When spying on your kids backfires

They’re watching. They’re always watching.

After Traci’s final cancer treatment, we decided to celebrate. Thanks to my buddy Bert, we had a lovely kid-free weekend in St. George.

We didn’t do a ton, since I’m still in my walking boot and on my scooty bike (which made me very popular with all the old people in St. George who wanted to tell me their scooty bikes stories) and Traci’s still trying to get her strength back up. But we were healthy enough to watch movies, eat food, get massages, walk (scoot) around the farmer’s market, and spend an afternoon in Vegas.

It was just the break we needed.

While it’s nice to have some grownup time, we always end up missing the kids a little bit. In the past, we’ve always had to call grandma and grandpa to check in. “Everything going okay? How are the kids? Are they being good?”

This time was different. Paige has a phone. We have an Echo Dot and iPads with FaceTime so we can talk to them directly pretty much any time we want. Plus, thanks to notifications from the Ring doorbell, we could see what they were up to, even if they couldn’t see us.  (Sometimes we see Curtis knocking on the door in full catcher’s gear for no apparent reason.)

After three restful days, we headed home. But we weren’t quite ready to be done with vacation.

“Why don’t we stop by our house before we go to my parents?” Traci said. “We can sneak in a little nap before we pick up the kids.”

You don’t have to ask me twice.

We followed the plan and picked up the kids about an hour later.

“How come you guys went home before you came here?” Curtis asked when we showed up at Grandma’s.

“Went home? What are you talking about?” I replied, innocently.

“We saw you, dad,” all the kids chimed in. “On the Ring.”

Nuts.

Busted by our own spying tool.

Technology is the worst.