FRIDAY 5 AT 5: iPHONE APPS

I was recently gifted an iPhone from my sweet, loving husband.

Although it wasn't my birthday or anniversary, I still consider getting an iPhone to be a gift because (1) Davey allowed me to ditch our Verizon Wireless plan and get a plan with AT&T and (2) he bought me the latest iPhone with all the accessories to go with it.

Several weeks ago Davey and I both upgraded with Verizon to Windows phones (he got the Palm Pre Plus and I got the Samsung Omnia II). After a couple of weeks I realized I wasn't fully happy with my new phone, mainly because it wasn't an iPhone. I've had a iPod Touch (which is basically an iPhone without the phone) for several months now and I've just really loved how intuitive everything is. Plus, I work on a Mac 40+ hours a week, so I really feel comfortable with Mac products. We are a divided household, and we're okay with that.

Which is why I consider it such a big deal that my husband would support me in totally "switching sides" to AT&T in order to have an iPhone. In fact, it was his idea! I just want everyone else to understand how incredibly blessed I am to have a husband who wants me to be happy -- and this is such a great example of that.

I was able to sync all of my contacts, apps, and music from my iPod Touch over to my iPhone which saved me a lot of time/hassle. So, for today's Friday 5 at 5 I would like to share a few of my favorite iPhone Apps:

1. Twitterrific: simple design, easy to use. Tweeting is pretty basic, and so should a Twitter application. I love that I don't have to click photo links to see them, they just show up. I also appreciate that it puts the tweets in ascending order and starts me from the last tweet that I read (no needless scrolling through a line of tweets just to get back where I left off last time)

2. YouTube: comes standard on the iPhone. Yes, I'm one of those lame people who can spend hours on YouTube watching kittens and puppies do cute little tricks. I also subscribe to a couple of channels, my favorite being Zak George because he has taught me how to teach our dog some pretty awesome tricks. Plus his Border Collies do some really amazing frisbee tricks.

3. iRelax: I love going to sleep to the sound of crickets/frogs outside my window, however I don't have crickets or frogs outside my window where I live, so I listen to high quality recordings of them to go to sleep. You can also mix your own tracks of soothing sounds and save them. There's also a timer so I know my phone will shut off in 30 minutes (even though I'm usually asleep in 5)

4. ColorSnap: This app was created by Sherwin Williams - the paint store. Take a photo of anything (say your bedroom comforter) and then use your finger to select colors from that photo (with the idea of using those colors to paint your wall, furniture, or buy coordinating accessories). Once you have your palette chosen, the app will give you the closest paint colors offered by Sherwin Williams to achieve your color scheme. I've been using this app a lot lately since I'm putting together mood boards for our house (those posts coming soon!)

5. Pandora: I've listened to Pandora radio for many years now and I'm still not tired of it. The only thing I am tired of is not having a subscription. Anyone want to gift me $36 so I can buy a subscription? I listen to this at work, at the grocery store, when I'm cooking, while I'm crafting, right now as I blog (the Ingrid Michaelson station if you were curious). This site has helped me discover tons of new music artists that I love.

Got any phone apps that you love (be it for the iPhone or another phone)? Any amazing giftings by a friend or your significant other that just blew you away? Anyone wanna buy my iPod Touch?