Okay so we've been without TV/Cable for over a year now...maybe even longer. We decided to get rid of our cable service because of several reasons. 1. It is a distracting part of our life with children. It is hard to focus on them when something interesting is on and it is hard to turn it off. 2. The stuff our children see and hear mostly unintentionally is not positive or uplifting. 3. It is waaaay to easy to let the TV babysit your children, especially when you are me! :) 4. It was so expensive and not really important.
Well during all this time my children have been watching movies instead. Approximately 1 movie per day sometimes 2 depending upon the schedule. Not always an entire movie, maybe just parts, etc. You get the picture. On top of the fact that I got so, so tired of hearing the same movies all the time and practically having them memorized, I mostly grew impatient with the length of the movies and how sometimes they just "had" to finish them! So, after much discussion Justin and I decided it was time to get an Antenna so we could access the free tv channels out in cyberworld.
My parents have always had free TV so I knew it was out there it was just that our house wasn't equipped with an Antenna to make the channels come through. So, we did some research and ordered a nifty HD Antenna which Justin hooked up that very day is came in about 30 minutes.
What do you know, we have TV. It is clear and on a tired, lazy morning nice to put on a 30 Channel 8 kids show for them and be able to turn it off without interrupting the movie!
I still believe all the same things I listed above. So, we don't have a TV in our living room just our bedroom and the kids room (in which the ones in the kids room doesn't currently work b/c it is not equipped with HD so we have to get a converter box). In order for Justin and I to watch TV we would have to go out of our way to sit in the bedroom to do so, which makes this process a little more intentional that just flipping it on and leaving it on.
We have been in the habit of watching after the kids go to bed on the computer so we hope to maintain that habit even now.
We have kept our Tivo b/c you can use it via a wireless internet access and still record shows, so for only $9.99 a month we have that service but we'll see if it sticks around!
That is all that is new around here! For now.
2 comments:
Welcome back! :) There's nothing like a little PBS in the morning. Evan's favorites are Dinosaur Train and Super Why. They have lots of cool games online too that correspond with all the different shows at pbskids.org that Evan loves to play!
I like your tenacity at finding the what works for your family. We do the same. And I think that as technology continues to merge (i.e. Why are TV and internet still separated for the average consumer?), it will become easier to maintain that balance with less sacrifice AND easier to get out of balance if we allow. Keep it up!
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