Luxury Housing Trends & Home Improvement Ideas

You’re not still writing your shopping list out by hand, are you? Not when today’s technology brings you an array of electronic gadgets that ensure you’ll never forget the milk.

This electronic “Smart Shopper” comes with voice recognition capabilities, so you can mount it on the refrigerator and simply speak into it whenever you want to add something to your list. The items are automatically organized and displayed on an LCD screen, and when it’s time to head to the store, you simply hit the print button. The list prints out on thermal paper that’s easy to take with you.

$150 for the device at Horchow.

If you have a long dark driveway (or someone in the house just can’t stay off the grass when driving in and out of the garage), then it might be a good idea to add some illumination to define the borders. You can pick up solar driveway lights, which are easy to install, but if you don’t want to spend much money (or you want something with more personality), you might try some cute animal-shaped driveway reflectors.

This raccoon is holding a little reflector that will catch the light from your headlights as you enter the driveway. It should work as well as a light for defining the borders after dark. If raccoons aren’t your cup of tea, you can also get squirrels or rabbits. (You may be out of luck, though, if you don’t dig forest critters.)

$13.95 from Midwest Plaza

Every year there are more and more fun outdoor lighting options out there (there are plain old boring lights, too, but who wants to write about those?). I spotted these “Magic Globe” floating solar lights over at Frontgate.

Each globe has a hidden solar module that collects energy for free during the day (I love outdoor lighting that doesn’t need to be plugged in), and then the lamp glows for up to 12 hours after dark. There are 3 LEDs inside for lighting, and they cycle through a rainbow of colors (yellow, magenta, red, green, lilac, orange, blue, mint, and purple).

It’s $49 for an 8-inch globe (not that buying just one would be any fun).

Frontgate