The Gift I Almost Skipped: YLL Karaoke Machine

I almost did not buy it. That is the honest truth. The week before Christmas I stood at my kitchen counter with my phone in one hand and a cart full of maybe-gifts on the screen, and I talked myself out of the YLL karaoke machine three separate times in one afternoon.

My reasons were solid, or so I told myself. Mia was seven and already had a bedroom she could barely walk through. Eli was four and loud enough without any help from electronics. And I have been burned before, more than once, by a toy that blinks, plays a jingle, and ends up at the bottom of the bin by February.

What changed my mind was a memory. Back in July, Mia spent a week at my house and put on a show every afternoon in the living room, using a hairbrush as a microphone and a bed sheet as a curtain. She did not need a stage. She needed somebody to sing with her, and I was the only somebody in the house, and my voice is a church alto that has seen better decades. I kept thinking there has to be a better way to do this than a hairbrush.

So I ordered the YLL machine. What came was one small speaker and four wireless microphones, which is the part that matters when you have three grandchildren and one of them is four. The speaker sits on the toy shelf in the spare bedroom I keep for the kids, or on the coffee table when the show moves to the living room. It is light, about three quarters of a pound, and small enough that Mia carries it from room to room herself.

There is no app. There is no subscription. I paired the YLL speaker to my phone over Bluetooth in about the time it takes to boil water, and the songs come off my phone the same way they would through any speaker. A phone or a tablet is required. That is the one thing you should know going in, because a grandparent who expects a screen built into it will be disappointed.

Four microphones sounds like a small detail until you are the one handing out microphones to three children at once.

The first Saturday after Christmas, Mia took a microphone, Eli grabbed a second one, and I picked up the third. Eli does not really sing. Eli shouts, mostly the same four words over and over, and the machine takes it. Mia works the room like she has been doing it for years. I put on an Elvis record through it and sang along badly, and both of them thought that was the funniest thing that had ever happened in my house.

The fourth microphone turned out to be the useful one. When Rachel comes to pick up the kids, she stays for one song. When my neighbor Ruth stops by on a Saturday, she gets handed a microphone without being asked. That is what four channels means in a real house. Not a party trick. Just enough microphones that nobody has to wait their turn and lose interest.

Two things I did not expect. There is a key that reduces the vocal on a Bluetooth track, so Mia can sing over the real recording instead of an instrumental, and she uses it constantly. And the YLL machine is small but it is not a whisper. Five watts fills my living room nicely. It would not carry a backyard party, and you should not buy it expecting that.

Honest downsides. The microphones are small and Eli has dropped one on the tile more than once, and it still works. The YLL speaker is plastic, not something that looks expensive sitting out. And because it runs off my phone, the songs are my songs, so the playlist is Elvis, church choir standards, and whatever Mia has talked me into downloading. If you want a machine with its own library built in, this is not that.

Ten months later it still sits on the toy shelf. It has never gone home with the kids, which was deliberate on my part. It is the thing we do at my house, and I am not above protecting that.

Sophie is two and lives three hours away in Oklahoma City, so she sees it about once a month. She gets a microphone handed to her the second she walks in the door, and mostly she holds it upside down and hums, and Mia claps for her anyway. That is worth something to me. A toy that gives the older kids a reason to be kind to the little one is doing more than a toy usually does.

What I'd Tell You If We Were Sitting at My Kitchen Table

I would tell you to stop shopping for the package with the most lights on it. I would tell you that a gift the two of you can do together beats a gift they do alone in a bedroom. I would tell you to check that whatever you buy works with the phone or tablet already in your house, because a toy that needs a subscription is a toy that quits working when the card on file expires. And I would tell you that the YLL machine having four microphones is not a gimmick. It is the difference between one child performing while the rest of the couch watches, and the whole couch singing.

I almost skipped this one. I am glad I did not. If you have a child in your life who sings into a hairbrush, this is the upgrade. You can be terrible at it together, and being terrible at it together is the whole point.