With its candy-colored emoticon graphics and remarkable ease of use, FaceChipz ™ serves as a holiday gift that will outlast most of the presents parents might buy. This is because it offers something its grown-up counterpart, Facebook, cannot — a community made of kids with abundant safety features and no chance kids can wander to inappropriate pages or have inappropriate adults trying to log on to their profiles. Because of this, it allows kids to be children and parents to breath easier if they are concerned (and there’s plenty of reason to be worried) that Facebook is just not safe enough — even with some decent protective layers that parents can use — for their sophisticated grade-schooler, tween, or teen.

The FaceChipz ™ team has collected every safey certification imaginable (including the Socially Safe Seal of approval). And collecting is a key mechanism for the social networking site. Here’s how it works: Once a child signs up for FaceChipz ™ with a parent (both must have logins), the child can set up a page at which the kid can chat, play games, get e-mail, share pictures, etc. To get a friend to join, the child must purchase and register the code of a FaceChip, which looks like a poker chip only cuter. Then, the child can deliver or send the chip to a friend, who also registers the chip. In this way, only a child given a physical chip by another child can be a friend on FaceChipz ™. This kind of safety does have a price, albeit a small one, as the FaceChipz cost $7.99 for a pack of 5. But the concept is ingenius because it incorporates kids’ love of collecting with high-end Web technology. You can also earn points with the FaceChipz ™ with which kids can buy stuff on the Web site.

This really is a terrific invention that is already growing quickly and will continue to evolve to keep up with kids’ demands. As a sort of a bridge between Club Penguin and Facebook, it makes a safe home (kids can even block members who are mean to them) in a world of social networking that is a staple of contemporary children’s lives. It’s an indoor activity worth checking out, particularly with the extra time many of us will have over the holidays and the cold winter months.

In the category of “long overdue” comes a new product from the Barbie makers that encourages girls to get into the car race (http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/la-fi-pollywheels26feb26,0,6336470.story?coll=chi-bizfront-hed). At the recent Toy Fair in New York, Mattel introduced Polly Wheels and Polly Pocket Dolls who can drive the pink, purple, and glittery sisters to the die-cast Matchbox and Hot Wheels lines. While girls have been revving up the imaginary engines of boy-geared cars for generations — and real-life racers such as Danica Patrick have pulled fast car driving into the forefront — this new female friendly lot of mini autos should further break down gender walls on the playing surface. Who knows, perhaps we’ll get to see some more macho-looking dolls for boys, now?