Kibbles & Bytes Blog

*Last-Minute Shopping*
If you’re still looking for the perfect gift for the techie, Mac enthusiast or general Small Dog fan, you can definitely still take advantage of a Small Dog gift card. Just give us a call (“*see phone sales hours here*”:http://www.smalldog.com/contact/), and we can activate one for you and email it to the desired recipient with no shipping required!

Gift cards are available in any denomination you’d like; “*see the list of suggested amounts here.*”:http://www.smalldog.com/category/Gifts_and_Swag/Gift_Cards_and_Certificates/Small_Dog_Gift_Certificates __Note that email delivery is only available via phone sales until 12/31.__

*Donation Matching*
Any time you make an online or phone purchase with us, we encourage you to make a donation to any of our pet charities — and that gift will be doubled. Small Dog matches individual donations of up to $200 up to our set annual level of charitable giving.

For more information and to see the list of included charities, please visit “*Smalldog.com/charity.*”:http://www.smalldog.com/charity/?utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&utm_campaign=kb-charity

Be a great gift giver this holiday season!

We are happy to announce that Gene Garfin has won a pair of “*Chill Pill Bluetooth Mobile Speakers!*”:http://www.smalldog.com/search?search=chill+pill+bluetooth The new Bluetooth Chill Pills are a compact, rechargeable, and wireless stereo speaker system that allow you to live your mobile life out loud.

Gene won these speakers by liking Chill Pill Audio on Facebook. You too can make your feelings about Chill Pill Facebook official by following this link:

“*Chill Pill Audio on Facebook*”:https://www.facebook.com/CPAudio

Chill Pill Bluetooth Mobile Speakers: “Unplug, Chill, Recharge.”

Many of you probably didn’t know that I am a huge fan of cooking. I love the kitchen and everything that comes from it — except for the bags of garbage; those are gross. Over time, I have used a website called “*All Recipes*”:http://www.allrecipes.com to find new dishes to cook.

This has been a great resource, but what tends to happen is that I will make something with the website open and then close the window once I am done cooking. That means the next time I want to cook that dish (if it was good) I have to go back and try and find it. Sometimes I can’t find a recipe and it makes me sad. Last weekend, I decided I should do something about managing my favorite recipes better than I do right now.

This led me to the App Store since I knew I wanted to have a digital copy of my recipes. To my surprise, there were no free apps for recipe management, so I made sure to heavily research any app I was considering buying. I came to the conclusion that “*Paprika Recipe Manager*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paprika-recipe-manager/id451907568?mt=12%26uo%3D6%26partnerId%3D30 was the best choice for me. It wasn’t cheap at $19.99; in fact it is tied for first place with “*Pages*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https%3A%2F%2Fitunes.apple.com%2Fus%2Fapp%2Fpages%2Fid409201541%3Fmt%3D12%26uo%3D4%2526uo%253D6%2526partnerId%253D30 for the most expensive app I have purchased for my Mac. Trust me though, I think it is worth every penny.

“*Paprika Recipe Manager*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paprika-recipe-manager/id451907568?mt=12%26uo%3D6%26partnerId%3D30 is what I like to call a zen-like app. It has the perfect balance of strong functionality under the hood with a simple user-interface making it very easy to use. What is great about this app is that it has some great additional features beyond just storing your recipes. You can add custom categories like tags to recipes. This makes organizing and finding recipes super easy once you get a lot of them.

You can also create a grocery list from your recipes. I read in earlier comments that a previous version didn’t have the ability to sort by aisle, but this one does. To me that is a great sign that the developers of this app are listening to the community — a HUGE plus in my book. “*Paprika*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paprika-recipe-manager/id451907568?mt=12%26uo%3D6%26partnerId%3D30 also lets you add recipes to a calendar to create a schedule of meals for the week. Of course, this integrates with the grocery list function too, so you can easily create your weekly grocery list in just a few clicks.

