One thing our family has come to enjoy on Friday evenings is family videos. My children love watching themselves as little kids and as parents we love watching those moments that have slipped away as our kids have grown. Now getting any pictures or videos is like pulling teeth. So, if you have a camera, video recorder or even write things down, take time to capture the moments with your family.
Enjoy the moments when you were their entire world, their superhero. Once they hit those teen years you become the annoying, embarrassing one who they love but don’t always want to be seen with.
Enjoy the moments you can hold them, hug them and tickle them for a thousand giggles. Before long they become too cool for hugs and too big to sit on your lap (although my six-foot-tall son still does once in a while).
Enjoy the moments when they don’t need anyone, but you and they want to spend all their time with you. As they grow older their friends, boyfriends/girlfriends or job soon becomes their time.
It’s interesting the things we can learn from watching videos of ourselves and our families. Things we did that helped our children’s growth or things we wish we could have don’t differently. I was lucky to be able to raise my children as a stay-at-home mom and we have plenty of video that has captured those moments. Things my children did that we laugh about with tears in our eyes and times we say, ‘I can’t believe I let you do that while I was recording’. There are moments I don’t remember and other times I vividly remember with all the feelings and what we were doing.
I have three children five years about and one time my oldest asked how I managed to keep order and give the right amount of attention to each of them when they were together. I said I really don’t know I just did, and it worked. I think that’s the part of woman’s multi-tasking kicking in as a mom. While recording I tried to catch the moments of one or two children and what they were doing and talk with the other ones outside the view of the video at the same time. Of course, the laughs or ‘gee mom thanks’ come into sound when I am recording one and the other says mom look or mom listen and although I am listening, I’m not recording them as they want. The moments we learn we are not perfect parents, but we did our best and they are happy.
I also have learned through the videos how important it was what I did with them that shaped them today. All my children love music and not just one type but a good variety of old and new. They like to have music playing in the background while in the shower, doing schoolwork or just because. While watching videos my oldest again made a good observation. In well over 80% of the videos I always had music playing in the background. It was more Christian or classical then what is played today but there was music. To me I was just using it to keep a calm atmosphere in the home and to stimulate their minds with something other than T.V. I like watching T.V. enough but never really during the day and I never wanted it to become a babysitter for my kids. They had their programs they liked as they got older but for my family it was about doing things together and using our creativeness for entertainment. More moments we have lost as they are now young adults living their lives with college, work and friends. But the surprise was the impact just having that constant of music has played in their lives. And even though they are older they still like family time. We might not have it as often but on weekends we still try to plan things together as a family and they want to be part of that even if it has to include their boyfriends/girlfriends or friends.
Small simple moments as kids and those moments have made such big impacts on them and left footprints to treasure in our hearts forever. My three children still live at home but two are in their twenties and my youngest only a couple years from graduation. We still are able to capture moments on camera but rarely on video. No matter the season my husband and I are in, we treasure each moment and have permanent smiles when they are all with us talking and enjoying the time together and not off in their own million directions.
Capture the times with your children because each time will only last but a moment and yes when you blink they will be all grown up.
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