If the beeping of an alarm clock is too aggressive for your sensibilities, Philips has created a Wake-up Light. With light and sound it gradually awakens sleeping beauties in a gentle and “natural” way. Thirty minutes before your set time, the amber light gradually increases just like, well, the sun. You can synchronize the soft light to your favorite FM radio station (AM news and talk shows not an option) or choose the sound of morning birds, wind chimes, and – for those not yet totally sold – a beep. All sounds take 90 seconds to reach your selected volume. $100 at all stores. (And yes, there is an app for that.)
Across the retail aisle is a popular kids’ card game called Sleeping Queens ($10). A six-year-old who couldn’t get to sleep one night invented the game. Twelve character queens have fallen under a sleeping spell and it’s the players’ job to wake them up. Whoever wakes the most queens wins. We understand the inventor – who’s now 16 – has become a very sound sleeper since selling her card game to Gamewright and has been nominated for the 2012 Toy and Game Young Inventor of the Year award. P.S. The Queen of England wakes to the sound of her personal bagpiper every morning. No word if she falls to sleep under a spell.
