a year without TV (and still alive!)

I've been loving reading my friends' blogs, lately. Must be the season, because there have been some good stuff going in the blogging world lately. Some people have posted recently about wonderful family traditions they enjoy, others about self-mastery and self-improvement, and others are simplifying their lives. I'm inspired by what people are doing to strengthen their families! And I'm loving all the great recipes. All this good stuff has made me want to post about our year with no TV in our home.

Last December, we decided to turn off our cable. There are lost of reasons we did it. We'd talked about it for months but never had the courage to actually do it until Comcast raised our rates; I think it is ridicuous to pay to receive the very basic channels, anyway. I'll show them, I thought. So we cancelled. I knew it would be hard for my husband who likes to relax in front of TV after work, and my kids who love the shows on PBS and would turn on the TV the minute after they ate breakfast. But I was surprised at how hard it was for me. The biggest adjustment I had to make was using my brain to think of things to do instead of just turning on a glowing box that gave endless hours of mindless entertainment. It was surprising how much we depended on TV to fill our time and entertain us. Well, it seemed so quiet in our house for the first couple weeks. And my kids kept asking 2 things over and over: "Why did you turn off the cable?" and "What can we do for fun?"

Fast forward a few months...We had no idea how much fun spending time together is! How great is it to have conversations with one another? (I am only kind of exaggerating.) Logan (where we lived at the time) is such a fun place to live. It has so much to do. We had tons of grass to play on, a swing set, a sand box. The pet store, book store, and Old Navy were a stick's throw away from our apartment. We had bikes to ride, good neighbors, a huge grassy field across the street at the middle school. There are awesome parks to play at. Then there's Logan canyon...a, not joking, 5 minute drive and you can be in the mountains surrounded by beautiful scenery and not be able to tell you are very near a city. There is first dam where you can go fishing and feed ducks. I could go on and on. The point is, we needed to get rid of the TV so we could enjoy life more. And I don't think TV is bad or evil, and it is fine to have TV in your house. There are uplifting programs, and it is a very nice break for a mom with young kids that needs to make dinner or have a shower without her kids screaming outside the bathroom door, etc. But it was just too easy for us to let it steal away all our time. Maybe we are the only ones who would turn it on at 6 or 7 to watch our fave show and before we knew it, Jay Leno was on. There needs to be a balance. Anyway, I am glad we did it, because now we don't live in Logan and we miss it so much. When we think of all the fun things we did, the shows we watched are not included on the list. And my kids never ask what they can do for fun, anymore. They play for HOURS imagining the coolest scenarios; I love to hear their creativity. My husband and I have enjoyed reading the last 2 Harry Potter books together and just finished Angels & Demons, by Dan Brown.(Side note, if you have any good books to recommend, we need another one to read! Please leave your suggestions in comments) We still love to watch movies, and do that fairly often. But we've not payed a cable bill for a year!

I barely even notice it's gone anymore. Except around General Conference time, that is a bummer. So there are a few drawbacks. But, all in all, it's been a positive experience.