Installing Philips Hue lights throughout my home

Introduction

I had bought some Philips Hue lights for my living room a while ago.  I had also bought some cheapo GE versions of the lights for my kitchen that is so flaky, sometimes only 7 out of the 8 lights come on.  Anyway, there was a recent Visa Checkout $25 off $100 offer on Bestbuy.com.  And I had some BBY gift cards from the AMEX Offers a while back.  So bored, I went browsing around the BB site and wound up buying a Hue motion detector and 6 more Hue lights for my bedroom.

Bedroom

For the bedroom, I installed 2 nightstand Hue bulbs and 4 LED Hue dome lights.  This also meant I needed an Amazon Echo dot for the room.  I was going to buy another motion control unit for the bedroom but that made no sense.  The only annoying thing is that now when I walk into the bedroom, I have to say “Echo Bedroom On” vs just flipping a switch.  However, because I no longer have to get up and turn off the lights when I’m already toasty in bed, that benefit outweighs the Echo inconvenience.

Hallway

I was going to put another Hue motion controller in my hallway, but I found out these existed – motion controlled LED flood lights.  This was an awesome revelation because I didn’t really need Hue lights after all, and they are much cheaper than Hue lights too!  After a few weeks with them, my only complaint is that the bulb has an off-putting 3000K color spectrum.  I would have preferred a 2700K or even more yellow than that.  I’m still undecided if I want to keep these bulbs or not.

Outside

Since I was in a lighting kick, I found out this now exists as well.  Since I’m lazy and I’m electrically challenged, I didn’t want to install a new light switch to turn on my patio lights at night.  Hence, my patio is usually dark at night although I’d prefer them to be lighted.  Anyway, I tried a different light that didn’t work out so well, so I have these coming in to test out.

Conclusion

All of these lighting upgrades aren’t necessary, but they do make my life easier.