hollywood housewife

snapfish versus shutterfly versus mpix versus costco

I've been meaning to do this experiment forever, since I couldn't help but feel that my default picture printing at Costco was the less-than-desirable route for memory keeping.  Then last week so many of you responded to the photo organization element to my frantic nesting. 

In the next couple of weeks I'll lay out exactly how I manage the hundreds of pictures I take each month, but first I wanted to figure out the best way to print said photos.  Since storing them on your computer is nice, but holding them in your hand is better.

Here was what was important to me:

-Price

-Ease of website (uploading, ordering)

-White border option

-Matte/Lustre finish (as opposed to a glossy finish)

-Auto Correct option on or off

EXPERIMENT: I chose 8 photos that had been taken in the last year.  I chose pictures taken with different cameras, three of them from non-amateurs so that I couldn't blame myself for any strange color or focus issues.  I ordered the same 8 prints from these places on a Friday night, and selected the cheapest option for shipping.  Here's how it stacked up:

I was really impressed with the speed and ease of Snapfish.  I had a coupon, so I uploaded a huge chunk of pictures as a separate order from the experiment order.  We're talking 200 prints and they went up quickly and easily.

Autocorrect: Yes it let me turn it off

White thin border: Yes

Matte: Yes

Arrived: Wednesday

Cost: $.09 each, my total with 3-5 business day shipping was $1.48

Shutterfly was equally easy and quick to upload.

Autocorrect: No,  or I couldn't find it if it was an option.

White thin border: No

Matte: Yes

Arrived: Wednesday

Random pro: Gave me 30 minutes after I ordered to cancel

Cost: $.15 each, but it automatically applied a first time user credit.  Total with 3-7 business day shipping was $1.79

The uploading process at Costco photo seemed archaic in comparison to Snapfish and Shutterfly.  Once navigated, they loaded as quickly (under 2 minutes) but it was definitely not as smooth or intuitive.

Autocorrect: Yes

White Thin Border: Yes

Matte: Yes

Arrived: I picked them up at the location just a few minutes from my house.  So it was immediate (well, within the hour).

Cost: $.13 each, but without shipping charges.  My total was $1.10

MPix was definitely the most professional site I tried, recommended to me on twitter by several photographers I trust, including Miz Booshay. 

Not quite as user-friendly as Snapfish and Shutterfly, but easier than Costco.  At least it was after the upload plugin failed three times. 

Autocorrect: Yes

White thin border: Yes

Matte: Yes

Arrived: Friday (a full week after ordering)

Random pro: Gave me 30 minutes to cancel after ordering

Cost: A whopping $.73 each ($.44 of which was the lustre coating)

Shipping ranged from $3 for 1st Class USPS to Next Business Day for $10.75 (reasonable).  I chose the cheapest (and clearly slowest), so my total was $8.84.

And now for the proof of quality:

Right away, Shutterfly was out for two big reasons: no white border option and the colors looked significantly different than from the other places.  You can see it best in the black and white, where it has a yellow tinge that borders on light sepia. 

So that left the other three.  I could see (but just barely) that the colors from the Mpix prints were the most accurate. 

After weighing all the pros and cons, I had a clear winner for my everyday printing:

It was the cheapest, hit all my major points, and I liked the web interface the best.  It also offers frequent coupons (the one I took advantage of at the same time was 200 prints for $2!)  This outcome really surprised me.

For something immediate, Costco stood up just fine, so it will remain a decent option for me.

For large prints, gifts, or things deemed precious, I was glad to discover Mpix.  But for daily prints, the price difference is just too much to be ignored. 

Consider me a newly converted Snapfish customer!

blurb books vs. iphoto books

There are several quality photo book sites, but my two favorites are blurb and iPhoto.  There are pros and cons to each, but I really like the results as a way to document.

three of my favorite parenting books

It's Mommy Monday again.  The day my momma-bear just comes roaring out.

Kids DO come with a manual.  There are parenting books/blogs/DVDs on every subject under the sun.  

How to, how to, how to.  You should, You shouldn't, You must, Don't you dare.  

I am, in all aspects of my life, a happy mix of planning every detail and completely winging it.  I parent in the same way.  So I read a handful of books and took all of them with a grain of salt.

These are three that I believe are worth your time:  

The Blessing of a Skinned Knee by Wendy Mogel.  The subtitle of this book is Using Jewish Teachings to Raise Self-Reliant Children.  I am not Jewish.  I love this book.

 Dr. Mogel was a Beverly Hills child psychologist who noticed that more and more parents were bringing in their over-scheduled and exhausted children into her practice for general unhappiness or because the children were "failing" in some way.  After a series of tests would reveal that there was nothing wrong, the parents almost seemed disappointed.  It seemed as if parents wanted an explanation for why their precious angel wasn't tops in his class or the best athlete or the most social.  It couldn't be that their kid was just average.

Dr. Mogel turned to her faith to find meaning and purpose in parenting.  I turned down the corners on many of the pages of this book, but the ones that stuck with me were about family ritual and character.  

"A key concept in Hasidic thought expresses the idea of balance: 'Keep two piece of paper in your pockets at all times.  On one write, 'I am a speck of dust.' On the other, 'The world was created for me.'  The divine and the ordinary merge in Judaism, where the holiest day of the year isn't Yom Kippur, the majestic and awesome Day of Atonement, but every Saturday.  This potentially average day of the week is such a distinctive time that, according to tradition, a band of ministering angels follows each person home from synagogue to help usher in the special spirit of the day."

Isn't that something?  

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Free-Range Kids by Lenore Skenazy.  I annoy everyone around me by quoting incessantly from this book.  I wrote about it more in depth here.  I know a lot of the principles in this book make parents nervous.  

I was given a lot of freedom when I was kid.  My parent's trust wasn't something earned, it was something expected.  I consciously or subconsciously rose to their expectations.  I probably could have destroyed that trust in a hot minute, but I didn't.  I wanted to keep the freedoms awarded me, and I was no dummy.  

This doesn't mean I didn't mess up from time to time.  I was, to put it mildly, a headstrong child.  But I never gave my parents reason to believe I was anything but a decent person with common sense.  They let me find my own way and I am a better person for it.

I'm raising Pigtail in a large city, so the rules are a little different from my own childhood.  But I want to navigate from a place of trust and not fear. 

*

Healthy Sleep Habits, Happy Child by Marc Weissbluth.  I read a couple of the sleep training-type books that are popular and considered controversial.  Can I confess something?  I flat out didn't understand them.  I didn't understand what I was supposed to do.  Really.  I felt like the message and helpfulness was lost in the defense of sleep training logic.  

This book made so much more sense to me.  It broke it down by age and explained in detail what was happening in my little one's brain and her natural sleep patterns.  It helped me understand Pigtail's rhythms and how to shape that into a schedule that made sense for our day.  The book wasn't too judgmental or too gentle.  It was informational.  And that is what I was looking for in a sleep book.

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I haven't picked up a parenting book in several months.  I've gotten more comfortable with my instincts as I go, but I do think I'll continue to read something on the subject several times a year.  Any parenting books you swear by?