Say Hi To Grandma Through the Screen

JeanneSager — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 17:28:00 GMT

My three-year-old likes to show her grandparents her nursery school projects. Too bad they're in Virginia, and we're in New York. Seeing a construction paper elephant is a tough job when you're looking through a phone line. We're still working on that.

But if an article in yesterday's New York Times is any indication, there may soon be a nation of toddlers who never have to use adjectives to tell Grandma about their new artistic creations. Grandma and Grandpa have gone digital so they can keep up with their grandkids living half a world away.

With half of American grandparents living at least two hundred miles from their grandchildren (according to the AARP) and two-thirds of kids seeing at least one set of grandparents only once a year, Web cams are stepping into the void to make sure kids feel that family connection. Some parents even use on-screen Grandma as a remote babysitter, setting their kids up in front of the computer to chat while they get some work done around the house.

With my in laws living so far away, their biggest fear seems to be that my daughter will forget them. They once handed me a picture of them - so she doesn't forget us, they said. We make sure that doesn't happen with weekly phone calls, and we bring them up in regular conversation. She runs to them when they arrive just as quickly as she does my parents, who live across town and talk to her on the phone even more often (what can I say, my side of the family tends to have bigger mouths!). We haven't purchased a Web cam yet, but it is a temptation. My in-laws will want to see the first loose tooth, the First Communion dress. A photographer by trade, I take pictures of these things, but I don't always have the energy to actually get them online and e-mailed four states away.

One expert quoted in the article said she worries grandparents will get too hooked on what technology offers; that they'll be tempted to visit less because they've already "seen" the grandkids. I kind of doubt it. The kind of grandparent who would power up their computer just to get a look at that cute little monkey is the kind of grandparent who would be there in a heartbeat . . . if they could.

A kid bouncing around in front of a camera has nothing on a kid wrapping their arms around you.

Image: New York Times

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