A Family that Plays (music) Together...

One of my most favorite memories as a child was lying in bed at night and hearing my mom make popcorn in the kitchen and listening to my dad play guitar.  As the popcorn smell drifted upstairs I'd hear my dad tuning up for some golden oldies.  The Beatles were really big in our house.  In fact, I consider myself a "Beatle Baby" as I'm sure John, Paul, George and Ringo serenaded me from the ol' turntable as my mom rocked me to sleep.  As the corn popped, and my mouth watered, my parents would usually break into some kind of song.  He'd start by warming up  his guitar with a little ditty I loved called "Alice's Restaurant."  And then, at some point they always seemed to sing "Brown Eyed Girl."  Mom, would be melting butter and singing harmony from the kitchen..... "Do you remember when.... we used to sing...Sha-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la-la- dee-da- la-dee-da...brown eyed girl"  I usually sang along quietly,  trying to match my moms notes.  I liked that we were both harmonizing with dad, it was kind of  like my own little secret.   I remember thinking if the song were "Blue Eyed Girl" it could have been about me.  I still pretended it was anyway. 

I took piano lessons for many years, played in the marching band, sang in various choirs and singing groups. One of my younger brothers took up piano and guitar too.  I wonder how many hours we spent on our big upright?  It was my Grandma's piano and the one my dad learned to play on too.  Every now and then dad would come in and plop down on the bench beside me and I knew it was time to get serious.  It was CHOPSTICKS time!!!  Sometimes I would play the top, and sometimes the bottom...but the goal of our chopsticks duet was not to make beautiful music... nope, it was to see who could be clever enough to mess up the other persons rhythm.  For a long time I was the underdog, but over the years was able to trip up good old dad a few times too.  This past Christmas our Gracie and her PaPa had their first "Chopsticks Showdown" I tried downloading a short 35 second video of them,  but for some reason blogger wasn't allowing me to.  Suffice it to say Gracie will be the underdog for a while too...but PaPa better watch out because she's feisty!

As I watched my dad and daughter duke it out on the keyboard it brought back so many fond memories of our little den with the big piano on Channing Ave.  I love that my kids will now have some of the same memories too.  Our son Dboy,  has followed in his PaPa and Uncle's footsteps and become a pretty darn good guitar player.  I'm thinking it sure would be fun to have "Alice's Restaurant" played in our house too.  We'll have to get Pa Pa workin' on that next.



This is by far and away one of my favorite Christmas pictures from this past year.  Dboy on guitar, PaPa rockin the bass, and Gracie tickling the ivories with some "Joy to the World" and "Deck the Halls."  It made me really glad that I grew up in a house with lots of music. And even more glad that my kids are too. Oh, and I saved the best for last....sometimes my parents would let me and my brothers come downstairs and join them for popcorn.  Even on a school night!!  Now that really was music to our ears.