For the past three years we’ve had cable. Digital cable, a few movie tiers, the DVR… you know, the whole nine yards.
I don’t watch TV. At. All. Especially here of late and if I do watch it, it’s online.
My children on the other hand watch way. too. much.
Sometimes, it’s on and I don’t even think they are watching it. I think it’s a comfort or something, I’m not sure.
Yesterday, I called and cancelled the cable.
Now, I’m not saying that I just cancelled the DVR.
Or just the digital cable.
Or knocked us back to the 44 channel basic cable.
No, we now have the cable that you pay $11 a month for to avoid using rabbit ears.
THAT cable is what we have now.
I watched the cable man show up today. (Funny how if I want them to fix something it takes days, sometimes weeks, and they are never on time, but tell them you want to cut it off and they are out here immediately.)
It was then that I told the kids.
They were less than thrilled.
Samara even cried.
They sat there and flipped through our 10 channels and guess what? They found something to watch. Amazing isn’t it?
Then we went to the boy’s house and made cookies and played and not once did they think about the TV. (He doesn’t have cable either.)
The minute we walked back in the door, Samara was crying again. Because we have no cable.
CRYING.
I feel somewhat bad, but not really. We watch too much TV. We don’t need to watch that much TV.
And now we can’t.
I’m pleased as punch with my decision. I’ve been wanting to do it for awhile but never had the nerve.
The kids?
Well, I’m just glad that we’ll have new toys to occupy ourselves with the rest of Christmas vacation.
Besides, their dad has cable. They can still watch every other weekend and Thursday nights.
So how about you? Are you a cable family?
Until next time…
good for you!!! i always wonder what more we could do as a family if we didn’t’ have cable……..maybe we’ll give it a try when our contract is up in the summer. i bet they’ll be over it sooner rather than later. have a very very very merry christmas!!!
you know, I did this last year and ultimately I was the one who wanted it back. I felt like it was cheaper than going to a movie (we have 4 kids), or out to dinner or other forms of entertainment. It’s hard to break from it, my hat is off to you. You’re doing the right thing! Be strong(er than me)…
I plan on keeping as much cable as necessary to keep the TreeHouse channel – the one for 5 and under with NO commercials? That one. They get an hour a day or so. And my big kid gets maybe 2 hours on vacation/ weekends. IMO it sucks their creativity and problem-solving skills. When it is off, then they have to entertain themselves.. but boy, is it ever difficult to get them to stop bugging me! The “Go play outside and don’t come home ’til dinner!” days would be a dream, eh?
Merry Christmas!
Cathy
I personally gave up TV 10 years ago and the cable went to, which meant my kids too…my Dh took a little while longer with the sports and nascar. Now for about 8 we haven;t even had the rabbit ears! We have 2 TV’s, but they are used for movies, videos and school. Our life has been SO much better since. I wouldn’t have time to watch TV now…I’m too busy with LIFE! Blessings-Tracy
About all we do is discovery channel, noggin, and pbs when the rugrats are awake. TV died last Christmas just as Crossroads was getting geared up to do a 40 day prayer and fast, so the longhair took it as a sign ( and not unjustifyably) that the electronic pacifyer was our fast. Ugh, was it HARD… for about 3 days. At the end of the 40 we got the one above the fireplace. Ive been thinking that we may do another one, its easy to fall back into the habit, and i am a Whodunit surfin junkie. Hold your ground, they will survive. (Tell em you could turn it off like it will be as of the 1st here, lol)
Since our move three months ago, we have yet to set up the satelite which is all you can get here. We don’t even have basic anything. We get static. We haven’t missed it a bit. The kids watch what they want on their computer and or DVD’s.
It’s actually driving my parents crazy thinking that we don’t have T.V. and how are we supposed to know whats going on kind of thing. They even sent us a check for Christmas to get it turned on.
We are a Directv family.
I’m afraid we are a cable family. The digital and on-demand stuff is only in the living room. The kids’ playroom TV has regular cable. They watch too much. I don’t watch enough. But I’m not cutting it off anytime soon.
We have satellite, in two rooms, and each has a DVR. I don’t see that ending anytime soon – my husband is too much of a TV junkie!
We did, however, cancel our telephone “land line” last week. That was $50 a month for something that we rarely used. The only calls we ever got were telemarketers, and of course we didn’t answer those!
Once we found out that we could keep our DSL without a land line, it didn’t take long to make that decision at all.
Good for you! They’ll get over it, I promise. We haven’t had cable for a little over 3 years now. If there is something my husband and I want to watch and can’t get with our antenna(we get about 10 channels, now that we have the digital converter), we watch it online.