Office1000 Blog January Archive

Messy Meals with Babies

By Blog Stories at 01/20/2009 21:29

Every parent knows that one of the dirtiest activities that a baby can get to is eating. It seems that an early age, babies have the tendency to get dirty, and playing with their food is something that they like.

Maybe your baby thought of making his/her spaghetti ammunition for the next war, or it can be that he/she just chose to drop his/her bowl of soup for the sake of dropping it, or maybe he/she is just having a hard time inserting the food to his/her mouth. Whatever the reasons, it can turn out pretty nasty for the parents.

Parents always end up cleaning all the mess. Scrubbing the floor, washing the baby, and wiping the stains can be pretty burdensome for a parent who is on-the-go. If you are one of them, maybe you should just change your tactics and go for something that can be easily cleaned, just like putting a messy mat.

By using messy mats, you won't have to scrub the floors of your home because mats are typically easier to wipe. You do not have to worry about stains getting difficult to scrub, either, because the stains go to the mat.

An alternative solution can be, of course, introducing cleaner food to the kids. Perhaps the chances are small, but by giving children food that do not make much stain, just like mashed potatoes, perhaps, they will not have the opportunity to mess up.

In the end, messing up with food is part of being a child. While it is ideal to have them eat their food without mess, we cannot really dictate them. It's part of growing up, and it is part of being a parent to clean.

GreenGuard Certified Products Available from Office1000.com

Many of the products that we offer by Safco Products and Marvel Office Furniture have recently received a GreenGuard Certification. What does this mean to you?

GreenGuard is a program that is voluntary for low emitting products. Being certified for GreenGuard Indoor Air Quality signifies that a product contributes a minimal amount to chemical emissions in environments indoor.

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Color the Stars

A few hours ago, I did something that I have not done for many many years already. In the univeristy where I am currently enrolled, there is this subject we have to take in which we will have to implement projects that will contribute to the enrichment of the our immediate community. Different colleges have their own thrusts. We weren't forced to enroll for our home college's program, so we have the freedom to choose what is best for us.

I enrolled in the College of Music's class, thinking that they have a focus on artistic and musical development. True enough, I was grouped together in a class full of music, theater, and fine arts major, which is enough to intimidate a no-artsy-pantsy person like me. Last term, we regularly had self-enrichment exercises, while the focus for this term is the artistic enrichment of our program's beneficiaries.

What we have come up with is a children's musicale, comprising of students 8 to 14 years old in a nearby community. Of course, before teaching the students how they will go about with their musicale, we have to show these kids that we can have a mini presentation of our own. So we had to prepare our performances and props.

The props are what we created for today. We had to make cut outs of stars coming from recycled carton boards that some of our classmates had brought. The stars did not need to be artistically excellent, just enough to show that there was effort. So kiddie markers and paint at hand, we started off to color the stars.

The Case with Mechanical Pencils

For quite some time now, I have been using a mechanical pencil for most of my writing tasks. Actually, I already try to use my mech pens as much as possible, whenever I am not required to use a pen in my writings.

I got my Rotring mechanical pencil from one of our house's old storage boxes. That storage box was filled with stationery materials. I was looking for a pencil that day when I saw this mechanical pen together with some lead refills. Wow, I love the way it clicked. Haha.

I do not know exactly why, but pushing the button to show some of the polymer lead inside sort of gives me an impression that I am using an injection. I always had that fancy. Moreover, writing using a mechanical pencil makes my penmanship a lot thinner and smarter. Well, at least that is what I think.

Aside from these benefits, I find that mechanical pencils are better than the ordinary wooden ones for the simple reason that they do not need to be sharpened until they reach the point when they are too small use. They also provide more environmentall conservative options to writing. The only downside that I can see is that lead refills are easy to consume. I do not think they will even last a day.

Do you use mechanical pencils? How do you like them compared to your ordinary pencils? Come and share us your story here!

Wondering About Dormitories

Fortunately or unfortunately, I don't have the need to stay in a dorm during my college years. My place is just an hour's ride from the university where I am studying. Of course you might say that I am missing half of my life by living with my folks during my college years, but it is impractical to do so, since living away means more expenses.

On the bright side, not living inside a dorm means I get to avoid a lot of not-so-nice things you have to deal with during your stay, such as dirty dishes and laundry, noisy room mates, dangerous room mates who are largely unknown (you always have to put in combination locks when you are not around to avoid theft), lack of organization and, well, not being around family.

However, curiosity always kills the cat and, in my case, I am just left to wonder how is it to live in one of those dormitories. Sure, I am not a fan of parties, so I won't be looking forward to them, but the thought of hanging around with friends and friends alone is enough to make me curious.

While I enjoy an enlarged amount of freedom inside our place, there are still some set rules that won't be otherwise existent if I had lived in a dormitory, so I cannot stop wondering about it.

