Ring! Ring! ...Hello?

In a few weeks, my doorbell will have been dead for 3 years. It doesn't seem like something worth keeping track of, but I miss it. I miss it every time I have to replace the piece of tape I put on top to discourage people from pressing the bell and waiting, assuming that we are on our way. I miss it in the evening when I come home and there's no little orange glowing button. I miss it every time I have to text or email someone: "Just knock, because the doorbell doesn't work."

Well no more. After 3 years of not wanting to pay for an electrician to come rewire it, we decided to take a different approach. We paid Jeff Bezos to fix the problem instead, recently adding a ring to our ever-increasing amount of Amazon products in our lives (we're not happy about it, but we've come to love our lord and master).

We'd been waffling for about a year on it (in part because of our reluctance to buy more Amazon products) but after seeing one at a friend's house, we decided it was the cheapest, easiest solution to my sad doorbell problem. And it was incredibly quick. D and the girls even managed to install it in the rain in about a half hour (it probably would have been quicker without the "help" of small children). The kit included an adorably small level and several inserts to angle the device. We didn't end up needing to tilt it, screwing it directly into the door frame. The only question really was whether to use the gray metallic faceplate or the black one.

We chose the black face plate instead of the gray metallic one since at least it matches our shutters. It is linked to our echo to tell us when "someone is at the door" and offers some motion detection as well, which is nice for when a package goes missing or to make sure the cat sitter remembered to pay us a visit. Most important for me, it makes an audible chime for the person at the other end pressing the doorbell. It's the little things, I guess. The kids find it hilarious and love to ring it every time they come in. We get a fun video on our phones.

Despite this unneeded extra use, we've been impressed with the battery life so far (you can hardwire it in but our original problem was that we don't have electricity to the doorbell). It's not totally flush with our door frame because it was a bit wider than the space between the trim, but it looks great. From above, you can still get a peek at our sad little doorbell. But at least now it isn't confusing visitors.