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Title: Cloth by Clothes Minded

Cost: Free  ($.99 for the Cloth Weather upgrade)

Platform: iPhone, iPod touch (4th generation), iPad 2 Wi-Fi, iPad 2 Wi-Fi + 3G, iPad (3rd generation) and iPad Wi-Fi + 4G. Requires iOS 4.1 or later.

The new school year is quickly approaching, and the first day of school is an excellent opportunity to make a fresh fashion statement. This week’s app, Cloth by Clothes Minded, will help teens archive images of their favorite outfits for later reference. Feeling uninspired on a rainy morning? Simply click on Cloth to remember some of your closet’s best combinations.

After downloading the app, Cloth walks you through all the features with a simple tutorial. However, this app was easy to use even if you decide to skip the intro and go straight to the wardrobe. Click “Snap” to take a photo or load one from your phone’s library. After taking an acceptable shot, Cloth presents you with several editing options. Add a flattering effect, cover up blemishes, whiten your teeth, or add a fun mustache sticker.  Once your picture is ready, write a brief description, create tags, and add it to a category.  Later, when you have trouble remembering the best pants to wear with your striped shirt, search your tags for striped shirt or visit the casual wear part of your wardrobe.

There was much to love about this app:

1. Organization: If only your real closet was so organized! Categories and searchable tags make finding the right outfit for the right occasion an easy process. My overall favorite organization tool was the weather addition.  The app uses wunderground.com and your location to match your outfit to real weather conditions. If you wake up to an unexpected snow storm, simply refer to your “Snow” or “Freezing” categories for quick inspiration.

2. Social Networking: This app is also integrated with several social networking sites. Link your Facebook, Twitter, or Tumblr accounts to share outfits, or if you are particularly proud of your apparel, send a photo off to clothapp.com for a chance to be featured on the site’s homepage.

3. Badges: One more reason to try Cloth – you unlock badges and points as you add and share outfits.  They are fun, collectible, and competitive.

If I could change one thing about this app, I would add a category for “wish list.”  It would be useful to save snapshots from dressing rooms into a separate folder that you can share with family and friends. Even without this feature, teens will love the app. Recommend it to the young people you know that like fashion or even just taking photos. They will enjoy sharing and getting feedback on their favorite wardrobe pictures.

For more YALSA App of the Week posts, visit the App of the Week Archive.

From Debbie Lee, Priddy sales and marketing extraordinnaire ~ she shares some of her favorite titles coming out this winter. So if you thought your January would be dull, gray and ... well, blah - think again! With bright colors and fun formats, Priddy knows just how to lift the spirits!

Promise me, at the end of reading this, you'll feel SO much happier about the winter!

In January, Priddy's Baby Play Day will be released in a high quality cloth book to follow up on the release of the board book version from a previous season. Roger Priddy has described it as a more high-end cloth book than what he's done in the past.

The beloved characters from our popular Funny Faces series re-emerge in a brand new line entitled Funny Friends. Charlie Monkey  and Millie Moo are value priced books that capture the whimsy of the original series in a smaller trim size and without the lights and sound that required batteries in the Funny Faces series.

Bright Baby Touch & Feel Spring is the third in a line of titles illustrating the seasons with simple words and images for baby. The cuddly chick on the cover makes it a perfect Easter gift.


Rick Riordan's Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse is the third book of the five books in the Percy Jackson series.

As you will know, if you've been following this series, the Big Three Olympian Gods (Poseidon, Zeus and Hades) all agreed after World War II to stop siring half-blood children with mortals as such Half-Bloods generally cause major problems for the world (such as WW2!). Unfortunately 14 year old Percy Jackson's dad reneged on the deal and Percy's the Half-Blood son of Poseidon). He's not the only one who was guilty of breaking the agreement though. Zeus also broke it and his daughter, Thalia, never made it safely to Camp Half-Blood, where the children of gods and mortals are trained to cope with the monsters that beset all Half-Bloods. As Thalia was dying, her father turned her into a pine tree and she stood guard over the Camp for many years until Luke, son of Hermes, poisoned the pine tree. Percy and his friend Grover the Satyr managed to recapture the Golden Fleece and bring it back to heal the tree which magically protected the camp, but not only did the Fleece expel the poison from the pine tree, it also expelled Thalia. This happened a few months before The Titan's Curse opens (at the end of The Sea of Monsters review).

Thalia is still getting used to being amongst people again, but she and Percy have become friends, and the two, together with Percy's friend Annabeth (daughter of Athena), set out on a rescue mission to help Grover get two newly-discovered Half-Bloods from the military boarding school where they live to Camp Half-Blood. Unfortunately, one of the school teachers is really a Manticore and he objects to Nico and Bianca di Angelo being taken from the school. During the battle that ensues, Annabeth is captured, despite the timely arrival of Artemis, Goddess of the Hunt and her Hunters. Artemis offers Biana the chance to become a Hunter and she agrees. Afterwards Artemis sets off alone to hunt another monster that is destined to cause the downfall of Olympus, whilst Percy, Grover and Thalia, together with the two Half-Blood siblings and Artemis' Hunters, travel with Apollo the Sun God to Camp Half-Blood for their safety.

Back at Camp, The Oracle delivers a prophecy that leads to a team of five Campers being chosen to go in search of Artemis, who has gone missing. Thus Percy, Thalia, Bianca, Zoe (another Hunter) and Grover set out on a journey that takes them across the country from East Coast to the West, to San Francisco where Percy finds out, amongst other things, what it's like to carry the weight of the sky on his shoulders. Cool monsters, skeletal warriors and bad guys abound in this tale, as well as the Gods behaving badly (and occasionally making bad haiku - Apollo). Percy gets to meet Aphrodite, they visit the Hoover Dam, two of the party of five are killed, then finally, the Gods vote on how to kill the three survivers of the quest!

Percy Jackson and the Titan's Curse is also available from Amazon.com - I must say, I do like this blue cover on the US edition !