One logical requirement of your employment with MindBites is that you contribute to the community by making your own MindBites. It helps us to understand what our authors and users go through to publish on our site. In addition to making my own MindBite, I wanted to write about the process as someone with no video production or editing experience, other than simple videos of my son with our digital camera.
I joined forces with Huntley, another new member of the MindBites team to shoot. She has already shared her take on the process, but here are a few of my own take-aways about the process:
The Baby Formula contest is about half-way through the submission period (submission deadline is November 3rd), but that still leaves you with an entire month to register and get your entry in…. There’s $1500 in cash at stake, just in time for the holidays!
We’ve had some fantastic entries, so far, ranging from Baby Sign Language and Flashcards, to Understanding Child Shyness, How to Talk to Your Young Child About Sex, How to Calm a Crying Baby, How to Make Peanut Butter Playdough, and Introducing Healthy Foods to Baby. You can view them all for free and vote.
With each entry and vote, you are helping a great cause, Any Baby Can. Any Baby Can provides support and resources to the youngest, sickest, and poorest children and their families. We are impressed with the services and education they provide the community and are very proud to partner with them.
The TechCrunch event started over at the AT & T Executive Education and Conference center at the University of Texas at Austin with a panel discussion about grassroots marketing. There were 20 people on the panel which was moderated by Erick Schonfeld. First let me say that I was blown away by the AT &T Conference Center. I won’t comment on the panel except to say that there were a lot of panel members. I would like to give a shout out to my friend Jeff Dachis for keeping it real on the panel.
The MindBites team hit the Austin Tech Crunch (+ Austin Ventures) Meetup at Pangea and was immediately accused of being part of a posse. Hmmm…which definition did they mean?
pos·se
group of people summoned by a sheriff to aid in law enforcement.
A search party.
A gang involved in crimes such as running guns and illegal narcotics trafficking.
Slang A group of friends or associates.
I am hoping that they were going for #4 here although #3 would be quite exciting.
Jeff Kramer & Huntley Tarrant at TechCrunch Austin
MindBites.com was well represented at the event and we had a good time meeting new people. We particularly enjoyed talking with Daddy Clay from DadLabs.com , our friends from Porter Novelli and Thom Singer, the networking madman.
Jason Reneau, Our Fearless Leader
When we sat down on what appeared to be an open couch, we were told by KeyVault that we could sit there but we had to listen to the quick pitch. We were like flies caught in fly paper but we liked the approach. Very effective.
After awhile, we started to get delirious:
Huntley Tarrant & Alex Jurek at TechCrunch Austin
All in all, the event was a good time and worthwhile to come out in force with our MindBites Posse in full effect.
Good morning MindBiters, Blog Readers, and Persons Who Find Us Via Google (welcome!),
Half of us here at MBWHQ (MindBites World Headquarters) were out of the office sick, yesterday, thus the lack of blog and twitter updates. But have no fear, we are back, today, and better than, well, yesterday…
Week three of The Baby Formula contest finds you (yes, YOU) in a fantastic position to make yourself somewhere between $500-$1500 richer (and who couldn’t use the cashola-we read the newspapers!). Check out the competition, vote, or enter yourself.
Remember, your participation goes toward helping out Any Baby Can, a great non-profit helping the poorest, sickest, and youngest children and babies.
Here is the most recent video we have, promoting our contest. Watch it, I promise you won’t be disappointed!
Also, BabyBlogAddict posted about us! Check out their blog, and the post about the contest!
Well, The Baby Formula contest has been up and running for 2 weeks now, and we have some great entries! Make sure that you go and vote weekly. Voting will increase to daily after the submission deadline on November 3rd.
Of course, don’t forget to enter… With only a handful of entries right now, you have a fantastic chance to take home a prize of up to $1500 in cash ($1000 Grand Prize and a $500 People’s Choice Award)! Submit your how-to video on babies or parenting of babies, newborn to three years of age. Need an idea? The Baby Formula contest page has some great examples, including Huntley’s How To Appliqué a Onesie Using Felt.
Finally, remember that The Baby Formula is benefiting Any Baby Can. Your participation, through entering and voting, is helping to support the youngest, poorest, and sickest children in our communities.
For those among us that don’t want to guess what chocolate candy is melted into a diaper or sample baby food or estimate the belly measurements of a woman who is undoubtedly uncomfortable with her burgeoning waistline already, I have a great new baby shower activity suggestion: felt appliqué onesies! Felt is great for this because it comes in plenty of brilliant colors and designs but doesn’t fray like normal fabrics will. If you go with another fabric, you’ll have to sew down the designs (well - and with one of a few particular types of stitches).
I’ve actually done this at a couple showers at my house now and am completely in love with my baby shower innovation! The process is pretty simple and pretty cheap. Plus, if you structure it correctly (e.g. with appropriately selected cookie cutters), you can get even the least creative and artistic attendees to put out something that the baby won’t be ashamed to sport proudly.
As a member of the MindBites team, it’s more than a little bit sad that six weeks passed between me starting my new gig here and me actually absconding with one of our video cameras to try out this whole “make a mindbite” thing. Nonetheless, I crossed that mountain a few weekends ago and am very proud of my inaugural film debut: How to Applique a Onesie Using Felt.
I’m not a particularly crafty person by nature, but my middle (and much craftier) sister and I concocted this project some time back when our oldest sister was expecting. I did a bunch of doodling and then we turned my better doodles into some swell felt applique onesies. They were so adorable and such a hit with everyone that the onesie project soon took on a life of its own. We’ve since hosted more than one baby shower where we used this as the activity (well, sans sewing, which we did for folks since sewing doesn’t lend itself well to large group activities). Anyhow, as a baby shower activity, these were also a tremendous success (and way better than the countless other baby shower games I’ve been subjected to… yuck)
Anyhow, I’m meaning to write about the experience, so here are my takeaways:
The event was very crafty, indeed, with Jennifer Perkins of Naughty Secretary Club (and a new MindBites author!) signing books, Average Jane Crafter passing out fancy door prizes every 15 minutes, and button ring makers eating the endless supply of delicious chocolate and vanilla cupcakes. (Here’s a tip from MindBites, they were bought at Sam’s!)
Two serious crafters on the MindBites team, Alex and Brittanie, took the opportunity to film the event and especially pay close attention to the event’s craft project, How to Make a Button Ring, sponsored by Naughty Secretary Club, Average Jane Crafter, Craft: Magazine, Craft-o-Rama, and MindBites. Enjoy the video!
We are very proud to partner with Any Baby Can in our new contest, The Baby Formula. Any Baby Can has been serving Travis County and surrounding communities for almost 30 years. Their mission is to ensure that all children reach their potential through education, therapy, and family support services.
ABC offers a variety of services to support the community (prenatal education, English classes, auditory services and hearing aids, literacy classes, childbirth classes, and parenting classes), and they also organize specialized family and medical support for children with developmental delays and chronic illnesses. Through these and other services, ABC brings help and hope to more than 5,000 of our community’s youngest, sickest, and poorest children each year.
We are excited to announce that our new contest, The Baby Formula, begins today!
The Baby Formula is calling for submissions of instructional videos related to parenting and babies (newborn to 3 years of age), for the chance to win up to $1500 cash just in time for the holidays. The registration and submission period runs today through November 3rd.
Email This Post
Subcribe to our RSS feed
