Wednesday, March 20, 2013

I spy with my camera eye...

Amidst the preparations in my household for baby number two in roughly six weeks (a girl this time, which I think I’ve failed to mention here before), a number of transitions have already begun on the home front. Among them has been moving my two-year-old in to a new bedroom. Not just any bedroom though—it’s his bigger, better, “big boy” room! We talked it up for weeks as our previous guest room transformation gradually occurred. And while I am reluctant to type it for fear of jinxing things, he has done well with it the first month and is quite proud of his new digs! (Hence the cheesy, squinty-eyed grin.)


At the same time, keeping an ear out for what will soon be two kids down the hall at night also led us to purchase a second baby monitor. This time, we decided to buy a video monitor (which we may return given the battery doesn’t last through the night, the camera sometimes doesn’t work and the built in thermometer is way off…but that’s just par for the course for this consumer). Yet while I think I like having this new capability, I’m still debating a bit.

My husband and I never considered a video monitor much until hearing from a few people who had them as well as seeing one at our nephew’s home. Plus, given that we would hear him awake and talking, singing, etc. (but still in bed, thankfully) for sometimes more than an hour after we said goodnight and turned out the light, we were mostly just curious to find out what was going on in there! The result has actually been some comical reality TV right in our own home. And more functionally, it has been nice when we hear him in the middle of the night to just flip the video on to see if he’s still laying down or if we need to go to him.

But I also admit to feeling a little sneaky watching him in there. So, what do you think…am I invading my toddler’s privacy? Is there such thing as “toddler privacy?” (If my son’s barging into the bathroom any time I don’t lock the door is any indication, he has no concept of the word…though I’ve explained it several times.) Certainly it’s not something that we plan to keep up with for years to come, but at least for now, I feel it might bring us a little extra ease and peace of mind as our family life gets a bit more complicated (and exhausting) in the months ahead.

3 comments:

  1. Yet another indicator of how freaking old I am. You young parents have such moral dilemnas to deal with.

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  2. I think the video monitor is a great idea. He is such a little performer, you would hate to miss any of this cute antics. I love the safety aspect of being able to see him, too. As parents, watching him and keeping him safe from all you can will save him and you a great deal of anxiety.

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  3. You might as well start invading his privacy now. Then when he gets his driver's license you can install one of those dash cameras in his car. My co-worker has one for her teenage daughter and our whole office laughs at good stories she tells about the footage it captures.

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