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Our first video venture

In May 1990, Lin Sue Cooney (then Shepherd) from 12News heard about a group of moms who had recently started a magazine for parents. She came out to my home, sat on the floor in my son's nursery-turned-office and interviewed me and co-founders Teresa Immerman and MaryAnn Ortiz-Lieb. Talk about real life: I had to interrupt the interview at one point to referee a squabble between my two sons, then 2 and 4.

Before Lin Sue left my house, she wrote out a $12 check for a subscription. A friendship was forged that continues to this day. A few years later, she, MaryAnn and I got together over lunch to ponder an idea: creating a TV version of the information we provided each month in the magazine. At first, I would go down to the station every Friday to do a taped stand-up during which I'd talk about family events coming up that weekend. In the segment's next evolution, I'd write scripts that condensed some of our story topics, which Lin Sue would read on the air — often while holding up various props that related to the topic.

The final evolution — and where we are today — came about seven years ago, when Lin Sue called me excitedly with the news that the station would be assigning us a photojournalist so that we could help produce actual segments with video footage. Writer/Producer Vicki Balint from our team now sets up the interviews and accompanies 12News photojournalists as they happen. — Karen Barr, Publisher & Editor