Do far away grandparents Facetime with Baby and how often?

Question

My out-of-state in-laws love to see baby on Facetime, which I don’t love because I don’t want baby looking at the screen. However, we do it for them because we know it is hard for them to be far away. We try to do it once a week and the calls last for over an hour sometimes where they just stare at baby and make noises, etc. My FIL is guilt-tripping us insinuating we are keeping the baby from them and we should do it more often, but it’s just hard to coordinate these calls for a time in the evening when baby is not cluster feeding, fussing, or sleeping and they can try to interact with him. 
We post pictures on a photo-sharing app multiple times a day but it’s still not enough for them. It seems demanding to me, but I’m a FTM and maybe I just wasn’t prepared for how intense grandparents can be? 
For those with family far away, how often are you video chatting or do you have any other good ways to keep obsessed grandparents happy?

Answer

You don't owe them your baby or your time. It's very nice to have grandparents who want to be involved. All of my kids' grandparents live in the same city we do, but they're very respectful of our time. We accidentally went 2 weeks without seeing my in-laws and felt really bad the next time we went over, but not because they said anything about it. However, my MIL goes down to visit her parents a lot and will be gone for weeks, sometimes months. I think when she was gone for 2 months we only video chatted 2-3 times. Your priority should be your baby and his schedule and they need to respect that.

Answer

My in laws live three hours away and my MIL calls multiple times a day. Sometimes my husband will say the baby is sleeping even when he's not because he gets annoyed with it 😂. My parents live over 24 hours away and don't call nearly as much. We send multiple pictures pretty much every day. My parents are chill because this is like grand baby number 10 I think 😂 and for my MIL this is grand baby number 3 from her children but there are five grandchildren total or something lol

Answer

I think once a week with more frequent pictures is plenty!
My parents live about an hour away. We probably FaceTime 1-2 a week and share pictures 1-2 a week and see them 1 time a month. But it probably makes it easier that I have two kids, so if I need to nurse they talk to my daughter until I’m done and then they can see baby again.
Don’t feel bad - I think you are being very accommodating!

Answer

I feel your pain. My mil lives 5 minutes away and FaceTimes every night asking where’s the baby and comments on what he’s wearing, what he’s doing, why he’s crying, ect. It’s deff hard to coordinate and is really inconvenient because he is usually fussy or nursing or we’re having dinner or he’s sleeping and she yells through the phone baby talk, sometimes waking him up 😒 he has no concept of the phone or who’s on the other end making noises. It’s really just for her own satisfaction.   Once a week though sounds manageable for a few minutes. But do whatever works for you and your baby. His needs come first

Answer

With Covid making visits impossible, I FaceTime my family almost every day and my in-laws once a week or so. I just keep it flipped so the screen is towards me because I don’t want her starting at a screen all the time either. All she sees is Mommy holding a rectangle lol. 😅

Answer

I try to FaceTime my parents least every other day. They are in Canada and I’m in the US. But they are understanding if I can’t and if I missed their call.

Answer

Obviously everyone is different. I call my mom every day, sometimes multiple times a day

Answer

You weren’t prepared for grandparents to want to want their grandchild? 🤔 we’ve always lived away from extended family. With our oldest, my MIL FaceTimed wish her weekly. Same with my dad and sisters. We now have a 3 year old and a 2 month old and they FaceTime every other week or so. They FaceTime with cousins (who are 13 months, 8 months, and 2 weeks almost weekly). Sometimes more often when we all have the time. It’s important to all of us this at our kids have a relationship with their extended family. If that’s something you don’t care about, that’s your own choice. But I grew up without family around and now at 28, I have almost no relationship at all with extended family including hrandparenfs. I don’t want that for my kids so we make the time 🤷🏻‍♀️

Do far away grandparents Facetime with Baby and how often?

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