Precious Moments with SnapSights

There are moments (quite regularly) where I’m out of the house – at work, meetings, grocery shopping (the usual mama stuff) and wondering what my precious 3 are up to back at home. The guilt (will it EVER stop!) over missing out on all of their special moments, making sure they aren’t doing anything they shouldn’t (middle child loves to jump off the kitchen counter and ‘fly’ like superman) and just being up to date with what they’re up to every afternoon sets in again.

When I ask my kids what they’ve been up to the response is a fairly standard ‘nothing’ (or something hilariously non-sensical from the younger two). I have a wonderful nanny – to whom I’m so very grateful – but she can’t possibly keep tabs on all 3 of the mini monsters at all times plus however much I love her telling me what they’ve all been up to at home, it’s just not the same as seeing it for myself.

So when I got the opportunity to try out a new service called Snapsights – essentially a baby/kiddie monitoring service that involves getting cameras installed in areas of your home that you choose (it sounds much scarier than it is – this is by no means a ‘big brother’ system and nor is it a nanny-cam), I was curious and decided to give it a go!

Once up and running, I was given a code to access the cameras remotely, meaning that I could login and see what was going on at home (strangely addictive even when there wasn’t anyone around – I found myself wondering how best to reconfigure the furniture). This was awesome – I felt like I was there with my little girl Violet when she was eating her lunch, watching the kids play (and fight) and keeping tabs on whether they were in fact helping themselves to the cookie jar (they were – it has since been moved!).

With my ‘virtual nannies’ watching out for any danger, my husband and I received a text message and email every time they thought that there was something we should be aware of. ‘Alert! Your little boy is attempting to climb the cabinet on the corner of the living room from the couch and is all alone. He is currently in a position that could trigger an accident’ followed up with a video clip of the incident so that we could check-in with our nanny and make sure that everything was ok. And on the flipside we also got the cutest messages and video clips whenever the snapsights ladies witnessed a heart-warming moment that they thought we’d have loved to see. My favourites: ‘Your adorable daughter just finished her lunch’ and ‘Your cute little boy just fell asleep on the couch while watching TV.’

But mamas my absolute favourite perk of the snapsights service were the Happy Moments that were emailed to us at the end of every day (the team clock-off at 6:30 pm which is perfect and means that you don’t feel like you’re being watched while eating your dinner or enjoying some time with the hubby – and there are options for switch off the cameras whenever you like) and the end of week compilation of all the moments stitched together and edited to a cute little song – that we sent to grandparents and friends abroad so that they got a little taster of what the minis are doing.

I have to admit I was a little sad when the cameras came down and I no longer received my daily alerts and funny little snippets that helped alleviate the guilt of being out of the house. But at least now when I ask my little ones what they did all afternoon and they say ‘nothing’, I know that – having witnessed their regular afternoon activities – actually they were up to all sorts.

To learn more about SnapSights including price packages tailored to the monitoring hours you choose and how to enroll, please visit www.snapsights.ae or call Tel: +971 4 552 0670