My Tech Team Holiday Survival Guide

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A few more days to go and we’ll all be saying yuletide greetings in sing-song tunes under the mistletoe. Most people are already packing their stuff or on their way home for the holidays, and some are dreading the thought of being stuck home. So, how does a self-confessed social media addict and tech-geek survive the holidays. Here are a few tips and apps to keep you entertained and possibly recruit family members to the tech side.

1. Travel Apps – Let’s start with getting there, if you are visiting a place for the first time there are plenty helpful navigation apps to help you get there. You can also manage your trips, track flights, schedules and check your budget.

FlightTrack – gives you up to the minute flight schedules, weather report , route maps and flight cancellations and delays. It can also be synced with TripIt.

TripIt – This is a popular travel buddy, it can assist family travelers by tracking itineraries and other details for any trip. It can be used on iPhone, Blackberry, and Windows Mobile.

TripCost – This is a free iPhone app that keeps you within your budget.

2. Foodie Apps – the Holidays is all about spending quality time with family and gastronomic adventures. Forget about starving yourself and keeping away from holiday food. There are some great food apps that can help you – from shopping for food, recipes and dining out.

Epicurious – it is THE food website to go to and now it is also available in iTunes and Android Market.

Urbanspoon – if you prefer dining out instead of shakin’ and bakin’ at home and you have no idea where to take your family, this is the app for you!

3. Gift giving – there are plenty of productivity apps that help you keep track of things to buy, as well as your budget. One good app to have around the holidays is the Free Christmas List on Android Market and Christmas Gifts List ($0.99) on iPhone, both help you keep track of what gifts you bought for your friends and family as well as how much you spent on each.

4. Family Fun Apps – whether you use it to entertain yourself or keep kids occupied while on the road, there are Christmas themed apps that you can download. Super Dance Elf Christmas with Friends is a fun app that lets you put a photo of your family, pets included in dancing elf characters. You can share this with family and friends through email and brighten someone’s Christmas with your personalized holiday greetings. Android Market has a similar app called Santa Booth where you can take a picture of yourself or use an existing photo.

Of course there are the game apps mainstays, like Plants and Zombies, Angry Birds and Frog Launcher in holiday themes.

5. Record and share – social media apps lets you record and share the best moments with your family. Of course you can always share via TweetPic and Facebook but there are easier ways to share, especially if you are using a mobile device.

Shozu lets you upload mobile pictures and share them to all your social networking sites, Juicecaster is a similar app that also lets you send videos. If you want to have your own page just for the holidays, you can use Treemo – an app that lets you upload and store all of your holiday pics by creating a personalized mobile page.

The most important holiday survival tip is to enjoy this time with family and friends. Share your holiday with people that are important to you on and offline. While social media can be addicting, it is okay to keep your virtual life silent for a while and make time for real interaction with your family and friends.

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