Sweet Child of Mine
There are certain aspects of my childhood that bring me just as much pleasure now as they once did many years ago (hence why I’ve convinced my boyfriend to accompany me to a pumpkin farm this weekend). This time of year makes me nostalgic for lots of reasons and it got me thinking about some of the things that aren’t quite as fun now that I’m older. I wouldn’t wish for it to be any other way, but sometimes it’s nice to look back fondly at some of the simpler things that brought me so much joy.
1. Jumping in puddles.
2. Making retainers out of pretzels (it wasn’t as glamorous once I got a real one).
3. Playing make-believe.
4. Mixing five Slurpee flavors in one cup.
5. Building mazes for my dwarf hamster (I’m still creeped out that I even owned a rodent).
6. Overalls.
7. Back-to-school shopping. Nowhere near as fun when I have to pay.
8. Collecting things that had no true significance. Stickers. Pogs. Trolls.
9. Prank calls.
10. Trying to fall asleep on Christmas Eve.
What little things made you inexplicably giddy as a kid?
image via flickr
95 comments
Aw, nice list! I personally got overexcited about:
1. getting my dad to peel an orange in one long, curly strip – my brother and I pretended it was a telephone cord and would hold it like a phone at either end. DORKS.
2. mixing up the flavours of neapolitan ice-cream (sounds like you with your slurpees)… and then getting really disappointed when it turned into grey soup.
3. picking out flavours of Jelly Belly beans at the sweet shop.
4. The insane excitement of planting beans/lentils/whatever I could get in the kitchen, and watching them actually sprout.
I was a really happy kid. thanks for reminding me.
rainy days and apple pie
http://girintheloft.blogspot.com
Hee hee, I was also waaaay into Troll dolls. I had about a hundred of them- and only the ones from Russ would suffice. The other ones simply weren’t as cute. Heaven forbid a Troll not be deemed cute, right?
Other things:
-LEGO’s
-Pop rocks!
-Nintendo cereal (you know, the kind with two flavors in different bags in every box? SO GOOD!)
-Sleeping on freshly laundered sheets on a warm summer night with the window open
-Making videos with our badass camcorder of my pet hamster wearing Barbie shoes and driving around in my Barbie Corvette when I thought no one was looking (oh god, my mom STILL has that videotape somewhere…)
And on and on and on. I still play with the LEGO’s, only now with my young niece and nephew. They make me giddy as an adult. Shush.
- Feeding ducks at the duck pond
- Dyeing Easter eggs
- Drawing with chalk on the driveway
- Playing “ice cream man” with an upside-down Big Wheel
- Jumping rope {significantly less fun when it became exercise}
BACK TO SCHOOL!!!!
I miss this EVERY single year that passes!!!! 
The last one: Trying to fall asleep on Christmas Eve gave me goosebumps. A wave of excitement and giddyness came over me.
I loved those times. It seemed like anything was possible, and we were the most important people on earth. If only we could bottle that feeling. x
Oh I still love to jump in puddles! With wellie’s on of course! But I’m only 23! And still a child in my eyes
I was going to say my favourite thing as a child was putting on my mom’s high heels and playing dress up, but I still love to do that, and I still get that same excited feeling when I am getting dressed up! But in my own clothes of course! Even though I do love raiding my Mam’s really old stuff & finding some great pieces!
American Girl dolls and stomping in mud puddles while going for walks in the woods with my mom. I still like hiking, but now I avoid the mud!
Simpáticas botas.
greeting
Fighting over who got to be which Spice Girl (I grew up in the 90′s, in my defence).
Have kids, then you get to do all the fun stuff again! Lately our family has been super into slurpees!
thank you for reminding me about pogs. Oh. My. Goodness. I loved those things.
I’m making the boyfriend go to a pumpkin patch, as well. I love it. I miss R.L. Stine’s Fear Street books, 90′s television/music, playing Nintendo with friends (which I still kind of do), telling scary stories with friends and being genuinely scared, Ouija boards, a glass of chocolate milk made by mother each morning before school, etc…
This really dating me but: real penny candy…omg 50 cents would seem like a fortune!!! 50 pieces of candy!!! and the annual showing of ‘the wizard of oz’ on tv…yup, that was the only way to watch it way back then. i remember i would always have tea and buttered toast while i watched it. my friends and i would also have sleepovers and we’d have monopoly board game marathons… a sweet, small town life!
i know what you mean about the rodents. my grade one class had two pet rats and i used to hold them, carry them, build mazes for them out of blocks! eugh!
when i was little i was really into making houses for my barbies out of old cardboard boxes, “creating” recipes {throwing in a disgusting combination of ingredients into a big bowl. i was so disappointed when no one wanted to eat them!}, recording pretend radio shows on my cassette player, building forts with my brothers….
i could probably go on forever.
back to school shopping and christmas eve!! ahhh to relive those times when life was much simpler…
Ahhh! This time of year I am always longing to go to a real pumpkin farm, with apple orchards, and maple syrup!
