What do you get when you pair up a college basketball player and an Instagram influencer?
A love story for the ages, some adorable kids, and a wildly entertaining social media sensation.
Enter The Ace Family, one of the hottest channels on YouTube.
Here's what you probably don't know about them.
"I remember saying, 'Either I'm gonna be single forever, or I need to meet the one and it
needs to happen soon.'"
Former basketball star Austin McBroom said that he knew he had something special with
Catherine Paiz right from the very beginning, although he joked that it was Paiz who was
the one who was immediately smitten.
He told Power 106 Los Angeles,
"We met at a little like party dinner thing, all white, little party dinner.
Got there, shook her hand, and she was thinking about me ever since."
After a first date dinner at Nobu, things started to look serious for McBroom, but it
took Catherine a little bit longer to warm up.
Still, they kept seeing each other and it wasn't long before Austin confessed his love.
Catherine, who was still getting her bearings in the new relationship, remembered,
"I wasn't used to that to be honest."
"Why not?"
"I just wasn't used to like, things happening so quick, and things being so real so quick."
McBroom added,
"Yo, our relationship was quick."
While Austin had deep feelings for Catherine from day one, she was less optimistic about
the future of their relationship.
"How long did you think our relationship would last when we first started dating?"
In a Q+A video, Catherine revealed she didn't think the relationship would ever have lasted
as long as it had, confessing,
"And this is the thing, this is the reason why…"
"That's not good."
"It's because…"
"That's not good to think about."
"...when we met…"
"That's not good!"
"...every single relationship leading to that point has always ended."
She added,
"So my initial thought was it's probably not going to last, just because every other time
hasn't."
She also revealed,
"And I was at the point of my life where I was like 'I think I'm going to be single forever.'"
McBroom thought that that negative attitude could have actually ended up sabotaging their
relationship, but Catherine insisted that would have been impossible, adding,
"I really do think that Austin and I are meant to be in every way possible...Literally, to
every single extent we are meant to be."
In their very first YouTube video, the couple discussed the future of the growing Ace Family.
Catherine revealed she had a feeling that she'd end up with three of her own children,
because of a prediction that had been made over a decade earlier.
"Well a psychic told me that I was gonna have three when I was like 10 years old.
And she told me that I was gonna meet Austin."
But she added,
"Like after I met Austin and after everything happened in our lives, I ended up realizing
that the psychic was right about everything she said."
It sounds like the couple is following their destiny, in growing their family.
"Yeah, she said I was gonna have three, so."
McBroom said that he'd also be good with three kids, but did have one caveat.
"We're not stopping until I have a little mini me.
A little boy."
"Okay."
"Is that cool?"
She might live the life of a famous internet celebrity today, but things for Paiz haven't
always been so glamorous.
The YouTube star is no stranger to toughing it out, and has been working nonstop at a
variety of jobs since she was in her teens.
"My first job was at Victoria's Secret."
She said on their channel,
"I've been working my whole life.
I've always had a job since I was like 16.
And I didn't go to college."
Instead of doing the university thing, Catherine says she moved to China for a while.
But when she came back to the States, she headed straight to work.
"I moved to Miami, and I managed a venue, and I worked at a hedge fund, and I've done
like so many different things."
She said that her ultimate goal is to have her own athletic wear line, something she
had started to work on before becoming pregnant with her first daughter, Elle.
While she and McBroom teased that fashion might still be in her future, their YouTube
career has turned into a full time business.
McBroom's education helped The Ace Family make it to the top.
It turns out, the former college basketball player didn't spend all of his college years
on the court.
He also worked hard at his classes, majoring in communication.
Many people expected McBroom to continue with his promising basketball talent and turn it
into a professional career.
But instead of going pro, the star athlete found a different use for his education.
"Hey Ace Family!"
No one expected The Ace Family to become as popular as they did not even members of McBroom's
family.
While their fame was unexpected, McBroom's dad Allen couldn't be happier for his son.
Allen told The Spokesman Review,
"He's had more success than we could have imagined.
And he gets to be with his family every day."
McBroom made a name for himself as a skilled basketball player, but the athlete isn't just
a phenom on the court.
He's got loads of talent in other sports, too.
He revealed in a YouTube video,
"I played three sports in high school.
I played football, basketball, and baseball.
And I was pretty decent at all three."
He ended up focusing his athleticism on basketball because it was his favorite sport of the three.
McBroom said that it was basketball that always captured his attention and his heart, admitting,
"Baseball was just too slow for me.
And then football, I hate getting tackled...Basketball is just something I was always in love with.
Couldn't get bored with basketball."
He's not the only athlete in the family, either.
Paiz also has a pretty diverse athletic resume.
"I played hockey, soccer, and volleyball, and I did swimming growing up."
Austin might be the one with the degree in communications, but Catherine is the one who
can communicate all over the world.
