What’s Up with Packages Not Arriving in Time For Christmas?! #UPSFail #OrangeRoom

With our increasing reliance on FedEx and UPS to help make our holidays go smoothly by delivering all of our online orders and other packages on time, it was a real shock this holiday season when some showed up a week later!

But as one person on Twitter suggested, if you really want your packages to arrive on time, don’t wait until the last minute to place your orders!

Mario’s Top 3: How to shoot great video on your phone

The holidays are right around the corner, and you want to make sure you capture and preserve all those wonderful moments so you can enjoy them later. You don’t want your “Baby’s first holiday” video to be dark, grainy and super shaky, do you? Here are some really easy and basic tips for shooting video with your smartphone.

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TODAY: Tablet War Tuesday: New iPads but what about the new Surface 2?

In this special “Tablet Wars” segment in the TODAY show’s Orange Room, Digital Lifestyle Expert® Mario Armstrong and Carson Daly take a look at all the hottest new tablets, including the iPad 5 rumors, the just-released Microsoft Surface 2 and Surface Pro 2. They also examine the poll results of which tablets you’re most interested in!

TODAY: Using tech to keep in touch with your kids

So the kids have headed off to college! Are you an empty nester now or just feeling blue as you look into that empty room that was once a sea of clothes and dirty dishes? Well, fret no more! We have some fun ways for you to stay connected to your kids while they are away—and you don’t have to “friend” them either!

Google + Hangouts

This is a FREE service offered by Google. Hangouts is a fun and easy way to connect with your kids that are away at school or anywhere else for that matter. All you need is a Google account. Once you sign up for Google +, you can find the Hangout frame and begin. The service allows you to choose from either doing a texting chat or a video chat. Every kid is different—some may feel much more comfortable connecting with you via text chat and others may love to see their parents or caregivers! So video chat would be a fun solution for them. You can invite up to 10 people to hangout in your chat, so if you have other kids, grandparents, aunts and uncles and they want to join, they can! It allows you to share photos and YouTube videos as well. They also have a fun effects feature where you can add silly hats, glasses and other wacky items that can make the whole experience more enjoyable for everyone. Read the rest of this post on TODAY.com.