But that is all that I can do about it. Wonder.

Office1000.com Introduces Hand Poured Candles and Hand Painted Gifts by A Touch of Art By Marlene

We are pleased to announce the addition of a new line of products to our website. The products will be great items for gifts for all occasions.

Marlene Woods, the creator of these beautiful pieces, will be producing these items that are listed plus she will be adding new items to the line continuously. So be sure to keep checking back for new pieces...both candles and hand painted gifts. There will be gifts tailored for every holiday and will come in several colors or scents so you always have a choice.

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Planning for the Spring

In only around two months, the season of spring will come already. It is the time for new life, new hopes, and a new look. This does not go only for ourselves but for our homes and offices as well. This is the time of the year when we throw out what is unneeded and come up with fresh looking places.

I know that you are still trying to enjoy the winter season and all its Christmas-y effects. I also know that you still have an entire season to plan and execute your home and office's cleaning process, but I guess there is no problem with early planning. The least thing I can do to help is to present you with good ideas (and products) that you can employ during your cleaning quest.

One of those products that I saw are these Color Coding Dot Labels produced by Z-Label. Tired with the way you label your office equipment to check during inventory time? Well, these dot labels will do the trick of easing your job. They make up great ways to easily identify your office equipment, making cataloging and indexing a relatively easier task. Aside from their uses in office inventories, they're also effective in garage sales, attic storage, organizing kids' rooms, and a lot more.

These labels already come up with adhesive, and they are already sheeted as well, so what you only have to do is to stick them on whatever equipment you have. Happy Spring Cleaning Planning! (Errr...is there such a term?)

The Wonder of the Fingerprint

Your fingerprint means a lot of things. It is your gateway to identifying yourself to some of the world's most venerable institutions. Its assumed uniqueness assures people that you are the owner of the print and nobody else. It is interesting to note that despite the presence of signatures, which can be easily forged anyway, fingerprints remain to be one of the most used forms of identification for a lot of official documents.

I do not see other biometric technologies booming in the coming years, either, because of the fingerprints' accessibility and affordability. I can only see digital retina and face recognizers being place in ultra-secure and hi-tech installations where security is a must. But for documents, fingerprints will not go away.

Aside from documents, they also prove to be very useful in forensics. Before DNA testing was introduced, fingerprint detection was the main forensic measurement procedure. But that's beside the point. We're talking about document identification here.

In your office, how much do you use fingerprints for your purposes? Do you rely only on signatures, or do you use fingerprints at times? Where do you get your fingerprint pad ink?

I just have one question lingering in my mind, when a person cannot write or put in fingerprints due to, probably, the loss of limbs, what is the next identification measure?

Frustrations in Front of the Urinal

As promised, I'll be showing you some of the videos submitted to the Man in the Box show in YouTube. For those who do not know, Man in the Box is a collection of funny office stories submitted by viewers. Once in a while, a story gets picked an reenacted by the people from Man in the Box. If you have an interesting story to share, then go send it to the channel. Who knows, your story might be the next one to featured there--and here, too!

YouTube Video

How long does it take you to piss in a public urinal? For me, it all depends on what I am feeling. There are times when I easily piss when I'm already in front of the urinal. There are times, however, when I feel like pissing but just cannot do it when I'm already there. I do not know why, but I just cannot.

And this is when nobody's bothering. Imagine when while you are trying to piss in one of your office's urinal when a colleague comes along and tries to engage you in a chat. How frustrating can that be? I can still piss, albeit at a slower pace.

On the other hand, I know some people who find it downright impossible to piss when they are bothered by other people. They just stand there, wishing that everybody will just vanish and let them be. What exactly happens? Check this video to find out.

Hidden in a Book

When it comes to your valuable's safety inside the home, one of the first things that will probably come into your mind are vaults. These big masses of hard metal will be safe from the ordinary thief's attacks.

However, due to their sheer size and obviousness, they are difficult to hide inside a small home. In large estates, owners typically hide their vaults behind paintings or under rugs (or, at least, this is what I see on movies). For smaller vaults, they are under beds, desks, or chairs.

With the predictive nature of their locations, is it not yet time to turn to more stealthy storage materials? I guess it is. Times are difficult due to the global credit crunch. What you can do with your remaining wealth is to take care of it and prevent it from transferring to mischievous hands.

Presenting the Deluxe Book Safes from Helix International Corp. These book safes have jewelry pouches inside and lined interiors to protect your valuables from damage incurred from external stimuli. They are bound with book covers to allow you to store them among your library collection inside the book shelves.

While these safes are only meant for small collections, they add a great deal of safety to your valuables because of their hidden nature. Just be wary, though, because they look too deceiving that you may even forget about them after months of being idle! So always take in mind which safes your treasures are located in.