Sweet Memories

Seeing all these YouTube videos of children dancing and singing to Frozen makes me think of my own childhood. My siblings and I (along with pretty much any friend we had over for a play date) owned the spotlight on our video camera. My dad was always great about letting us use it to record ourselves for hours. I think he knew there would be some gems in the footage that were sure to make an appearance with the intent of embarrassing us later on in life! We were hilarious and strange at times. To this day we still love to watch those videos of ourselves dancing, singing, acting, whatever it was. This lip syncing to your Disney princess ballad is not a new idea folks. I guarantee every little girl around my age did this with "Once Upon a Dream," "Belle" (the market place song), "A Whole New World," "Part of Your World," etc. Our parents just didn't have smart phones and instant upload onto a website to make us famous. I know we have enough hilarious footage from our childhood to win "America's Funniest Videos" at least twice. I'm not kidding. 

I also think my own children are darling and already super funny, but most of those moments I haven't captured on camera. They go into the vault of memories that Michael and I will share. If we're lucky, one of us will think to email the story or a picture to their email accounts for safe keeping. I want them to be able to know how cute they were. I often think, "Man this would be so funny to put on Facebook! It would surely be a hit on YouTube!" but at the end of the day I tend to choose to keep these sweet moments to myself and cherish living in the here and now with these little babes. This is not to say I won't post videos and gems when I catch them. If I think it's worth it, I will not hesitate to share! Who wouldn't want to be famous!? (I'm only half serious.) 

I wish I had access to some of my sibling videos in honor of "National Sibling Day." I'd love to slap one on here and make y'all laugh. We had a magical childhood - Heather, Preston, Bri, Ashleigh, Katelynn, Julie, Sarah, you know what I'm talking about. :) 

A First Time for Everything

Last Tuesday evening Michael and I joined the other Dallas area IM's and Julie Kendall from Corporate for dinner. It was great to get a dinner out of the house without bringing the babies, but that did mean leaving the kids with a babysitter for the first time. I was a bit nervous because it was during the "we should be getting ready for bedtime" hours for both Carmen and Brooks, but all in all, it went well! A good friend from Charlottesville has a life-long best friend living in Dallas who has an awesome teenage daughter. She was a delight and Carmen had an instant friend. I'm grateful for connections! 

Julie treated us all to dinner at Frankie's (our neighborhood favorite Mexican food) and it was, as always, delicious. The company was better though! I loved getting to meet Julie and seeing the faces of this IM program more. Julie is fantastic and I hope we get to meet again soon. It was also great to be at dinner with other IMs and listen to them all talk about their lives, struggles, and successes in the program so far. 

So now that I've had a small taste of "date night" while the kids are at home with a babysitter and I survived my nerves, I am ready for more! Who's ready to watch them for us?! 

(Thanks for the pic, Julie! I took it from your Facebook page. : )