I Wish I Knew What Time It Was

December 29, 2018 5:44 PM

I am looking for a new digital clock to go in our baby's nursery, so I know what time I am doing feedings at. Please help me find a good one.

The last digital clock I bought off Amazon was terrible and almost impossible to program, so I'm looking for suggestions. I want a biggish display (I am moderately near-sighted but don't put on my glasses when feeding the baby), I prefer blue/green/white display colour to red, I want to be able to see the display in the dark and the light, and one that is battery and plug-in would be great. A bonus would be if it served as a nightlight of some pleasing sort. I don't need it to be a smart clock of any kind - I just need it to tell me what time it is. I've got $100 CDN in Amazon.ca gift cards, so that is my budget, though I'm hoping I can get one much cheaper.

posted by just_ducky to Home & Garden (6 answers total)

I haven't had a bedside clock for many a year now (I just use my phone) but as a kid I had one of those cuboid Sony Dream Machine units and it lasted me throughout my entire childhood despite being hit a lot and knocked off the table a lot and generally just abused. Sadly they're no longer in production, but good-condition used ones seem to still be available. I kinda doubt you can do better than one of those little guys—they were seriously built to last in a way that consumer electronics rarely are, and they do everything you'd need a bedside clock to do.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:47 PM on December 29, 2018 [1 favorite]

Oh, I see now that you prefer a green or blue display though. The linked item has a red display. For some reason in my memory mine had a green display, but perhaps I am just misremembering. Or perhaps there were both green and red variants, I'm unsure.
posted by Anticipation Of A New Lover's Arrival, The at 6:50 PM on December 29, 2018

We have the Sony ICFC-1 because it had the dimmest display we could find. The numbers are orange. We don't use the alarm or radio functions, but as far as I can tell they work. It also knows about daylight saving which is handy (a baby significantly raises the stakes of daylight saving!).

It doesn't have a nightlight. For that, we got this three pack of touch lights. It's great being able to move them around and attach them to vertical surfaces (bookcase, feeding caddy shelf, etc.) with sticker magnets. Again the appealing thing for us was that they get very dim (which is important if you're trying to change a baby without completely waking it up, for example). With our use we changed the batteries about once a week, so we got rechargable batteries and a charger. (This probably sounds like a hassle, but if you don't already have a rechargable battery setup, then trust me, you're going to want one in a year or so once baby has electronic toys.)
posted by caek at 7:59 PM on December 29, 2018

Here's a plug in thermometer/clock/night light that changes color according to temperature. "Normal" room temperatures would have the night light glow in the blue - green range. The clock feature is smaller than the temp. display, unfortunately, but I have super bad vision and it still works ok for me without glasses.
posted by gudrun at 11:23 AM on December 30, 2018

May I suggest a projection clock of some sort? It’s been a few years since my kids were babies, but when they were small I remember it being very convenient to just look up at the ceiling to see what time it was. Something like this.
posted by Agent X9 at 3:51 PM on December 30, 2018

If you're willing to consider analog clocks, Marathon make some nice analog clocks with illuminated dials. I own two - a jumbo wall clock (model CL030057BK-WH1) and a smaller bedside table version (model CL030053BK/WH), and am pretty pleased with both. In terms of fitting your needs:

1) They are easy to "program" - you set the time by turning a little knob.
2) The illumination is sufficient for night-time visibility, but is not quite bright enough to qualify as a night-light. I note that I own the models which have white dials - I suspect the versions with black dials are probably less legible at night.
3) The jumbo wall clock is powered by a AA battery (for the clock function) plus two C-cell batteries (for the illumination function). The bedside clock is powered by two AA batteries.
4) Both are available on Amazon and are within your budget.
posted by yours in calendrical heresy at 5:30 AM on January 1, 2019