One final feature worth noting is the built-in browser. I mentioned before that I find most of my recipes from “*All Recipes.*”:http://www.allrecipes.com Paprika will create a recipe card from the recipes on that site and others, though I haven’t tried to.

“*Paprika*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paprika-recipe-manager/id451907568?mt=12%26uo%3D6%26partnerId%3D30 is a great app not just for your Mac but “*for your iOS device, too.*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paprika-recipe-manager-for/id406732590?mt=8%26uo%3D6%26partnerId%3D30

From all of the features I have already mentioned this is by far my favorite. Here is an example: I’m at home browsing the “*All Recipes*”:http://www.allrecipes.com website from within Paprika for my Mac and I find a recipe that I want to try. I add it to the manager then it is synced automatically to my iPhone via a ??free?? cloud-based service. Now I can get up and go to the grocery store with my list of ingredients in hand — so simple. However, once again the iOS version of “*Paprika Recipe Manager*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paprika-recipe-manager-for/id406732590?mt=8%26uo%3D6%26partnerId%3D30 is not free. This one is $4.99 and I will say that seems like a lot for an iOS app in my opinion, but I had to have it. The two apps work so seamlessly that I don’t mind paying that much for an iOS app — it’s worth it.

All my years working in retail has made me into a frugal guy. I don’t like paying for things that I know shouldn’t cost that much. When it comes to these apps and having created my own iOS apps before I can honestly say that it is worth the $24.98 you will be spending on them. Paprika is just so feature-rich with a very easy to use interface that I don’t know why I didn’t buy them sooner.

If you’re a fan of cooking like I am, I suggest trying out the Mac version of “*Paprika Recipe Manager*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paprika-recipe-manager/id451907568?mt=12%26uo%3D6%26partnerId%3D30. If you’re a fan of all things tech, I suggest getting the iOS version of “*Paprika Recipe Manager*”:http://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/stat?id=19XpSnZWhPI&offerid=146261&type=3&subid=0&tmpid=1826&RD_PARM1=https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/paprika-recipe-manager-for/id406732590?mt=8%26uo%3D6%26partnerId%3D30 to accompany the Mac app. Paprika will surely enhance your cooking experience just like any cookbook can, except this one will never run out of blank pages and you can back it up.

I fully endorse the folks that created Paprika, and you can view their website at “*paprikaapp.com*”:http://www.paprikaapp.com if you want to do your own research.

P.S. For those non-iOS users who might be reading our newsletters there is an Android version of the mobile app out there too. Alas, I have an iPhone so I cannot speak to how well the Android version works, but seeing the quality and polish the team at “*Hindsight Labs*”:http://www.hindsightlabs.com/ has put into the Mac and iOS version I would expect it to be top-notch!

_Dear Friends,_

Well, the world did not come to a crashing end today regardless of the Mayan’s prediction (we’re still on the lookout for fireballs, though), but we have reached the Winter Solstice and the days are starting to get longer.

I wanted to say something about the horrendous tragedy at Sandy Hook but my assistant, Kerry Westhelle, beat me to the punch with this eloquent note. I could not have said it better:

__”Along with the rest of the nation, our staff watched last Friday’s events at Sandy Hook unfold with horror and disbelief. I myself have a 6-year-old and found it hard to even comprehend that such a thing could happen, or to imagine what those parents must be going through.”__

I won’t be standing on a soapbox and telling everyone what should be done to avert tragedies like these in the future, because it is far too complicated an issue for any one solution to work. What we do need, in this situation and many others, is for both sides to sit down and honestly look at what is important, and that is the safety of our children. First and foremost, this is our responsibility. No politics or special interest groups should get in the way of this.

It can be easy to get caught up in the chaos of the holidays, looking for the newest “it” toy, running here and there to get everything done. We ourselves are in the business of making money and the holiday season can set the bar for the rest of the year. When something like this happens, it makes us all stop and think about what is truly important.

In this busy season take a few moments to reach out to others, donate a toy, donate food, extend a smile. We can all do things to make a difference. While we cannot change what happened we can attempt to drive out the darkness with light.

Love one another.