Storytimebox
A ~$30 audio player that plays stories — built for my kids.
I built an audio player for my kids recently. The box contains a Raspberry Pi, lots of wires, some colorful buttons, a small LCD screen, and a handful of other bits and bobs that when combined create magic. It's loaded up with episodes from Storytime with Dad, which my kids have really been enjoying lately.
Building all of this pulled from my interests in electronics, system design, and delighting my young kids. They love being able to choose and play a story themselves — and I can leave them with it knowing they won't end up with ads or anything inappropriate.
How it works
Inside is a Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W, a little amplifier and speaker, a small display that scrolls the story title, and three big buttons — previous, play, next. It contains about 100 stories. It even auto-loads new releases. Every night it quietly checks the Storytime with Dad feed, downloads anything new, evens out the volume so nothing's ever too loud or too quiet, and adds it to the shelf. By morning there's a new story waiting.
I can also manage it from a small web dashboard — browse the whole library, play or remove a story, and dig through the full back-catalog to pick what downloads next. It's the part that makes it feel like a real little system instead of a one-off gadget.
The guts:
- Raspberry Pi Zero 2 W
- A little I2S amp + 4Ω speaker (behind a hand-drilled grille)
- A 16×2 character display that scrolls the title
- Three chunky buttons — ⬅️ prev · play · next ➡️
- A nightly RSS fetch, loudness-normalized
- About $30 in parts — versus $80–200 for the commercial boxes, most of which want an app and a subscription
The best part
It's also battery powered. Immediately after I gave it to them, they curled up on the couch together to listen to The Three Little Pigs. They even brought it to listen during their showers. How fun! How cute!
I did tell them it doesn't replace bedtime stories with us — which we all agreed is special, and should stay sacred.
What's next
I could see loading it up with music like KPOP Demon Hunters, or longer audiobooks like Harry Potter or Dragon Masters — we'll see how it goes. I also realized the whole concept is basically a reinvented iPod. But I love it, and so do my kids.