One of the top items this Christmas is going to be the Parrot Minikit Slim Limited Edition.  If you need a handsfree speakerphone for your car, this is the one you should get.  Granted if you want something that looks a little less girly, don’t the limited edition.  The other ones are just black, but work just as good.  This sleek speakerphone works great in your car.  You can easily put it on the visor of your car and forget about it.  It easily adapts to your environment and can even easily fit into your pocket.  Now, this is so easy to use.  As long as your phone as bluetooth, the Parrot will automatically synchronize its phonebook with your mobile phone.  Now, it has an awesome text to speech function which allows you to just say who you want to call.  You don’t even need to train it!  If there are several numbers for that person, you just need to specify by saying home, mobile, etc.  You can even record a shortcut for your contacts, so you can call them even quicker.  I love that it is extremely hard to tell where the microphone is, and it doesn’t have any speakers!  The sound from this is awesome.  The other really cool thing is that you can use up to 5 phones with this, and it has multi speaker voice recognition.

If you know anyone without a bluetooth handsfree speakerphone, you have to buy them this for Christmas.  It is so much easier to use than a headset and it looks nice too.

Do you have problems taking pictures of yourself with others? Do you find your arm ending up in the shot? Do you find that you aren’t in any shot, because you are always taking the picture? Do you find that you and your subject have to pose awkwardly just to get you both in the picture?  (Thanks to Christine for use of her arm picture).

If you answered yes to any of the above questions, you need to get an xShot.  What is an Xshot?

XShot is a telescopic stainless-steel rod that adds three feet of reach to any point-and-shoot or hand-held video camera. It is super easy to use. All you need to do is screw your camera into the Xshot to get to work. No screwdriver is required! You can make the xShot 9 inches all the way up to 37 inches. Want to see how easy it works? (Thank you Julie for the pictures!)

The first picture shows you how the xShot works. The second picture shows the actual picture that was taken. Its pretty awesome, isn’t it?  Wouldn’t it be nice to be on vacation and not have to ask a stranger to take your picture?  I personally found it super easy to easy.  I had no problem putting my Cybershot camera on there and taking lots of awesome pictures (unfortuntaly, my camera is broke, and I can’t get any of my pictures off.  I am waiting for a cable to fix this problem from Sony).  My fear was that I wasn’t going to be able to take steady pictures.  It was actually super easy.  I had absolutely no problems with it.  I found the xShot super lightweight (it’s only 5 oz).

When can you use this?  Some perfect times would be when you are traveling, hiking, camping, vacation, the beach, parties, concerts, sports events, etc.  I know that the xShot will be an item that will come with us no matter where we go!

Yes, you heard it right.  I am completely jealous of all of you, since I only got one of these to borrow!  The Sony Digital Photo Frame is worth about $249.99, so this is a giveaway you want enter!

Let me tell you a little bit about this frame.  It is a 9-inch digital photo frame with 800×480 resolution and 15:9 aspect ratio LCD screen.  It has 512MB of internal memory with optional image resizing to maximize the internal memory.  It also includes HDMI output for viewing photos in high definition on an HDTV.  You are able to auto correct images with features such as red-eye correction.  It also offers nine slide show styles and clock and calendar modes.  Now, I know that all sounds difficult to figure out what to do.  However, I was able to do this all without reading the manual!  This digital picture frame is even BlueTooth ready!  You can also run the pictures off several different kinds of memory cards:  Memory Stick media and Memory Stick PRO Duo media, SD, MMC, CF, Microdrive, and xD Picture cards. I seriously could not believe how crisp these pictures are.  I am seriously sad that I have to venture over to Fed Ex on Monday and send mine back.

Now, I know you don’t want to read about how much fun we had playing testing this out for you, my readers, so . . . . what do you have to do to get one of these in your house?

1.  Leave a comment on this post.  Check out Sony’s site and tell me what feature you think you would like best on this frame.  One comment please and let me know everything you did on that comment.  If you don’t list a feature, you are not eligible to win.
2. Stumble this post. If you don’t know what Stumble Upon is, please read Lori’s post at Blogging Cents. She explains it extremely well.
3. Vote for this post on other social media sites. One extra entry for each social media site you vote for this on.  (I’ll be adding some links to make this especially easy for you to vote — Digg, Propeller, Mixx, Kirtsy, Entreview, Reddit, Blogging Zoom)
4.  Twitter about this contest.  Please leave me your Twitter name in your comment.

For 5 additional entries,

1.  Blog about this on your blog.  Please give me the URL, so I can verify.
2.  Add this to any forums you belong too. Please give me the URL, so I can verify.
3.  Subscribe to this blog using either my email or RSS feed

This contest will run from now till August 24th at 8 PM CST.  It is for US residents only.  Good luck!

This Sony DSLR camera is my first “real” camera. This is definitely not a point and shoot camera. However, this another camera that you don’t need to read the book to figure out how to use it.  You will find that the majority of my pictures on Lisa Cooking are done with this camera.  My inlaws also took it to Hawaii with them on their vacation.

Some of the highlights of this camera include 10.2-megapixel Super HAD CCD which gives you clear, sharp photos, Live Preview of your subject, Tiltable 2.7-inch Clear Photo LCD Plus screen, Continuous shooting while viewing, Smart teleconverter 2x zoom, Expanded ISO sensitivity, Super SteadyShot in-camera image stabilization, Bionz image processor, 1200-zone evaluative metering, Dynamic Range Optimizer, Anti-Dust technology, Auto Pop-up flash, Eye-Start autofocus system, 9-point center cross AF sensor, Scene Selection modes: Portrait, Landscape, Macro, Sports, Sunset and Night Portrait/Night View situations, Creative Style Settings including Standard, Vivid, Portrait, Landscape, Night View, Sunset, B&W and Adobe RGB modes, Index and Slide Show Display, High-resolution thumbnails for PhotoTV HD viewing, Function Guide Display On-screen menus are intuitive and easy to use, Stamina Battery Power, and High-capacity media options.

In plain English, you’ll take some of the best pictures of your life with this DSLR camera.  The picture to the left here was taken the same day I got the camera.  If I could figure out how to use the DSLR in one day, anybody can use this camera!

One of best cameras I have owned is the Sony Cybershot. It is awesome that you don’t have to carry around a ton of luggage to take this camera with you.  You can easily slide this slick phone into either your purse or your pocket.  The 4GB of internal memory can store up to 40,000 VGA-quality photos or 1,000 8-megapixel pictures.  You seriously don’t need a memory card to make this camera work.  You also don’t need to read the manual that comes with to make it work.  The part that impressed me the most is that the pictures are awesome.
This camera takes the best pictures of any of the digital ones that I owned before this. On my other blog, I chronicled my entire basement remodel using this camera. I use this camera when we are out and about with the kids.  The menu is done by touchscreen, so you don’t have forty thousands buttons to figure out.  If you are in the market for a new point and shoot camera, I highly recommend a Sony Cybershot!