Oh I should add that iMessage, if you can get the whole family on it, is killer for maintaining group chats. Really though, just having a group chat with the entire family on it is great. Especially if the app has Find My features where you can see where folks are. For the youngest tho, we use Facebook Messenger for Kids on Amazon fire tablets if they want to join in on video calls etc. Sadly there isn’t an all-in-one service that is also very child-friendly (and Fire tablet compatible to be kid proof)