What a great innovation was the baby monitor when it first got on the market!
Parents were fascinated with it, babies were left in its company for long, without the fear of the parents, etc.
Then, people discovered it is not so reliable- sometimes it is not sensitive enough, sometimes you just can listen radio station on it instead your kid. Well, later we got the whole camera and sensitive-as-a-caterpillar shebang, but that is another story, because the baby monitor in question is from the previous generation. In our old house I could listen to whole conversations between the taxi drivers in the middle of the night, without even switching the baby monitor chanel with it.
Perhaps this would have been funny, if it wasn’t for the “little problem” that I could not hear my baby in the mean time. But, since we moved, nothing of the sort happened.
Until this morning.
I am a very light sleeper, I got to say, even the smallest sound in the house can wake me up. I sleep so light, that my husband is making constantly fun of me, that I am the family dog/keeper 🙂 Always on duty 🙂 I can hear a spider walking on the wall ( well, I can smell somebody’s perfume behind 4 doors, for that matter, my poor husband does not even try to explain the co-worker’s perfume :-D) , so I am way beyond creepy point in sensitivness .
In other words I don’t really need the baby monitor, I am just using it as a peace of mind.
Yesterday night I went to bed early. I was trying to read couple of pages from the last Harry Potter, I know, I know I already told you he does not die, that’s because I’ve read the last couple of pages before hand. Guilty as charged, but it was too much of a suspense to tolerate, and since I can’t renew it in the library and I might never get the chance to finish it, I decided to at least know if he dies or not. How many books for pleasure ( school and work does not count!) have YOU read from start to finish since you had your children?! Well, there you go then!
So, after I fell asleep in the middle of the night I heard a baby cry.
Of course I got up, went to the kids room, kisses, blankets and I went back to sleep.
This night, the children were waking up rather often( soon you will know why), but sometimes happens, nothing too unusual.

Then around 5 am I hear somebody crying “Mommy, mommy” . At first it sounded like a girl to me, but then ( let’s not forget I was sound asleep before that) I thought it’s just my imagination and went to see my son( since my daughter does not talk so much yet).
I went to the kids’ room, opened the door- they were sound asleep.
I went back to the bedroom and I heard again ” Mommy, mommy”( in very sad and almost crying voice).
I went back AGAIN to the kids room- nothing they were asleep!
Now, I must say, that if I wasn’t sleepy I would have probably draw the conclusion this is no kid of mine rather sooner, but I got to tell you I was very tired, so at first I was sleep walking, and not thinking as much.
On the third time, holding the baby monitor in one hand I opened the kids’ room door. The kid from the baby monitor was crying, my kids were sleeping.
Nope, it definitely wasn’t any of mine!
And for a second this scared the heck out of me, because I was thinking ghosts etc. 🙂 ( I watch tooo many ghost shows, you can tell!)
After I woke up completely ( or you can say instantly, from the moment I had the revelation this is none of my children) I started thinking, that it must have been one of the neighbours children ( I hope) 🙂
I’ve been listening to the neighbour’s kids all night without even knowing it, probably some of the neighbours have been listening to mine at some point too.

My friend and I were joking that somebody has to open “babysitting over the phone” service 🙂 Somebody stays awake whole night and then attends the different children 🙂
Very cool 🙂 , considering that after the first few years we all would know everything about each other thanks to the baby monitor system 🙂
We could organize book clubs or book readings over the baby monitor, or even bed time stories for the kids – one parent is reading ( definitely we would have a schedule), all the kids in the neighbourhood are listening 🙂
Thanks to the baby monitor you could work in the garden and listen to your favorite soap opera or the guys can wash the car and listen to the game! And that for no additional cost or special equipment 🙂
Talk about progress!
But that is not all, oh, no, that is not all ( as the Cat in the Hat says )!
It’s your turn- tell me what other functions you might think of the normal baby monitor?