, they launched 2 new features to help keep users a whole lot safer. Here's the quick scoop on what they are, an…

Leave it to my twelve-year-old-daughter to be way ahead of me on the Instagram design tricks -- in this case, how to make an ombre text overlay in Instagram stories. I fell instantly in love. Now we're not the types (ha) to spend hours m…

Last week, my fiance' showed me his newly organized iPhone with all the apps neatly filed away into folders and I got hella jealous. This is 40, people. Turns out, organizing your iPhone apps into folders is super simple, and it can make…

With the iPhone 8 announcement coming tomorrow, we know there's going to be lots of you (including us) strongly considering selling or trading-in your older model for a pretty new one. But there's good reason to update beyond just the aw…