The Birth Of Lily Calls!
I’m incredibly excited to finally release Lily Calls after months of development and testing.
This project is very close to my heart. Last year, my Grandad passed away unexpectedly, and my Nan was left to navigate life on her own. Before long, she became increasingly lonely and forgetful. Each day, our conversations began to revolve around reminders—“Did you take your tablets?”, “Did you remember to do X?.”
I started trialling Lily Calls with my Nan to help with the everyday reminders. But something lovely happened—Lily became more than just a helper. She became a companion. Someone my Nan could chat to, reminisce with, and share stories from years gone by. I’ve since evolved Lily from a simple AI reminder system to an AI companion, which learns with every conversation.
If Lily could help just one other family, I would be over the moon!
Where it started
As I mentioned, I originally created Lily as a simple reminder system — and it worked really well. Each day, my Nan would get a phone call reminding her about things she often forgot, like taking her tablets.
But Lily wasn’t just your typical reminder system. Behind the scenes, it was powered by state-of-the-art artificial intelligence. Instead of a basic yes/no response, I, as the carer, would receive an email like: “Barbara has taken her tablets this morning but she’s running low.” It wasn’t just about confirming tasks — it provided real, meaningful updates.
Improvements
Send messages
The reminders worked brilliantly, but I often needed to send one-off messages like “Don’t forget the casserole in the fridge” — and I didn’t want those added as daily reminders, since, sadly, there’s not always casserole in the fridge. So, I added the ability to send one-off messages. It’s been a real lifesaver for me; there’s often something I need to relay when I can’t — either because she’s in bed, I’m at work, or I might just forget myself!
Receiving messages
With one-off messages, I also wanted my nan to be able to send messages back to me. So now, at the end of each call, Lily asks if she has anything she’d like to relay — if she does, I get an email with her message.
Interests
My nan really enjoyed talking to Lily — she’d often laugh and have a great experience — and I wanted to make it even better. I figured it made sense to let Lily know about the things my nan was interested in, so she could steer the conversation toward those topics. It worked really well, and now Lily can even pick up on new interests from their conversations and save those for future calls.
Personalisation
One of the most important features I’ve added recently is the ability for a carer to describe their loved one’s life. This gives Lily a chance to truly step into their shoes and understand them on a deeper level. It’s had a profound impact on how meaningful the conversations have become and it’ll only improve as time goes on.
Where it’s going
The goal is to get as many people using this with their loved ones — to keep them more engaged and to give them an extra conversation in their day. A lot of people live alone and experience deep loneliness, my nan included. Lily offers an extra phone call, another friendly voice, and one more reason to smile. There’s many more improvements in the pipeline, the more users we get the more we will learn!