Puddle Jumping is still some of the most fun things right now!
Such a great list!! I especially love the pretzel retainer… I used to do that too!! I still wonder why. I miss playing with My Little Pony for hours and hours… they had such an exciting life.
Thanks for making me smile this morning.
We have a quilt that has to be washed and air-dryed, and when it’s too cold outside to hang it up, we drape it over our dining room chairs in the living room. And I’m SO JEALOUS that my cats get to play in what is, essentially, a blanket fort!
I love this – looking back on childhood is always something that brings me great joy. And I’m so thankful for that! I always enjoyed going to 7-11 or anywhere with a drink fountain and mixing all the soda flavors together. That ways a great treat! Now that you’ve said 6 flavors of slurpee – I want to try this! (Or slush puppies – those were my favorite growing up, there was more horrible for you syrup vs. ice in those).
Oh, pogs! I totally forgot about those! I had a ton!
I also loved legos, climbing trees, and I was more into buying school supplies than school clothes. I was such a tomboy as a child!
I love your list; thanks for posting it. For me, the one thing that jumped out at me was “back to school shopping”. I was the only girl in my family, and my two brothers were way older. So BTS shopping was always an “event” for me and my mom every August. We’d make a really big deal of it and go visit my grandparents who lived in the nearest “Big City” of San Francisco. My grandpa would play chauffer while my grandma, mom and I would shop ’til we dropped. Good times….
Playing with Barbies. Waking up on a summer morning with nothing to do but what I pleased. Reading for hours.
Barbies, rodents, cats, bikes……
http://www.FashionSnag.com
playing hide and seek at night when the santa ana winds come!
Haha Emily! I totally did the pretzel retainer thing too, and I definitely agree that the real thing was far far less fun.
Great blog, I’m a big fan
Ooohhh… trying to fall asleep on Christmas Eve! That’s perfect!
I miss:
-building tunnels in snowbanks for hours and not caring how cold it was (grown-up me is not a Winter person)
-Christopher Pike books (Remember Me! Final Friends!)
-Jem dolls, I wish I hadn’t given them away. Oddle I kept the cassettes
-dressing up like a “punk” for Halloween
-Waiting forever to tape a song off the radio only to get angry when the DJ talked over the track
-Speeding up records so everything sounded like Alvin and the Chipmunks
sigh… I want to be a kid in the 80s again…
http://idlefascination.blogspot.com/
The Fall brings about those feeling of nostalgia in me too. Every year my husband and I go to the pumpkin patches & we also do a corn maze. So much fun!
Things I miss from my childhood:
*Satuday morning cartoons
*Making mix tapes by recording songs from the radio
*Pretending the bed was a ship and surrounded by sharks.
*Reading books under a tree in my yard
*Penny Candy
*Weekly Saturday Flea Market trips with my dad
Those rain boots are so cute- love the image.
So, growing up I was obsessed with rainy days. For all my b-days I wanted it to rain. My parent’s even took me to Seattle so I could go to the rainiest city (it happened to be sunny the whole time we were there-buzz kill). I have grown out of it a little, but still enjoy the rain and the way the pavement smells and the sound trickling on the windows while I am sitting by the fire!
yay! I think I am going to the pumpkin patch this weekend too. cute post!
http://cupcaketrash.blogspot.com
such a feel good post.loved the comments too. sounds like you guys had happy childhoods.
Wow what a great idea and blog!
cant wait for more
Here is a link to mine, i have some pretty interesting fashion illustrations and interviews with new up and coming male models! so take a look and if u feel inclined comment
http://mrinsomniac.blogspot.com/
Omg pogs…totally forgot about those!!! I can’t believe how popular they were. #7 back to school shopping was HUGE for me- I looked forward to it every year. It’s true- when you are paying.. totes not as fun.
