Know any good songs? Write them into your story – NaPoWriMo Day29

My youngest daughter is playing Wii Rock Band, hoping to hit the expert level on lead guitar. She tells me, “So now I know all these old songs.” Oh. I’d been enjoying all the great music banging out of my living room. Guess I’m an old rocker now.

Are there any songs that have special meaning to you? Besides wedding day songs, music from college days and younger seem to carry the most memories. Think way back to when you were little—what children’s songs do you remember? I have a 45rpm record, made in a little booth similar to those photo booths in the malls, that carries my and my sister’s scratchy voices singing “I’m a Little Acorn Brown” and a Japanese children’s song, “Ame Ame,” about rain. Our mother taught us just a few Japanese songs which my sister and I now treasure. I included those songs in my mother’s memoir. Some are on audio under the Cherry Blossoms book tab above. If you’re writing stories of your childhood, think about including a few songs, ditties, jump rope sing-songs—a little bit of music history. Fudge, fudge, call the judge.

Sing a little song
Of six pence or a dime,
Reminding us of childhood
In a little rhyme.
Sing it to your children,
Sing out all the lines,
Let it come alive again
To keep it for all time.

PS: Technology changes, so if you have video or audio tapes of important family moments, remember to transfer to the newer technology before it’s too late. What am I going to do with that 45 record!?

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Remembering your own royal wedding – NaPoWriMo Day28

Doesn’t every bride feel like a princess in her wedding dress? If she doesn’t, maybe she needs to read How Not to Marry the Wrong Guy before it’s too late. William was careful, dating Kate for eight years, and the lovely young lady seems so poised in the spotlight and ready to take on the role of future queen. Who’s going to get up early to watch the wedding? Not me! (But I do want to see the dress.)

What do you remember most about your wedding day? Mine was hot! But it was the look on my about-to-be-husband’s face that melted me. I can still see it in the old photos.

Hope is reflected
In the faces of bride and groom
As they promise their futures,
Bound by golden rings
In forever circles of love.

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Capture proud parent moments with a scrapmoir – NaPoWriMo Day27

I’m usually proud of my kids, but sometimes I’m extra proud. Tonight my eighth-grade daughter put on a nice dress and pretty shoes (oh my gosh!) and walked across a stage to accept her Gold-N award for high grades throughout her middle school career. Yes, her daddy and I were proud, but most striking to me was seeing my child suddenly looking like a beautiful young lady ready for high school. Yikes! All the parents were snapping photos to document the moments of their own pride, and probably, like us, their astonishment at seeing how good their kid cleaned up.

What will you do with your special photos? Scrapbooking memoirist, Bettyann Schmidt, posts her ideas of saving pieces of life, not just photos, on the Women’s Memoirs website. Instead of making a sterile, wordless photo album or even scrapbooking with brief explanatory notes, she writes a little story besides the photos for a short, written remembrance of who is in the photo, or what happened and how she felt about it. I want to do this, especially for my kids. Read one of my favorite Bettyann scrapmoir posts and download her new, free Scrapmoir writing book at the Women’s Memoirs website. No, you don’t have to be a woman to do this; sensitive, thoughtful dads can make a scrapmoir, too – a simpler, manly version.

Look at her!
Skinny legs now shapely
Beneath a flowery frock
Showing off a figure
That looks brand new to me.

She tosses back long bangs
To look me in the eye
And I see the child’s face
Fading into the past,
An old photo in a new album.

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