AE Dreams

-Alysia

FunBites website: http://funbites.com/ Shark Tank Pitch: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4-bs-z7UwfA

We came across this adorable and inspirational little book: Lessons of a Turtle (The Little Book of Life) by Sandy Gingras. "Thank goodness for rest stops." "How did time-out become a punishment?" "Realism goes just so far..." Her musings comes from her daily re-runnings of the classic "The Tortoise and the Hare" race. This book reminded us of why we created Turtle Mail, and where it got its name. While coming up we ideas for cool tech toys for kids, we came across so many families who felt their children had no patience for the little things in life. One of our early ideas involved sending children daily puzzle pieces - parents thought it was so cute! But many parents said their children would not and could not wait for something to arrive in the mail. Their kids expected everything instantly. A couple of parents were intrigued by the idea that such an experience might help their child slow down in life and appreciate the anxiousness that comes from waiting for something special to come your way. Thus was born Turtle Mail: It's faster than snail mail, but still beats the metaphorical hare in the end! With our version of "the Hare" being email and text ;) You can view snippets of "Lessons of a Turtle" on Google Books. -Alysia

-Alysia

Turtle Mail Play Dates are well underway! We're having so much fun and learning a ton from these young playtesters. We're holding Play Dates through the end of January for Pittsburgh kids age 3-11. Sign up to let your kids meet and play with Turtle Mail!

Happy Holidays from AE Dreams to you and your family! We built this festive Gingerbread Robot at AlphaLab Gear's gingerbread contest this week! He spent the whole event standing proud, until just before judging time came around. Then, of course, he decided to take a seat.

If you have a child between the ages of 3-11 and live in the Pittsburgh area, we invite you sign for a Play Date with Turtle Mail! We'll be holding these Play Dates through mid-January. We will introduce you and your child(ren) to Turtle Mail and it's features, and send your child some personalized messages and activities. We're looking forward to your feedback!

It was very exciting to watch fellow mom and founder, Vanessa, pitch Covey, and former classmates, Kyle and Luke, pitch Nebulus, at AlphaLab's Demo Day! Covey is a location-based social network for new moms. Nebulus is an online, realtime collaboration tool for musicians. Niko and I are so happy to be a part of the AlphaLab network, and we're feeling pretty inspired after seeing today's presentations. We will have our turn at pitching AE Dreams and Turtle Mail at Demo Day in June 2015!  -Alysia

The New York Times posted a great article concerning E-Books and digital reading time. Many of the benefits of story time come from the interactions and responses from parents. Even when parents are engaged in e-story time, much of their focus can end up being spent on the device itself rather than the story. Story time is best used to spark a conversation between parents and their kids: "It’s being talked with, not being talked at." -Alysia

-Niko

Our office is pretty fantastic! We set up a work station for our daughter and got to work on our first Turtle Mail prototype (made out of cardboard and play-doh!)

We are very proud to be a part of Pittsburgh's hardware accelerator, AlphaLab Gear!  In addition to an amazing office space in East Liberty, we get access to Tech Shop in Bakery Square -- can't wait to start building :)