Madeline Fretz - Dear friends, as of today, we've reached 400 posts. That's right, folks, 400 posts about what made children's television great. Over the past two years, I've established myself as the #1 go-to site for Sprout fans. Okay, people, without further ado, let's take a look at some of the highlights of my 400 posts so far. Enjoy!
I first discovered the blogosphere with Big Bird Bridge, a blog dedicated to the Langhorne theme park Sesame Place created by noted theme park historian Guy Hutchinson. Big Bird Bridge, which hasn't posted since 2020, contained of posts about Sesame Place history - from former attractions to information about the ill-fated Tokyo park. I instantly fell in love with the blog.
 |
| A parent and a kid sharing together. |
PBS Kids Sprout launched on September 26th, 2005 as a joint venture between PBS, HiT Entertainment, Sesame Workshop, and Comcast. I, along with my sisters, was born in Richmond on September 21st two years later, and was (and still am) the only one in my family with autism. Back then, Sprout and I had nothing in common.
 |
| On the computer |
The first things I ever watched on TV were Baby Einstein videos, which I'm still a big fan of even at this age and even to this day. I first discovered Sprout when watching Caillou on my parents' bed. Needless to say, I was hooked. I grew up with Sprout, and was both hooked and scared. I even remember some things from watching the channel and going on its website that probably no one else remembers. However, it wasn't until 2015 (or was it 2014?) that I became a superfan, watching videos on YouTube, having fun on SproutOnline.com and Sprout apps, and sending in content. As much as I wanted to make a guest appearance on The Sunny Side Up Show and showcase my submissions, become a host even, I hosted a similar series in my elementary school. When I got older, I gathered more information on the history of Sprout - uploading videos on my then-new YouTube channel Playtime All the Time and editing as Maddiellabie on PBS Kids Sprout TV Wiki, founded in May 2019 by NeptuneID13.
I adored Sprout and constantly visited Big Bird Bridge, but there wasn't even a Sprout fan blog on the internet. In 2016, I, under my old account, founded a blog known as Let's Grow and started writing. Back then, there was Let's Grow, a YouTuber named after Sprout's original slogan who uploaded videos of rare Sprout content from Vimeo, Dailymotion, and Facebook, amongst other websites. There hasn't been a new Let's Grow video since 2018. I probably named the blog after him(her?) and wrote posts inspired by his(her?) videos. However, I abandoned the blog as time went by.
 |
| Me in 2020. |
My family moved from Richmond to Midlothian in 2018, and since then I've spent most of my life ... sad (a Debbie Downer, or so to speak). Since we moved, I've grown an obsession with CBeebies, the BBC's children's brand, and started uploading CBeebies videos on YouTube and even started a CBeebies wiki, now a wiki full of fake information. Many people on the internet have criticized me for many things, and the CBeebies wiki is one of them. I eventually migrated to PBS Kids Sprout TV Wiki. Nowadays, I regret starting that wiki. I became obsessed CBeebies because it, as well as other children's programs around the world, was similar in many ways to Sprout, and wrote a whole post about differences and similarities between the two this year.
The year was 2019 and I had launched a Twitter account (@TimePlaytime). As of 2020, the account is no longer up. On Twitter, I copied other people's tweets, mainly from other kids' TV fans. Once again, something many people have criticized me for. One of the things I tweeted about constantly was Sprout, once again obsessing over my childhood channel. The same year, I launched accounts on both Facebook and Instagram and uploaded Sprout videos on Playtime All the Time. I even called NBCUniversal to see if they could get Sprout back. This wasn't the first time I called them.
 |
| The first two images I uploaded on this blog. |
As 2019 became 2020, I was still obsessed with Sprout and wanted to express my fandom with the brand even more, so I started the blog you are on right now. While Let's Grow was named after Sprout's original slogan (and a YouTube channel I watched and took inspiration from constantly back then), Parents and Kids Share Together was named after an old Sprout tagline "Sprout, the 24-hour preschool channel parents and kids share together." My first post, a carbon(?) copy of Guy Hutchinson's first Big Bird Bridge post (right down to the title), was about why I started my blog - to connect kids' TV nowadays with kids' TV from when I was little.
As time went by, I created a custom crossover series known as Daniel Tiger and the Tweenies and a Sunny Side Up Show series starring my OC known as Kaitlin & Friends, and "abandoned" my blog. It wasn't until July 2020 that I would start writing on Parents and Kids again. My comeback post was a two-part one about the "complete" history of Sprout, mostly about the first and second generations. In December, I adapted the posts into a video on my YouTube channel. Back then, I wrote about the likes of old Sprout shows, old articles about Sprout, the "We Share" campaign, the Sprout Channel Cubby, and The Super Sproutlet Show, amongst other important parts of Sprout's history. In August, I wrote a post about Sprout's timeline which slowly became one of my most popular posts. If you know me, you know that I for some reason am a big fan of children's shows, but despite this, I hate certain children's shows, mostly ones that everyone else hates. One of those shows at the time was The Let's Go Show, and I even wrote a Let's Go Show hate post. Nowadays, I changed my mind about Let's Go and was one of many posts that I deleted. Inspired by the Sesame Place book from 2015, I started working on a Sprout book, which I've "published" this year and am hoping will become a real book (we need to find a publisher!).
