My earliest memories of music are not of listening to Sesame Street's Greatest Hits or "Row, Row, Row Your Boat" over and over.
My earliest memories of music are of listening to a Genesis cassette tape in my mom's car- "That's All", listening to all the oldies from the 50's and 60's with my dad, and my grandmother turning up my uncle's Creedence Clearwater Revival record and us dancing around to "Bad Moon Rising".
I grew up on adult music, not kid music, and enjoyed every minute.
Because of it, I have a fondness for all kinds of music. Frank Sinatra to Patsy Cline to Buddy Holly to The Isley Brothers to the Steve Miller Band... you get the picture.
I've decided to follow the same route with my children. We listen to a little of everything- oldies, classic rock, country, pop, etc. Rosie loves the song with her name in it- "Smile a Little Smile for Me, Rosemarie" and Buddy seems to dig "Little White Church". I laugh when I see them dancing to Pharrell's "Happy" (how can you not dance to that?).
One of the mom bloggers I follow talks about having her kids' CDs on repeat and how she even found herself "rocking out" to "Wheels on the Bus" when she was alone in the car. I had to laugh because it is a funny image, but because that would never be me in a million years. Considering we live 30 minutes from just about anything, we're in the car a lot. The last thing I'm going to do is sit through 60+ minutes a day of kids' songs while I'm behind the wheel. No, thank you.
My kids are everything to me, but the whole world does not need to revolve around them. This includes the music we listen to in the car.
My children are not deprived entirely from kid music. I admit to having a kid music CD or two (not bought by me) that get thrown in the CD player in case of utter emergency (extremely long car trips, for example). It does make them happy- maybe because it's a "treat"? We also put on soundtracks in the house- "Mary Poppins", "Wizard of Oz" (the key there is that it has to be something I can stand to listen to). The kids and I sing on and off throughout the day- The ABC song and the like.
Music, all music, is a part of our every day life. I can't imagine not having it, and feel lucky to have it in so many different forms right at our fingertips. If Rosie's first music memory is of she and I singing "Call Me Maybe", I'll be more than alright with that. I'll be thrilled.
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