The mom of two not only speaks English, but is also fluent in a couple more languages.
She said in a video on their channel,
"I speak three languages.
English, French, and Spanish."
Both of her parents were born and raised in Panama, so she grew up speaking both Spanish
and English at home.
She explained how she became fluent in French, adding,
"As I grew older, I had to go to French school because I'm French Canadian.
The only schools that were available to me were in French."
By the time Catherine was in first grade, she was trilingual.
And while he's not exactly fluent, McBroom also studied some French in school and added
that he's trying to learn Spanish alongside his daughter who is being raised to speak
the language by her mom.
The world may know Paiz by her first name, Catherine, but that isn't the name that's
written on her birth certificate.
She said in a YouTube video,
"My real name isn't Catherine.
Catherine is actually my middle name.
My first name is something else…no, no, no, don't say it, don't say it"
Paiz claims that she was always embarrassed by her name growing up.
But when she became an adult, however, she began to appreciate it a little more because
of the special story that's behind it.
Paiz was originally named after her mother's foster mom.
After learning they were pregnant, Catherine's father impulsively told her mom's foster mom
that they would name the baby after her, without knowing what her first name even was.
Paiz' mom wasn't thrilled about saddling her daughter with such an old-fashioned name.
She honored the promise, but always called her daughter by her middle name, Catherine.
"My first name is…
"...a grandma name."
While she refused to reveal her real first name in the video, Hollywood Mask reported
that the YouTube celeb's full name is Dolores Catherine Johnston Paiz.
While Austin and Catherine aren't exactly musicians by trade, they've dabbled in music
and have found a lot of success with it.
In 2017, they released a music video called "You're My ACE" which has racked up more than
22 million views as of mid 2019.
The song was co-produced by Glenn Travis, who also performs "Feel My Love," the song
used in the intro to The Ace Family's videos.
In the comments, The Ace Family stressed that their foray into the music video world was
quote, "all for fun" and said that they don't consider themselves artists.
The song is heavy on the autotune, but of course, it's also surprisingly catchy.
"Alright Ace Family we just completed our summer jam."
"It's a hitter"
The following year they announced that they had another song in the works, although it
has yet to be released, much to the disappointment of their many fans who are eager for their
next tune to drop.
Artists or not, The Ace Family might just turn into recording artists in the future
if their followers have anything to say about it.
Many, if not most, new parents struggle to adjust to having a baby in the house.
For The Ace Family, however, becoming parents was not just incredibly exciting, but it was
also surprisingly easy.
McBroom told Power 106 Los Angeles,
"Oh man, I don't think there is no tough part.
I think it's all fun, because we get to just act crazy, well, especially me.
I'm just a crazy person."
According to Catherine, first born Elle was quite the well behaved baby.
She revealed,
"We honestly have a really great kid.
She's such a good baby.
I've never had a sleepless night with her."
She even revealed that Elle hardly ever cries, telling the show,
"It's funny because in our videos people always say, 'I've never seen Elle cry,' and it's
true.
She just never cries."
But McBroom revealed a tiny bit of realness, adding,
"She only cries when she wants milk."
They might have become a household name seemingly overnight, but the magnitude of their own
fame hasn't really hit The Ace Family.
When Catherine was asked by Power 106 Los Angeles if they consider themselves to be
YouTube celebrities, she answered,
"We don't see ourselves like that."
"Right."
"It's crazy how fast we grew.
I see ourselves as, you know, a regular family."
She did acknowledge that while their fans may see them as famous, it doesn't affect
their own view.
"I wouldn't say we're celebs."
To the couple, making a living off of YouTube is just fun.
While they're definitely perfectionists, and will delete a completed video if they don't
think that it's YouTube ready, they don't feel too stressed out by their channel because
they love creating it so much.
"It's not pressure because it comes so natural to us.
It's work, but it's not really work because we're being ourselves."
"Yeah.
We're waking up every morning just doing what we do."
According to The Ace Family, the best way to succeed with a family vlog is to take your
time and to pace yourself.
"We didn't know what we were doing.
Did we?"
"No, we didn't."
Catherine told Power 106 Los Angeles,
"First of all, consistency is the number one key.
Be true to yourself."
McBroom warned prospective vloggers to stay focused on their own channels and not to expect
to be like the leading YouTube stars right away.
He advised,
"I think everybody, you know, sets expectations too high.
Especially when they see a family like us."
He says that when they first launched their channel, they saw a long road ahead of them,
saying,
"We looked up to a couple people and we were like 'Damn,' like, 'How do we get like them?'
But people can only get like that if you start."
Austin also echoed Catherine and stressed the importance of sticking with it, saying,
"So, as soon as you start, just get used to the camera, and just you know believe in yourself
and know it's gonna come as long as you just work hard and be consistent.
I think that's the biggest thing."
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