Ask HN: Parents, How do you record special moments and stay present?

I just started reading this book Storyworthy by Matthew Dicks.

He has this concept he teaches called Homework for Life.

The idea is that you write down 1 to 2 sentences of the single most storyworthy thing that happened to you each day in spreadsheet. Over time you get better at identifying these as you sharpen your storytelling lens.

This process has a whole host of benefits. You start to see that you make big different in the world. Time starts to slow down and you are more present. You have a record and way to recall all these amazing stories of your family.

All this for 5 minutes of time each day.

For me it was a matter of coming to 2 important realizations:

1) Not everything needs to be captured and preserved. My kids do dozens of things worthy of capturing every week, sometimes every day. While in the moment they all feel unique, “sampling” what I choose to record still results in plenty of content that paints a pretty complete picture.

2) Often taking out the phone causes them to change their behavior and diminishes the moment. Just today I caught my 18 month year old reading to himself making car and animal noises as he flipped the pages. As soon as he saw me with them phone he kept reading but did it much more silently.

Now I capture when I feel it’s right but don’t stress what I don’t catch. No one single moment will matter in the long run.

I used to use dedicated camera for photos and videos but after kids I have switched to phone cameras.

Initially, it was pain to use phone for photos or videos. Especially, the lag of unlocking phone, finding the right icon to click on and the waiting for the camera app to load.

But I record tons of boring moments, like kids eating, napping etc. It wasn’t deliberate practice, just something I enjoyed. I think this helped me get faster with phone camera. Now I am able to capture spontaneous moments pretty often. Also be able to capture them without looking at the phone.

But there is no way for me to be part of moments and also capture it myself. Usually, if I’m engaged with kids, then my wife captures the moment and vice versa.

Err on the side of observing with all applicable senses. What matters is how you feel about each other, and if recording moments to view later helps with this, go for it. I take photos mostly to share with my spouse/co-parent and sometimes friends and extended family, but since a few times of feeling... disconnected while behind a camera I have scaled that back to being okay with forgetting.

The lasting effect of shared experiences is stronger.

We make videos that are exactly 10 seconds in length. Less than three or five at different moments during the day, whatever is happening.

It works for us.

Facebook RayBan glasses are nice. 1-tap to take pic -- the children look directly into the camera/aka your eyes. I have it setup so one pic goes into android photos, which auto-uploads to google-photos. Then at the end of the year I print a photobook. Photos are better than video in a way because you can't print videos.

During my childhood, my dad simply had a tripod and camcorder which he could set and forget. So aim for set and forget.

Just do your best.

Recording the moments can be a way of staying out of the way and making space for other people (but it can be a way of getting in the way too of course).

Anyway I think being present in ordinary moments is probably more important to your child. Your partner/spouse/etc can be another matter.

Good luck.

alternate. have your camera ready, but don't record obsessively. for special events like birthdays take a few pictures at critical moments, but don't dominate the event with the camera. in particular for me that means i don't ask people to pose, on the contrary, i hope they don't even notice me taking photos. if people react to the camera to much, i stop, because that's not what i want to record.

on the other hand, do also record the not special moments. let everyone get used to the camera. make it normal that you take photos and videos often. then doing so at the special events hopefully becomes less distracting.

in asia, taking photos at events is more common, so it is a more natural part of any event, and people are not bothered by it.

I have this issue too. I decided to have 2 go pros and bunch of stands and batteries that just watches our family from third person view usually in time warp mode.

Teach children that in life, there's no such thing called "special".

Treat every moment as normal, keep going on.

Audio recording with your phone. I covertly recorded bedtime story/conversations with my sons.

I stopped recording events because it took me out of the moment.