Mac's Picks is a collection of family friendly interesting and useful sites, updated weekly. These sites are family friendly, and cover subjects dealing with a focus on the family as a whole, search, internet, internet radio, news, health, medical resources, household hints, education, educational resources, recipes, food, strange, different, help pages, homework, kids, diy, sites I call "head scratchers", and/or new sites dealing with all kinds of things of use to the general internet community. To find the criteria I use, simply click on the "Why How Info" link on the right side of this page.

This page is updated on a weekly basis, each Monday evening Australian (Queensland) time (GMT + 9 hours according to the world clock). Please come back and visit often.

Important Note: If you are returning to my page, welcome back! Please click your "Refresh" or "Reload" button on the top of your Internet browser to ensure you are seeing the current week's page of my "Picks of the Week". Also, I would love for you to make my site your home page. Simply click on Tools - Options in Explorer, or Edit - Preferences in Netscape, and click Use Current and it's done.

When starting out in the blogging field, and indeed, when looking for a blog that might interest you, you can spend a lot of time roaming around and not finding what you need. Thus, the Blogwise - Blog directory site nicely fills a niche and will help you find blogs of interest by subject, keyword, or even geographical location. Have a look. It could be a help.

Indeed, if you are considering starting your own blog, you probably would like it to stand out from the rest and look good as well as hold the content you wish it to. Thankfully there are people like Caz online who develop the basic look of your blog, and then give it to you to use at no charge. Have a look at the Blogger Templates By Caz site and browse through the ones he has listed there. If you find one you like, the instructions on how to use it are also there. It couldn't be easier now could it?

With the advent of one of the major holiday seasons fast approaching, and thus the possibility of having young folk in your home getting bored easily, and who might like to surf the net for a while to ease the tension, sites like the Safe Search Checklist - by Wendy Boswell, who is one of the better columnists at about.com, could prove useful for you to have handy. When dealing with young folk who are going to use your internet connection it's a good idea to have read this list and put it into practice. Let's keep our young folk safe online.

And speaking of the young folk, it might also prove useful to bookmark the Coloring pages for kids ! site which can keep them amused for hours at a time. Go with them on the first trip, sign them up (it's free of charge) and start them off on the site. Then show them how to get back to it using the bookmark you've created. Worth a look.

Without doubt many who receive gifts at this time of year will receive a digital camera for their use as well. The problem is trying to understand the jargon used, and understanding what camera is a good buy and not simply 'cheap'. If someone you know is looking for a camera, especially to take those holiday snaps that every family has, then have a look at the Digital Camera Directory where you will find all manner of good information and explanation. If photography is your hobby, then this page is a definite bookmark for you.

When one thinks of the Nestlé company one naturally thinks of chocolate. However, you will be pleased to know that they also house recipes for all manner of delicious food and not just those involving chocolate. Not only does the Nestlé Australia Recipes site have some yummy sounding recipes, it also has their free downloadable software that you can use to create your own online recipe book. And not only that, it's all free as well. Now that has to be a useful site to add to your list of recipe sites.

Eating healthily over the holidays is something we should all be aware of. However, not only do we need to know about the ways to do that but we also occasionally require information about all manner of health related issues. Therefore the HealthWeb site, which is a site of links to information about health issues, is one you really should bookmark for the time you need to find out about some condition either you have yourself, or a friend, family member, or neighbour has. Have a look. Its links are well worth having.

Remember the fun you had as a family when you were young? Well, you can relive those happy times with your own family by visiting the FamilyFun Great ideas - Practical advice - Fun stuff to do. site and browsing around. You might find things to entertain the family over the holiday season here as well. Not all fun has to be expensive nor centred around a television, game console, or even a computer. Enjoy.

There are those folk who would like to take a course in how to manage their operating system and get the most out of it. Others may wish a course where they could learn word processing or spreadsheets or database management. Still others may wish to have help studying for IT certification exams. All these and more can be found at the Learnthat.com site. This site has free web enabled training in computer use courses and it might be a good idea to have a look and see if one or more is something you might like to tackle. You certainly can't beat the price, and the courses are well put together. Have a look and see if this one is for you.

You will have no doubt heard that Microsoft is launching its new operating system called Vista early in the new year. Most of those waiting to get it (and a computer that will run this power hungry beast) will probably wait for about six months after the release date, just in case there are major problems with this system as there have been with others in the past. Having said that, if you are running Windows XP it's probably time you went to Microsoft and downloaded their Microsoft PowerToys for Windows XP software and really made the most of that operating system while it lasts. You'll find all manner of useful apps here, so give it a try while you're still running XP. Enjoy.

Have you ever driven past a church and seen one of those signs with a clever saying outside, and thought to yourself "I could do better than that". Well, now's your chance. The Says-It.com site allows you to make your own by using their Church Sign generator, or their Official Seal generator, and even make photo shots with speech balloons where George says, Hillary says, Dick says, Tony says, etc. You get the idea. *chuckles*. Have fun.

Our little green orb is laden with some pretty fantastic icons to engineering. I am speaking of things like the San Francisco Bridge, any one of the many large hydro-electric dams and spillways that dot the globe, amazingly tall buildings that truly can be termed skyscrapers. However, not all of the engineering used in the world was all that clever. Have a look at the Top 10 Engineering Mistakes in History and have a chuckle as I did. Yes, there were some colossal blunders made alongside the fantastic achievements, and you should be aware of both of them. Have a look, and enjoy.

Rebecca Game of "Digital Women - Women with their modems running...", is a graphic designer who is superb to say the least. Rebecca designed this "new look" web site specifically for me, and I can't praise her work enough. Her site, dedicated to women on the net, is worth seeing and bookmarking for future reference. If you are looking for links of interest to women, please visit her site. And if you need the best graphic designer on the planet, I seriously can't recommend her more highly. Oh yes, and when you visit her site, tell her Mac sent you. Thank you Rebecca. I am eternally grateful for your assistance and expertise. ;-)