Disney Magic … in Mayberry!

Since it’s already been established that Sarah Kate is the Most Awesome Kid in the World, the next logical step would be to ask her, “What are you gonna do now that you’re the Most Awesome Kid in the World?” but since she became the Most Awesome Kid while at Walt Disney World, the answer really can’t be “I’m going to Disney World!”

So Disney came to us.

Not Disney World, but Bob Hitchcock, PR Manager/Content Producer for runDisney, and Scott Henderson, videographer. Sarah Kate’s story got such a reaction that runDisney wanted to do a little feature on her for their IrunDisney.com website and social media channels.

They arrived on Thursday afternoon and began filming Sarah Kate “training” in our neighborhood, with me running alongside her for encouragement and to keep time. I tried to remember to keep my belly sucked in but I forgot most of the time, so there’s that…

I think Sarah Kate got bonus points for wearing New Balance running shoes, as New Balance is a sponsor of the runDisney race series. We weren’t sucking up, I promise – she wears them all the time.

We ran along behind their vehicle, used as a dolly. We ran toward the camera, we ran away from the camera, we ran along with the camera. Every possible angle was shot and every possible distance was used. Sarah Kate was tired, but she kept it up.

At one point during the filming, she tripped, but Scott wasn’t filming at that moment. Bob made an offhand remark about how he wished they’d gotten it because it was a part of her story. She got back up and kept going. I half-joked that if we kept going long enough it would happen again.

 It happened again.

We were moving away from the camera at that point, so I’m not sure how great that clip will be – Sarah Kate’s got a pretty good booty, but not sure we want that shot in the finished piece. 😉

After they filmed us in the neighborhood training, the whole family went down to the pier to do “family stuff”. It’s not unusual for us to go to the pier together, but it’s not something we do every day (or even every week), either, although  we did wonder amongst ourselves why we don’t go down there more often.

We stayed at the pier until sunset (seriously, people, the sunsets across Mobile Bay from the Mayberry pier are unbelievable!) and then went back to the house for the interviews.

Sarah Kate went first.

I was banished to the other room so that my presence wouldn’t influence her answers (at least, I think that’s why). I tried to listen at the door, but the dogs were with me and Stella was breathing so loud I couldn’t hear over her (stoopid dog!) When Sarah Kate finished, they summoned me and I sat down next to her (no, the chairs don’t match – we didn’t have good chairs for the interviews because the dining chairs all were too large or too tall).

Bob interviewed me alone first, instructing me not to acknowledge Sarah Kate’s presence for the first round of questions. After the first question, he said, “You might want to think about being more concise.”

LOL! That sounded about right.

After my individual interview, we were interviewed together, which made me happy because I could smile at Sarah Kate and squeeze her if I wanted. 🙂  I was so impressed with her and how well she did – very comfortable and not intimidated at all! Her hair didn’t look great, though – sorry, Nana! – because we’d been out in the wind at the pier for an hour and I forgot to fix her up. Oops.

On Friday morning, they filmed her at school.

First, they filmed her at her desk with several of her classmates, working on a science project. After that, they moved outside to shoot her with kids from the running club at “practice”. In the photo below she’s way in the back wearing pink.

She completed two laps of the one-sixth mile track while they filmed, which was on top of the five laps she’d done earlier in the day during P.E. Some of the kids ran alongside her, while others did their own thing as instructed.

After the filming was over, we said our goodbyes to Bob and Scott. If all goes well with Sarah Kate’s surgery and rehab this summer, she’ll attempt the mile at Disney again during the Wine & Dine Half Marathon weekend. We promised Bob that we’d let him know and get together if she does.

The video will be on the IrunDisney.com website, most likely sometime in May. We’ll get an advance preview of it a few days beforehand – we won’t be able to share it until it’s ready for the public, but we will get a heads up on when it’s going live.

Maybe we’ll use it as a demo for our reality series… 😉