In December 2020, I became an admin and started editing constantly on PBS Kids Sprout TV Wiki, once again abandoning the blog and only occasionally writing posts. This was around the time I wrote posts about articles from the Sprout Press Room and Sprout for Parents websites. In July 2021, I tried to revive Parents and Kids Share Together with a ToughPigs-inspired series known as "My Week with...," in which I would talk about a Sprout-related topic for a whole week. My first My Week was "My Week with 2010," in which I would focus on Sprout happenings from that year. I rarely do My Weeks nowadays.
My Week was a success, and I started writing on the blog more. One of my posts from around that time was about the history of The Sunny Side Up Show (this wasn't the first time I wrote about the history of Sunny). In August, I started high school, and the day before I wrote about my life as a Sprout fan, which is once again one of my most popular and personal favorite posts. In school, I wrote even more "My Weeks" and introduced a new Muppet Mindset-inspired series known as "Weekly Character Wednesdays," in which I would write about a certain Sprout character and his or her importance every wednesday. It's still going strong! My first weekly wednesday was on Mr. Mailman.
Also in September, my blog and I reached a major milestone - 200 posts. That day, I launched the Parents and Kids Share Together forum, which is still going strong, but I'm one of the only members.
In October, I introduced Sprout-tober, an Instagram challenge in which I would post a picture of or draw one of my Sprout favorites for every day of October - well, almost every day.
In November, I started The Great Sprout Survey, a series in which Sprout fans would talk about their favorite Sprout-related things. As time went by, I introduced a Sunny Side Up Show-inspired series known as When I Was a Sproutlet. Here's how to submit your answers to these series. And don't forget, you can write your own articles too!
Sprout's two longest-running blocks were The Good Night Show and The Sunny Side Up Show. I wanted to express my feelings on these blocks and have fans take a look at which one was better, so I wrote a post comparing the two and seeing which was better. At the end of the post, I explained why I wrote it. This is once again one of my favorite posts.
I grew an obsession with The Muppets (2011) and to a lesser extent the Muppet Show Muppets in general, giving me the idea to write a BIG Sprout fanfiction on the internet. In November, I published the fanfic online, and, on the blog, I wrote a post about the trailer and a post a day before releasing my story. "One Sleep to Go" slowly became one of my most popular posts. I released my fanfic on November 23rd, the tenth anniversary of the Muppet movie. As time went by, I started working on a sequel, and posted an announcement. As I've said here before, while I've always admired creative people, Parents and Kids Share Together isn't usually a place for fanfiction, but, since this was one of my biggest Sprout projects ever, I knew I just had to post about my fanfic. Nowadays, I'm working on making my fic a real movie.
I made my fanfic for one reason - I wanted Apple TV+ to revive Sprout and even started a petition, and, in order to do so, I wanted to get the old Sprout gang back together for a telethon to convince them to do so, which is what we do in the fanfic soon-to-be movie. On December 25th, a former Sprout employee whom I'm friends with on Facebook sent me the most amazing thing ever, which took my Sprout fandom to the next level. It seems like some of them really want Sprout back too. A day after, we took a vacation to New York for a few days, and I wrote about my experiences in one of my many, if not very few, non-Sprout posts.
And here we are now in 2022. As I said before, I've spent most of my new life depressed, wondering if they'll ever bring back my childhood (I even wrote and sang an original song about Sprout), and wrote a post about possible plans for Sprout's future. Some of my posts this year have included, but not limited to, Sprout Fan Memories, Sprout Fan Confessions, Early Installment Weirdness, Ten Years of The Super Sproutlet Show, The Girls of Sprout, Black History Month, Dennisha, Carly, Kaitlin, and Kelly, The ABCs of Sprout, proof the second generation started on September 21st, 2009, Nostalgic Field Trip, more posts about old articles, and even more posts about the history(histories?) of things. I even began to write about non-Sprout children's shows from outside the US, as, well, I'm a noted children's television historian. This was no ordinary year, as it was the year we 1. reached 300(!!!) posts; 2. turned two with a series of posts to commemerate(sp?).
And there you have it, Sprout fans and readers of this blog, that was the (almost) complete history of Parents and Kids. I hope you enjoyed this post, and keep reading! Without you, I would have never started this blog.
Oh, and besides, thanks for 400 Sprouterrific posts! Here's to 400 more!
No comments:
Post a Comment