I have always believed that a child that sings all the time is a really happy child. I love hearing my daughter sing with her headphones on. As I walked down the hall the other night calling her name (and she wasn't answering) before I could get to her room I realized immediately that she wasn't hearing me because she had the headphones on and was singing at the top of her lungs. Of course, I stopped right outside and just listened for a few minutes. It is one of her very favorite CD’s. It is the “Summer Splash Party Hits” CD that we purchased for $1 that she just had to have! I tried to explain to her that “true” it had some songs on it that she really liked, but that they were sung by different people that we had never heard before, which is why it was only $1. Well now we own it and we take it almost every time we go anywhere in the car or truck (much to my teenage son, Taylor’s, mega protests!!) and she sings as loudly as possible “I…..WAN-NA SOAAAK UP THE SUUUUNNN…. I WANT TO TELL EVERY- OOONNNNE TOOO LIGHTTTT-ENNEN UP” and every time I hear her little voice sing it fills my heart with joy and nothing else in the world matters except how happy I know she is at that moment. Another one of her favorites is “I Can See Clearly Now" which was also one of my step-dad’s favorite songs, so I think about how much I really miss him whenever I hear it (he committed suicide in October of 1996, I only wish he would have hung around long enough to hear her sing the darn song for him! That’s another blog for another day!). Her favorite song on the CD is “Cruel Summer” so when I hear her sing that, I think of the movie “Karate Kid” and some really fun times with my friends. Good old "Bananarama"! The other song is “Summer Nights” from the "GREASE" Movie Soundtrack so now we also own the movie (thanks to Grandma Joan for buying it for her at Christmas time) and the option that it has for her to just watch all the music parts, which she does quite often singing loudly and trying to mimic every dance move while she does. From the time she was about 4 years old until she was about 6 years old, whenever we would stop to use a public restroom, I would be standing outside the stall waiting for her and she would be singing at the top of her lungs. The other women would just walk by me and smile or say “oh how cute!” She doesn’t do it in the public restrooms as much anymore, but here at home, we all know when Abrianna is in the bathroom!

So I’d have to say that Abri has been pretty good about figuring out the correct words to most songs. Taylor, on the other hand is a little bit “off”. Okay, he’s a lot “off” when he tries to figure out the words to songs! For example, the song titled “Escape” or as most people know it as “The Pina Colada Song” (also on the Summer Splash Party hits) was hilarious the first day we put that CD in to listen to it. As I began to sing the words to the song when it started (yes, as much as I hate to admit I know the words and kind of like the song) the part came on where it goes “IF YOU LIKE PINA COLADAS” and Taylor (who will be so mad at me if he reads this blog) starts singing “IF YOU LIKE ME….. KISS YOUR MOTHER…..” and at first I couldn’t understand for sure if that was what he was really singing, so I waited, and sure enough that was it and I just busted up laughing and said “Taylor, do you want to know the real words to the song?” and he was like “what are you talking about?” so when I told him what they really were, then all three of us got a pretty good laugh at it. And if you aren’t laughing or smiling right now, then I guess you just had to be there!

My kids also love Queen, especially “We Are the Champions” they get into the whole slap slap clap as they slap their thighs twice and then clap. Rob & I just look at each other and smile as they sing “YOU GOT MUD ON YOUR FACE….BIG DISGRACE…..” (The slap slap clap part I think they picked up from an “ICarly” episode but it just adds to how much fun it is to hear and watch them sing the song!). Okay so to make it fair to poor Taylor that I “dissed” him in my blog (as he would say), then I’ll tell you my story which happens to involve another Queen song “Another One Bites the Dust”. I know by this point, my mom is already laughing because she knows exactly what I’m talking about. See my version of the song went something like this....dun dun dun “ANOTHER ONE BUYS A DATSUN (dun dun dun) ANOTHER ONE BUYS A DATSUN AND ANOTHER ONE’S GONE AND ANOTHER ONE’S GONE…..ANOTHER ONE BUYS A DATSUN….HEY! YOU BETTER GET ONE TOO….ANOTHER ONE BUYS A DATSUN”

Summer Splash Party Hits CD = $1, hearing your kids sing their favorite songs = PRICELESS!!