Cult of Mac Holiday Gift Guide: Gifts For Her Edition [Updated]

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her updated

Believe it or not, Black Friday has already come and gone. Pretty soon the Christmas season will begin, and we’ll mark this midwinter festival by getting together with friends and family and continuing to drink and eat far too much.
Meanwhile, we also buy gifts for those same friends and family members, whether they want them or not. Luckily, we’re here to help, and if you follow our festive advice, your gifts just might make it into the “wanted” category.
From now until Christmas, Cult of Mac will be putting together holiday gift guys full of ideas for the special ones in your life, no matter what their interests or your budget. Today, we’re looking at gifts for the lovely laydee in your life.

Kaboo Tech Pouch Bags$Various

Techpouch

Kaboo’s range of bags are just regular ol’ purses, with one secret weapon: The Tech Pouch. This is a technical, padded, expandable shock-absorbing pocket for your iPad (or other tablet). Thus, you can toss your other crap into your bag as carelessly as you ever do — keys, novelty keychains, makeup, chargers, lint and coins — and your iPad (or even your iPhone) will remain safe.

Pictured here is the Tina, which goes for $125.

M550 iPhone Bike Mount$50.

Bike Mount 01

If your lady is anything like my Lady, she loves the 1980s. And if — unlike my techno-indifferent companion — she owns an iPhone and also rides a bike for sporting purposes, she might like the 80s-style M550, a gray and red bike mount for the iPhone 5.

All-enclosing, weather-resistant but with access to headphone and charging ports, the M550 will look good on a Dutch bike, a mountain bike or a fixed-gear colorfest.

Amplifiear$25

Amplifear<br />

This is honestly as good for a Him as it is for a Her. The Amplifiear (try saying that out loud) is a small plastic dish which clips onto the corner of an iPad and reflects the sound from the rear-firing speaker back at the user. With this setup you can turn down the volume a notch, or just crank up the volume without annoying everybody else in the room.

The Amplifiear works with naked iPad, and iPads in cases.

NYHK Folio Shield for iPad$43.

Lion Nyhk 04

I figured we’d get the obligatory pink gadget out of the way first. And before you call “stereotype!”, I own this case, and I own it in pink. The Lady also has one — in white.

The New York Hong Kong case distinguishes itself in many ways. It’s cheap (at well under $50), it’s incredibly light, it’s covered in real dead cow skin and it doubles up as a handy stand which is as steady on a soft bed as it is on a desk.

The NYHK fits the iPads 2, 3 and 4.

Olloclip iPhone Lens$70

Olloclip

If your mother, wife, sister or girlfriend has any interest in iPhoneography, buy her an Olloclip. The $70 clip on lens slides over the corner of the iPhone and adds a fisheye, wideangle or macro adapter to the camera. Great for both creative still and for reversing the absurd digital zoom the iPhone applies when shooting video. And now available for the iPhone 5.

Real Instagram Photos$4+

Artgram

This pick is technically an app, but as it lets you order prints of your Instagram photos, it counts as an actual physical gift. Photos to Art is an iPhone app which will let the user choose and upload a photo from Instagram (or just from their camera roll) and receive a print back in the mail a few days later. Prices start from $4, and you can go from little prints up to giant canvases.

TelyLabs TV Skype Box$250

Telycamera 2

The TelyLabs is essentially a $250 webcam which turns your Mom’s TV into a Skype-capable powerhouse. The camera is hi-def, and connects straight to the Skype network, meaning that no pesky computer is required.

Better still, it sits on top of the screen. Anyone who Skypes their laptop-owning parents regularly will be familiar with what I call the “guillotine.” This is a move where their laptop screen is tilted up so they can see you, with the side effect that their screen-bezel camera chops their own heads off at the neck and shows you mostly the wall behind them.

The TelyLabs Skype Box fixes this.

Grove Bamboo iPad Mini Sleeve$59

Bamboo

Felted wool. Bamboo. Style. This case is protective, has a tough exterior and a soft, warm layer within. It is also beautiful and becomes more so with age. Just like mom.

Buy this for your mother and she’ll love you forever. Buy it for your GF and you’ll totally creep her out.

ZAGG ProPlus Backlit iPAd Keyboard$130.

Zagg Proplus

The Zagg ProPlus is a great piece of kit. The backlit keys make night-use easy. The keys themselves are as good as those of the Apple keyboards, and are finished in that soft-feeling-but-actually-hard plastic used on Amazon’s Kindles.

The case sticks to the iPad with magnets (sleep/wake also works) and the iPad 2 will sit firmly in the slot as you type. The iPad 3 will fall out, unless you add a rubber strip to the slot first.

This is probably the best iPad-sized keyboard I have used.

Tylt Retractable Ribbon Charger$40.

Ribbonreel

Toss this in a bag along with your lipstick, MiFi, Olloclip and other girly essentials and it’ll stay as alone as a nerd at the prom.

The ribbon-shaped cable pulls out from the reel and fits any pre-Lightning iDevice (except the original FireWire iPods, and if your lady owns one of those, you should MARRY HER NOW).

Griffin Mini USB Cables$25.

Usb Mini Cablekit

More charger cables, this time shaped like tiny dog bone toys. They are too short and stubby to tangle, and tiny enough to keep in a purse pocket permanently. I have a set and they’re tough and handy: you get a pair of microUSB plugs plus a 30-pin dock connector. Hopefully Griffin will be introducing a Lightning-flavored version soon.

Jill-E Camera Bags$Various.

Jille

Nothing says “I don’t care how I look” like a camera bag, which makes it a shame that most of Jill-E’s bags are aimed at women — I’d love a non-nylon camera bag.

The Jill-E bags look like regular, stylish purses on the outside, and conceal super-useful camera bags on the inside. Pockets, padding, dividers — they’re all there. Sizes range from compact-camera to full-on DSLR kit.

Withings Wireless Scale$160-ish

Withings

Yo mama is so fat, when she lays around the house, she lays around the house.

Yo mama is so fat that when she cuts herself, gravy comes out.

Yo mama is so fat that when her beeper goes off, people think she’s backing up.

Yo mama is so fat that when she talks to herself, it’s a long distance call.

Yo mama is so fat, you should probably just buy her a Withings Bluetooth scale, which will beam its readings to her iPhone automatically. If she can dig the phone out of her fleshy folds, that is.

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