A dad on our forum related how he had made a video of his own son and baby to give to him for Father’s Day. Isn’t that about the best present you can get as a dad? These fatherhood years go by so quickly and all we all love to try to recapture the feelings we had through them. Videos made in iMovie or in Adobe’s Video Editing suite for PC can be the best Father’s Day gift of all.

Here is the video HDFree gave to his son and sent us:

Though I’m not a big country fan and I find “Let them be Little” by Billy Dean a little sugary sweet, it’s hard not to get a little teary listening to the lyrics that talk about how short childhood is.

We made a list of other good home movie songs, some of which, I’ve put below, but visit the link to see the rest. If you have other suggestions, add them to the comments section.

Some of those other suggestions:

Birth

Forever Young – Bob Dylan – I first heard this as a background music in an Apple ad explaining the joys of iMovie. It’s a wonderful song, full of wonderful wishes for a new born.

Where do the Childen Play by Cat Stevens – puts parenting versus other grand projects in perspective, and makes a darn nice soundtrack.

LongMayYou Run by Neil Young – If you like the raspy voice of a young Neil Young, and also edit out a few lyrics, (“back in ’62 when I last saw you alive”) this has a good beat and mood.

May you Never by Eric Clapton

Somewhere Over the Rainbow by Israel Kamakawiwo’ole – very soothing variation on the old standard, and if not overused, less clichéd than other more popular versions.

Crawling Babies

La Donna e Mobile – You’ll instantly recognize La donna è mobile (“Woman is fickle”) as the misogynistic song from Giuseppe Verdi’s opera Rigoletto (1851), Though you don’t need to consider that last part. Just use it as backdrop to a baby (preferably female) cruising around the house and you have instant soundtrack magic.

Everyday People by Sly

Family Stone Sweet Child of Mine by Sheryl Crow

Baby or Little Girls

Tupelo honey by Van Morrison by “She’s as sweet as Tupelo Honey” is all you need to know.

Blue Sky by The Allman Brothers

Rock-a-Hula Baby by Elvis Presley

I found this during my daily Google troll on the words “stay at home dad” and was introduced to the work of Jon Lajoie, a Canadian singer and comedian. Most of his other videos are funny, but are not meant for “General Audiences.” This one, however, is a crafty rap song with heavy metal guitar riffs on the life of a stay at home dad. Nothing new in here except that the production values and his sincerity belting out the lyrics (“I don’t do drugs. I get high on baby hugs.”) are impressive.

Other videos show his skill at touching introspective ballads that always take a salacious turn after a few verses. I have to admit to laughing out loud at some of them.

For some reason, perhaps because of the title, I thought Eagle Eye was a simple film about a drone surveillance airplane gone mad. There is a drone plane or two, but the movie is so much more than that. Directed by D. J. Caruso from a story by Steven Spielberg, and starring Shia Laboeuf (Transformers) and Michelle Monaghan (Mission Impossible 3), Eagle Eye is a high tech conspiracy movie that plays on your worst fears about how computers track our everyday move. It pits two unwitting innocents against the Department of Homeland Security when they are set up to be the agents of an assassination plot. Without giving too much away, this movie draws on the best of 2001, The Parallax View, and War Games.

The pyrotechnics here are stunning with some new car chase scene ideas you have definitely not seen before. A chase scene in the baggage handling routing system of an airport will have you twisting and turning as the main characters ride conveyor belts like a beaten up piece of old uggage. This is a movie that will keep your attention just because it does a few things not seen before

Dads will enjoy this action thriller, but Eagle Eye is not a movie for young kids. There is no sex and very little profanity, but there is a tremendous amount of chaotic violence and heart-pounding chase sequences. The plot action also involves death threats on a mom and her son if she doesn’t participate in the action.

Just in time to help you maximize the few minutes left before Christmas, here are the top 16 holiday movies captured in their most famous scenes.

This is just enough of a dose of some of them to make you fondly remember your first viewing and save you from a trip to the video store. Many of them, in my opinion, are a bit too cloying for re-viewing again now. And for cynics, read today’s excellent article in the New York Times on the sad dismal life of George Bailey in It’s a Wonderful Life. The writer, Wendell Jamieson, opines that the world would have actually been a better more prosperous place without George, citing his felony theft, upstate New York economic trends, and the dismal conformist life that George in which George is forced to find meaning. If you’re mumbling “bah” around this time of year, this is a fun article to read.

As I mentioned in a previous post, our family enjoyed the short 22 minutes Shrek the Halls for its brevity, slapstick and adult humor, and insight on the real meaning of Christmas (as Donkey says, “It’s not Christmas until somebody cries.”).

But back to the video. You may want to send this one from Grandparents.com on to friends and family.

Merry Merry.

This is amusing, but also makes me think of other funny videos we’ve laughed at with our kids. I’ll post more.

This video is meant to be viral – watch until the end for the serious message about the disappearance of bees. Scientists now think they have figured out the mystery, but do not know how to solve it.

The link at the end takes you to a Haagen Daz site, so important message on bees with a commercial sting if you act.

A tip of the hat to MEGO.com for finding this one.