Head Tale

When we bought our new house, we also got a much faster Internet connection which is part of the reason I started getting more into smart home devices – Internet-enabled security cameras, multi-coloured LED lights we can control remotely, smart TVs and eventually about half a dozen various Google Nest smart devices placed strategically around the house in bedrooms, kitchens, living rooms that give us access to a whole host of useful features.

Here are ten of my favourite features:

1. I can ask Google to play pretty much any song/album/artist/playlist I want at anytime – from 80’s rock in the morning when I wake up to mellow jazz at suppertime to relaxing ocean waves in the tub and it just happens like magic.  And there’s nothing to replace a parent reading to a child but Sasha’s gotten in the habit of listening to bedtime stories through Deezer in her room and I have to admit, having Robert Munsch’s voice reading his own stories to her is pretty cool too!
2. When we moved into our house which is quite a bit larger than our last place, I considered buying an intercom system of some kind.  But I was happy to find Google Home has this ability built in – we can broadcast messages back and forth around the house without yelling or running up and down stairs and, even better, a recent update allows us to target messages to devices in specific rooms instead of them being heard on every device (useful if we’re sending Pace a message to get ready for bed when his sister is already in her room falling asleep.)
3. We mostly have Google Minis but we also have two of the higher end Nest Hub devices – one in our kitchen and one in our master bedroom – and these have display screens that can show a random display of your photos, artwork and more.
4. The hub in the kitchen is also useful for pulling up recipes.
5. The hubs can also show YouTube videos though the screens are pretty small so we don’t really use this feature as much.
6. All of the devices are useful for setting alarms, timers and reminders for various things.
7. The devices are great for answers to quick questions – from “what time is it?” if you can’t see the clock to “What’s the forecast for tomorrow?” to “How many days until Christmas?”
8. I have connected my Google calendar and any activities or appointments I have pop up on the Hub every morning.
9. I can use the Google devices to control other smart devices in the home – from muting our Smart TV if we don’t have the remote control in hand (how lazy is that?) or streaming our security cameras to the Hub’s screens.
10. There’s lots of fun features that the kids are more likely to find – things like “Tell me a joke” to “Sing me a song” to “What is your favourite colour?”

[Edit to add: A couple weeks after originally posting this, I discovered they added a feature called “Family Bells”, I think during Covid when many kids were schooling from home, which are like super-charged alarms that you can set to go off on any speaker at any time and any day(s) you want.  We use them to get kids up in the morning, remind them of various “steps” such as eating breakfast, getting dressed, brushing teeth, time to head out the door.  Then at night, the same thing – snack time, stories, PJ’s, etc.  So far, finding this works a lot better than inconsistent requests/begs/shouts from parents to do these things!)

I’m sure there are tons of more capabilities that I haven’t even begun to explore – from creating “Routines” to using the devices to make video calls but so far, I’ve really enjoyed having these devices and all that they can do for a very small price.

(Obviously, Google/Amazon/others have an interest in getting you as customers so they can access your data/voice/searches and that’s something to be aware of and why their prices are relatively cheap for very advanced technology.

A friend who works in cybersecurity also expressed misgivings about us having security cameras in our home (some models of the Nest Hub also have a camera though not the ones we have) in case they get hacked but our two security cameras are both pointed outside in rooms we don’t use very much so I’m not too worried about it.  Plus, later in that very same conversation, he went on to expound about his love for his Alexa home devices which, like Google Nest devices, I think of as more intrusive, privacy-infringing and a risk to your personal information than a single camera is – short of having it pointed inward in your bedroom or bathroom that is!) 😉