It Takes a (Wired) Village

What a difference a few months make!  In the first of February, my second baby boy made his appearance. My life reached a new level of great and a new level of busy! A second child does seem to multiply things by more than two…
After taking a leave to care for the baby (and I had hoped for a better sleep routine than what we have currently accomplished), I am back at ACS Technologies. It will be a new balance to continue to try to fulfill the needs of our clients as well as my sons. I think I am up for the job, though! It is great to be back and jump back in to things as well as see all that was accomplished while away.
There were many things different about the birth of number 2, but one thing that I immediately recognized was the role of technology and social media in this birth. We often take our cell phones for granted, but they were quite handy for contacting family in town as well as out of state. I not only could call the parents, but keep them  updated on progress with text messages throughout the morning. As my Dad traveled to SC, I could easily see his flight progress on my phone (as well as the ice storm covering the Dallas airport).
As soon as baby boy arrived, a picture was emailed out to immediate family. What was one of the next steps to let people know? Forget about having to make lots of phone calls, just one quick post to Facebook and the good news was shared. All of our friends and family knew with a click of a button.
In the days following, I became increasingly thankful for technology. I continued to share photos on Facebook so friends and family could see the baby. I emailed out not only pictures but videos from my phone. How much easier this was than taking a roll of film to be developed! The immediacy was key as well. If I did want printed pictures, I could just upload them from my phone to Shutterfly.
Sometimes we would also directly connect through Skype on the phone for live interaction with long distance family. Gone are the days of returning lots of phone calls about meals. My friends just signed up for their day and item on www.takethemameal.com.
In addition to all the baby gear, now all the phone applications that exist for a new baby are overwhelming and helpful! We still have the classic baby monitor, but we hardly use it. Instead I can see if my baby is sleeping by just checking the webcam through an app on my phone. I can even take a sneak peak when at work!
Lullabies now can be played by the phone. I even had a friend send me an iTunes album as a present! No need to write down all of the feedings and diaper changes in a scribbled log, I found a handy application that with a few easy buttons kept record of everything.
It definitely takes a village to raise a child. For me, it needs to be a “wired village”!