I’ve done it! I’ve embraced new technology that someone else didn’t convince me I needed. I wasn’t badgered by an ad, accosted by solicitations or even gently harassed. I just woke up one day and decided that there must be a better way. And there was. This is my story:
I’m really just a guy who didn’t want to put up Christmas lights on my house. They have blown off for two consecutive years. The installers damage our gutters, shingles and often the lights themselves. I didn’t want to deal with the hassles again. But I didn’t want to be a complete Christmas looser either. I had planned to get some colored bulbs and pop them into my eve lights. But then I remembered that there were some cool wifi lightbulbs that changed color. A quick Google search later and I was pretty sure my adventure would start with a box of Philips Hue Lights.
Installation info: Really straight forward. Plug your bridge (this links with your lights) into your router. Install the bulbs, make sure the power is on, download the Hue app. Link with your bridge. Search for the bulbs (app setup). Sometimes you need to enter in the bulb’s serial number for the Hue app to find it. Then start changing colors!
After the novelty wears off you’ll want to set up some rooms and then you can link bulbs to those rooms. You can adjust bulbs individually or all together. You can also apply filters called ‘scenes” and set up your own color pattern and save it as a scene.
Other features include timers and routines allowing you some basic automation tools. At some point you can start to play with Hue Labs were you’ll discover your lights can do just about anything you want. “Dance for me! Dance!”
So bottom line? I Feel good about my decision to do the absolute minimum to elevate myself above the Christmas grumps like Scrooge and the Grinch. The lights work well and they are a ton of fun to play with. I can’t wait to change the colors to pink for Valentine’s Day, Green on St. Patrick’s Day, Pastel colors for Easter, and any other obnoxious things I can think of 😀