Everybody’s doing it; you can read them on countless blogs and see it on Facebook every day in pictures. Why not an RtB version? But here’s the catch: you have to do it with me.
Each day I will pose a question we all must answer. (Now would be a good time for the lurkers to delurk. I know you’re out there. How do I know? Sorry, classified.)
Day 1
What are some of your most treasured childhood memories? Give a list.
- Going to elementary school in the fall. The smell of leaves, construction paper, glue, mimeograph ink; Miss Rinehart’s long hair and pretty dresses.
- 1965. Lying in bed on Christmas Eve, swearing I could hear sleigh bells in the distance. Waking up to find a cowgirl outfit under the tree, complete with skirt, blouse, boots, hat, pistols and gun belt.
- Eating Sunday dinners at Grandma Johnson’s house, with all the cousins there.
- Playing with next-door neighbors Mary Sue and Wendy Lapish until dark.
- Trick-or-treating in our neighborhood — at night.
OK, your turn. Anything come to mind? Tell. The more I know about you, the more stuff I can blackmail you with later.
1. Going to the water park during my 7-11 ages when I didn’t care if my suit rode up or not. And we would RUN to get on the Giant Slide of Death.
2. Spending the summers with my cousins. Unaccustomed to “country life”, I found it extremely entertaining to pick pickles for an entire day. Also, the family video camera was relinquished to us. Some of the most hilarious videos I’ve seen to this day…
3. Playing baseball at the old community park with my Dad.
4. The time of 8-15 when I had a thing for sherbet.
5. Any “Take your daughter to work” days.
Picking pickles? You mean grabbing the cukes off the ground? How fantastic.
1) All Christmases (when I was young at least). Mom and Dad were both teachers so they were home the whole vacation. They both made sure that the house was decorated to the hilt inside and out. Christmas music was always playing on the stereo. Christmas morning we were awakened by Leroy Anderson’s A Christmas Festival, and presents galore under the tree.
2) Camping in western and northern Michigan. Since Mom and Dad had the whole summer off so we’d disappear for 2-3 weeks at a time.
3) Swimming anywhere whether it was the pool or lake. Nothing like swimming in Lake Michigan! Or Lake Superior…brrr!!! But fun! In the winter it was skating and sledding. At the local rink, not Lake Superior…..
4) Halloween for me too!
5) Playing at Potter Park all summer. The City hired college students to be Coaches at the local parks. There’d be a huge green box — The Box — which, when unlocked, held all sorts of balls and bats and games. Many many games of volleyball, Capture the Flag, baseball, chess, you name it, were played.
6) Riding my bike everywhere.
7) Playing Hide and Seek by our house. AFTER the street lights went out….parents didn’t care, they knew where we were.
Hmm I could go on an on! I consider myself one of the very very lucky ones who can say that their childhood was wonderful!!!
PS pictures of the Fink in her cowgirl outfit are requested
Christmas music on the record player — I should have included that one! My mom always had the “Treasury of Christmas” collection playing during the holidays. You know, the old collection from Columbia? I still have it, transferred to CD somewhere. I actually bought the collection on eBay on 33 RPM like three years ago! Great memory, and I’m glad you had a bunch too!
PS – that picture of Mavis and me in our cowgirl outfits is around here somewhere. If I can’t find it, I’ll ask her and see if she has it. Stand by!
1. Swinging on the backyard swing my grandpa made and getting it to go as high as I could. I felt like I was flying.
2. My ‘Living Barbie’, who had posable arms, hands, legs, feet, and waist. She could sit on a horse and I didn’t have to dislocate the leg at the hip.
3. The only year I went to summer camp for a week. It was at Camp Whitman on Seneca Lake in upstate NY. It’s still there by the way.
4. The sound of the bell on top of Grandma and Grandpa’s garage. They would ring it when we had to come home and we could hear it from where ever we were in the neighborhood. I’ll never forget that ring.
5. The way my grandpa made a steak taste when he made it on the backyard fire place. Don’t know how he did it but I’ve never been able to duplicate it.
Thanks for that little walk down my own memory lane!
PK
You are welcome, friend. I was hoping this would be how this little project turned out. Let’s keep it going…
Loved your #1.
You know that you would catch me sending a reply if it has ANYTHING to do with memories – what a slobbering, nostalgic sucker am I [should that be a song?]
