Gadget Mommy » holiday http://gadgetmommy.com ...navigating technology for families Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:02:41 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.9.2 en hourly 1 Unwrapping Presents Nightmare http://gadgetmommy.com/2009/general/unwrapping-presents-nightmare/ http://gadgetmommy.com/2009/general/unwrapping-presents-nightmare/#comments Fri, 13 Nov 2009 17:08:39 +0000 Trish http://gadgetmommy.com/?p=62 You’ve spent the time to find that perfect gift. You’ve wrapped it up with care. Christmas morning comes and the kids rush to open their presents and that’s when the nightmare begins. That cute little toy that they had to have will now take 30 minutes to excise from the packaging. The easy part is [...]]]> You’ve spent the time to find that perfect gift. You’ve wrapped it up with care. Christmas morning comes and the kids rush to open their presents and that’s when the nightmare begins. That cute little toy that they had to have will now take 30 minutes to excise from the packaging. The easy part is getting the main box open, then comes the invisible rubber bands, 1,000 twisty ties, tape hidden in random places. By the time you get one present done, you are so frustrated that you can barely stand the thought that there are more presents to unwrap. Let’s face it, most of this stuff is plastic and is in no real danger of ever breaking. So why must they secure each toy like it’s a matter of national security. Barbie is not going to escape her box and runaway with Ken. The Littlest Pet Shop animals aren’t going to run wild. Last year I had the pleasure of trying Amazon’s Frustration Free Packaging. It was great. I purchase the Matchbox Mega Rig Space Shuttle for my son. The box was a plain cardboard box, no fancy pictures like the traditional packaging. The excitement came when we opened the box. The parts were in simple plastic bags. We had it out of the box and he was playing with it in less than a minute. We saved ourselves the annoyance of all the extra packaging and my son actually got to play with his toy right away. Another benefit, is that it’s less packaging to throw away. We were able to just put the box in the recycle bin and not have to worry about disposing of all the other junk that comes with traditional packaging. So this holiday season, if you have the opportunity to try frustration free packaging, I highly recommend it!

]]> http://gadgetmommy.com/2009/general/unwrapping-presents-nightmare/feed/ 1 It’s that time of the year… http://gadgetmommy.com/2009/general/its-that-time-of-the-year/ http://gadgetmommy.com/2009/general/its-that-time-of-the-year/#comments Wed, 23 Sep 2009 16:15:37 +0000 Trish http://gadgetmommy.com/?p=40 So here we are, day two of fall.  You wouldn’t know it,as you go into many major retailers, that we still have a few holidays between now and Christmas. It seems a little unnatural to me to see Christmas decoration on display while we are still in September. What happened to Halloween and Thanksgiving? Are [...]]]> So here we are, day two of fall.  You wouldn’t know it,as you go into many major retailers, that we still have a few holidays between now and Christmas. It seems a little unnatural to me to see Christmas decoration on display while we are still in September. What happened to Halloween and Thanksgiving? Are they not important enough holidays anymore? There shouldn’t be Christmas lights on display next to the Halloween costumes, it’s just not right.

But, as they say, if you can’t beat them…join them. So today I’m going to tell you about a website that simplified my holiday season last year.  Wishlist.com is a great site that lets you create wishlists for any occasion. I used it for Christmas, but you can use it for birthdays, anniversaries, or even baby showers.  I found Wishlist.com after becoming frustrated by my kids receiving gifts that they had no interest in. In turn, my  house was becoming cluttered with stuff that they didn’t play with.  So last year I created a wishlist for each of my kids and sent it to family members. The result was that they got things that they wanted and family members weren’t frustrated by trying to figure out what to get them. I encouraged all our family members to follow suit and it was a great time saver for me to know exactly what to buy. It was a win-win and I plan on doing it again this year.

How does it work? Got to Wishlist.com and sign up for an account. Create a wishlist for each family member. Add the ‘Add to Wishlist’ shortcut to  your browser’s favorites. When at any website (such as Amazon) just click on the ‘Add to Wishlist’  in your favorites and it will be automatically add that item to your wishlist of choice. You can also search on the Wishlist.com website for items. Once your wishlist is complete, you can e-mail it to your family and even share it via Facebook.  You can update the list as often as  you want!

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