Thursday, March 18, 2021

Once upon a time, a seven year old princess turned into this amazing young woman

Recently, my sister Shawn sent this pic of my 16 year old niece Sophia (holding her cat Flynn) and I asked “So Sophia is still wearing fake glasses as a fashion accessory?”

For as long as I can remember, my niece here who has perfect vision, perfect weight, perfect grades, perfect EVERYTHING has enjoyed wearing glasses to look… I dunno, a little more ordinary. 

Anyway, my sister told me I’d be happy to know her glasses were real, they were made to filter out blue light from various electronic devices Sophia spends so much time in front of; her smartphone, tablet, her laptop for school.  Ah, ok.  

I feel like such an old-timer sometimes, how in the world did we grow up without all the contraptions we take for granted today?  Last night I watched a video on Youtube “The Dial Comes to Town”, a 1940 instructional video from Bell Telephone on how to dial the new telephones.  “Instead of hearing an operator say ‘Number please’ you will hear what we like to call… a dial tone!”   One local teen is excited:  “It’s about time, our candlestick phone is positively prehistoric!”   (She got that right!)

Meanwhile, Gramps insists there’s too many gadgets to fuss with as it is.  (Not to worry, he comes around at the end.)  And the irony of all this is… today’s kids don’t know how to use a dial phone either.  They don’t need to, they’re busy constructing various devices for NASA missions to Mars! 

Wait, where the heck was I even going with this?  Oh yeah, my niece Sophia here!  Seeing this picture of Sophia, and the twinge of guilt I got recently for posting a Randy Rainbow music video on my blog (it’s his creation, not mine) made me think of a music video I once made for Sophia, when she was 7 years old and enjoyed dressing up as a princess… and her Uncle Doug was a litle more familar with technology.

I shared it on my blog then, 9 years ago…  I thought I’d share it again.  If you watch it, just a warning:  this is from 2012, I had no smartphone or movie apps then, just a Kodak digital camera and Windows Editor on my prehistoric computer!

32 comments:

  1. Bravo! Bravo! Bravo! Do it again, Doug. This is truly amazing. I loved every minute of it.

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    1. Thanks Gigi, you're very kind! Coming from you (I know how you love musicals & the theater) that's a real compliment. Maybe someday I will try this again :^)

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  2. Wow, what a delight and so well done. Doug you are a really creative lad that definitely should do more of those.

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    1. Thanks Patti, that was me being an Easter ham ;^) But I do appreciate the kind words!

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  3. Very creative, Doug! Patti is spot on! You should resume film production!

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    1. Thank you Florence! Haha, film production! Maybe I will :)

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  4. That was simply awesome! I really enjoyed it.

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  5. What a fun video. When you are young and wear glasses you look cool, as you grow old and need them, they look less cool. Sigh.

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    1. Haha! Thank you Joe, and your wry observation here gave me a chuckle--so true. :^)

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  6. ha! ha! Hi Doug, that was great. The video made me laugh and so brightened my day:)

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    1. Aw Sue, that was very nice of you--thank you. :)

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  7. How wonderful this is! You are so creative and talented to make this and I can imagine how happy it must have made 7 year old Sophia! You should consider making more videos. The possibilities with just a smart phone are probably endless!

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    1. Bonnie, thanks so much! I've often thought of getting a smartphone, but I'd have a lot of catching up to do! (Meanwhile, you should see some of the videos my niece has made with hers) :^0 Thanks again!

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  8. Laurie, thank you--very kind! She is one little girl who grew up a little too fast :^|

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  9. Wow, she is a gorgeous young lady. You did a marvelous job; I was making videos back in those days and it was NO picnic. Any video that starts with Neuschwanstein is perfect in my opinion. :)

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    1. Haha thanks very much Margaret--you threw me for a minute there with the long name of that castle! :^)

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  10. I LOVE the video :)
    Is that your voice (not someone else dubbed in?)
    It's a very nice voice.

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    1. Thanks River! No that's not my voice but I wish it was; it was Richard Burton, I was just lip-syncing along :^)

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  11. Loved the video too, Dug! And I find it wonderful that you did all that for your little niece. She is adorable (then and now). My youngest grand daughter is 7 and is into the princess from Frozen. Wears that outfit all the time! (which is strange in some ways as when she isn't dressed as a princess, she's off with her dad (Herpetologist) catching snakes in the parks.)

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  12. She's Beautiful and my Granddaughter wears fake glasses as a fashion accessory and to look 'smarter'??? *LMAO*

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    1. Thanks Bohemian, and I'm glad to hear another young person out there accessorizes with specs too. And hey, I think girls in glasses do look smarter! :)

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  13. I certainly enjoyed your video (not quite as much as Randy's, but still) and think you definitely deserve kudos for your 9-year-old attempt! Thanks for sharing it. :-)

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    1. Thanks DJan! Well, I know there's no comparison to Randy's but his was made for the world to see and mine was only meant for one 7 year old girl :^) I can't believe I shared it on here, let alone twice haha.

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  14. A few years back I was at a museum here in town that has a rotary dial telephone and I overhead two pre-teens discussing what it might be. That is when I knew I was old.

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    1. Haha--Ed I believe it. I saw a video on youtube, 2 teens with a dial phone, they knew what it was but didn't know how to work it. :^)

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  15. Love your blog! Love the video! What a great memory!

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  16. Good grief, Doug! I could swear I wrote a comment on this post a while ago and I don't see it. I keep forgetting to check when I use my iPad to write comments. It is not reliable. Dang it!

    Anyway, I just wanted to let you know I was totally impressed with this video you made for your lucky niece! You are the absolute BEST uncle ever! And you are a techie genius too! Totally blown away!

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    1. Thanks Kay, you're way too kind! But even if you hadn't commented, I don't expect you to respond to every post--you have like 400 bloggers in your Blog Family :) Anyway, very sorry about your recent injury and sure hope you're back on your feet soon! :^)

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