LG Migo VX1000 (Verizon Wireless)

About a month ago, my fiance and I merged our phone services into one "family plan" and bought the little Migo for our daughter. She is going to start playing basketball after school, and we wanted to make sure she could call us whenever and wherever she needed to. This is the phone to buy your pre-teen girl!

It's neon green with a little carabiner clip that she can hook to her backpack and an ac charger to restore power overnight. There are only 4 numbers she can call. We've programmed it for Dad, Mom, Aunt Michelle and her grandmother. Anyone can call her, which is nice for her friends.

You can't call collect to a cell phone (at least the last time I checked), and we don't have a landline. If she misses her bus or practice quits early at school, she feels secure that she can grab her own phone and call. We live in a new neighborhood, and she doesn't have many friends yet.

This peace of mind for her and for me is worth the $49 or so that we paid for the phone. The family plan allows us to share 2100 minutes per month with free nights and weekends on all 3 phones. It's a good investment.

The only drawback that I noticed is that the phone is very small and the speaker is not very powerful. My daughter has found it hard to hear me if I call her and she is in a noisy place. The small size is perfect for her hands though. And it's tough as nails. She dropped it more than once, and it didn't suffer a scratch!

I've heard friends and coworkers complain that their kids run up huge bills and lose expensive phones on the football field. The migo can be integrated with a GPS tracking system with a web monitor application too, though we've not yet added this feature. I think that is about $20 per month. We've not needed it yet...Hope this helps.

Update...This phone is working well and the battery life is great. She only has to charge it about every 2 days (doesn't use much and has to power it off and hide in backpack during school hours!) I just love the security that she has a way to call me. We've had occasion to use it a few times already for emergencies (i.e. missed bus, lost housekey, etc.)

Our daughter is also learning some responsibility and good judgement. She knows when it's too early or late to make a phone call and has taken great care to not leave it in precarious places (like her brother's bedroom!) We're proud of her and [still] quite happy with our purchase. More later...