1. Sitting alone hidden in my cave under the bushes reading books.
2. Catching fireflies after dark while the parents stood and talked and “forgot” how late it was.
3. Spending 2 weeks in a small town in PA with my grandparents where we could wander freely all over town, in the back alleys, along the railroad track, across the big bridge to town and no one worried about us.
4. Hiding my boots in the ivy at the end of the street because I was too “cool” to wear boots to school.
5. School carnival with games rides and colored lights that transformed the parking lot into magic.
And knowing you like I do, I can see you doing all these things — even now! XO
1. The first warm day of spring when the grass seemed to “green up” overnight and things began growing again after a long winter.
2. The smell from the Stokely cannery when they were processing sauerkraut–it wasn’t really pleasant but it’s a good memory!
3. Doing shows in our basement with two old closet doors for a stage, a bare lightbulb for lighting and an old bedspread for a curtain.
4. Ice skating on the old Stokely pond–the city workers would fill it every November and in the spring, we’d collect frog eggs in cans–then we’d forget about them and they’d stink up the garage.
5. Sunday drives–we didn’t go on vacations and gas was cheap! It was our weekly “getaway.”
Sunday drives! Another memory I didn’t add. Sounds like you had a fantastic childhood, pal.
1. Family vacations to Florida with 4 generations present.
2. Playing “baseball” for hours by myself. You can do that when you have a ball glove, a rubber ball, and an old barn to bounce the ball off of.
3. Riding my bike on the road without the fear of being hit by a wild driver.
4. Playing for hours on the huge piles of snow left by huge snowfalls. The biggest and best piles were right by the road!! What were my parents thinking!?!
5. Getting a dog for my 7th birthday. My grandma thought I should have a dog so she got me one without asking my father first!!! Trixie was my best friend for the next 16 years!
#4 — remember when you could be out in the freezing cold for hours at a time and it didn’t bother you at all? Great memories. And I had no idea about Trixie!
COOL idea! I wanna play!! OK – here we go:
1. Spending lots of time during the summer on Lake Ada in northern Minnesota. We used to rent a cabin on the lake, but then bought my great-grandmother’s place & remodeled it. I have lots of relatives that also have summer places on the same lake, so was like a huge family reunion every summer with good food, swimming, water-skiing, fishing, etc.
2. Spending Sunday afternoons with my grandparents for a few hours: color TV!! Home-made hamburgers & french fries. Candy dish full of Hershey’s kisses, M&Ms, Peppermint Patties, etc.
3. Being “equipment manager” for our school district’s “Summer Band” program. Both my folks directed different bands & I’d get paid ($5/rehearsal) to set up chairs/stands & get things organized for rehearsal. Man, I was rich!!
4. Spending time with my dad in the basement & him teaching me how to develop 35mm film, print pictures, doing enlargements, and other photo tricks to make your pictures look good. That later translated to me being a photographer for school yearbook.
You were a school photog?!?! I never knew! And Grandma’s candy dishes — awesome, right? It’s like our parents purposely never had chocolates around so it would always be a special occasion at Grandma’s….cool.
XO
Yes! This was exactly what I was hoping would happen. How cool to learn of those special memories about your lives. Even though I’ve known several of you for years, these were all a surprise. NICE
Stay tuned for tomorrow’s question.
1. Living within walking distance of my best friend.
2. Driving my sister around in the wagon attached to my Barbie jeep.
3. Finger-painting in my great-grandmother’s back yard (because she wouldn’t let me in the house).
4. The family reunion at a state park.
5. My older sister playing school with me. She’d make lessons for me and let me use her desk.
1. Spending summers and school holidays building new houses and flipping old ones with my dad, starting at age five. It was the ultimate father-daughter time and is still my favorite thing to do with him. Plus, now I can fix nearly everything that breaks in my house. Or call him for technical support.
Now if I want to hear some well-done Mark Hayes, I have to do it myself. Not nearly as fun, especially since there’s no grand piano at my house.
2. My grandparents’ lake cottage in Michigan – we drove 2 hours each way, every single summer weekend. Fishing, skiing, swimming, bug bites, sunburns, card games — it was great fun. They sold it in 2003 and made a killing – and I miss it immensely.
3. Waking up to my mom playing piano Sunday mornings – because she, like me, isn’t one for practicing much ahead of time.
4. Living on a horse farm – and all it entails. Spending hours in the barns, pens, and pastures; the awesome farmer’s tan I always had; learning to drive a truck and a tractor before the age of ten; taking long yearlings and breaking them into show horses; the show circuit.