Don't Spend Another Dollar on a Baby Monitor

The first time around, I bought the highest-rated baby monitor on the market. Full color, zoom ability, lots of stars on every website, and it was fine. That is, until it broke and I couldn't find anyone to fix it. Suddenly, I had two hundred dollars' worth of plastic-covered electronics sitting in my junk drawer (ok my bread box, same thing) and no baby monitor. That's when my husband suggested we try a home monitoring app called Alfred. 

At this point, that video of a hacker talking to a baby over a wifi monitor had made its rounds on social media and I was leery of online monitoring but the difference with Alfred and other high-rated apps is that they're sign-in and secure. So, we pulled an old phone out of the drawer (does everyone have a drawer of old phones they can't part with?), downloaded the free app, and gave it a go.

Two years and another baby later, I can't IMAGINE spending money on a monitor. The low-light detection, sound, and screen resolution on my oldest Samsung slays the best monitors and range? Well it's an app designed to monitor homes from wherever you are so yeah, it’s basically unlimited as long as you’ve got wifi. You can add people via email to your trust circles so they can access the camera when it’s on through Alfred (for example, it’s important that I be able to use my husband’s phone when mine dies) and there’s a web viewer you can access for full-screen laptop viewing, handy for when you’re sweeping and don’t want to squint to see your baby.

My guy’s not a napper so when he goes to sleep around 8:30 you better believe I’m setting the phone up to monitor him and heading downstairs with a glass of wine to celebrate another day won. And hey, with all the money I saved on a new monitor, I deserve a good bottle.

xo