Snow playing was big for me and also these “dinner and a movie” Sunday nights my mom and little brother and I would do- she’d make something and we’d all watch a movie together and eat dinner- fun fam time
very cute
I am loving your blog — fashion and food: two of my favorite things. Especially when photographed well
As for my childhood? Things like building snowmen and snow tunnels in the park, getting dirty potato chips after ice skating lessons, lots of travel via the public bus, lunch at pick a bagel every day of the 6th grade, making clothes for my beanie babies out of socks, playing gameboys which were black and white and actually had to be connected by a cord, Saturday morning “daddy play time,” and so much more
Oh my gosh.. This entire list screams ME! Are we the same person?! LOL.. LOVE LOVE LOVE it.. Made me feel like a kid again for a short moment.. Have a wonderful weekend
*Jumping in piles of leaves.
*Shopping for Halloween costumes.
*Playing house.
*Writing letters to Santa Claus.
*Pogs.
*Worms and snails.
*Limited-edition holiday cereals and snacks.
*Jumping in puddles.
*Carousels.
Most of these things still make me giddy to this day!
when i was younger i used to literally keep track of all the days i’d stayed up past midnight. oooo man i wish i could still keep track of that, haha.
also the other day i was going to buy stickers and then my friend convinced me that they were a waste of $$! i want to have a reason to have stickers, lol!
i LOVED stickers. i would stick them every place possible. i also lived for back to school shopping at the annual nordstrom sale every summer. you’re right, it just isn’t the same when you have to pay!
Jumping in puddles was definitely top three for me! Speaking of pogs, I was trying to explain them to the 17-year-old son of one of my co-workers last week (he didn’t know what they were!), and he said, “You sound like you’re crazy.” Wow! I definitely collected things that had no true significance. Beads were my collection of choice.
Pogs, trolls, stickers. I absolutely love this post. I was once obsessed with Lisa Frank binders and folders (do you remember her designs?), the ones with the colorful kittens on them. Saturday morning “Saved By the Bell”(with Zack & Kelly) was my favorite weekend event. Oh, and I was just talking to my girlfriends about that game, “Dream Phone” where you press the phone and have to meet Tom at the Poster shop….
Oh, the memories!
I totally collected Pogs (and the slammers!), stickers, and even erasers. I housed my erasers in a hot pink barbie lunch box!
I also remember the pajamas with feet, those ridiculous Disney character slippers, cassette tapes, Lisa Frank binders and folders!
xoxo,
Victoria
http://thestylistadiaries.blogspot.com
I had a dwarf hamster too, named Dinky! And I used to love calling my friends up in the mornings before school, so we could all wear matching outfits. Now it’s the opposite!
Barbies. Barbies were my number one as a kid. I would be so quiet playing with my barbies that my parents left the house without me once.
I also had hamsters, we had 3, and one was a girl and we mated them and had 2 litters. Hamsters are cute, not creepy….mice however…
Also stickers and pogs…still have quite the Beanie Baby collection too.
• Sticker albums (and trading with friends)
• Grease, the movie
• Flood days when school was cancelled
OMG, I think I still have my pogs packed away somewhere!
love this. collecting pogs and trolls!! i personally also collected barbie trading cards. and i’m pretty sure i still have all three of those collections in boxes somewhere in my parents’ basement.
I used to buy those candy cigarettes as a child and pretend to be glamorous. Now that I think about it that’s a pretty f*cked up thing to sell to a child! Lol.
I also used to love going to the candy store and buying a dollar’s worth of candy, which would almost fill a small brown paper bag. I’d go to school and meet up with my friends before class and we’d sit at those big white lunch tables and trade candies! Ahhh the good old days. I knew I’d grow up to be a bit square and maybe even a little stuck up. But I never imagined I’d be this bad, lol.
oh my gosh i forgot about pogs!!! i used to make retainers out of fruit roll ups…sick. and hamsters. eww. although watching it roll around in the little ball was pretty entertaining.
missing school. now i just feel overwhelmed and like i have so much to catch up on but back then it was awesome, especially when it was to spend a fun day not because i was sick.
have fun at the pumpkin patch! i’m hoping to take my little brothers next weekend!
LoVe your BLOG! So happy I found it =)
I still have all of my sticker books! Scratch-n-Sniff were the best…oh and the ones that were like mood stickers with the greenish oil in them! I still have my garbage pail kid collection too! Does anyone remember the plastic charms? I still have the belt with all of my charms (plastic records, roller skates, etc.)…I need to dig that out! Loved shrinky dinks too. Does anyone remember Poochie??? The dog with pink ears??? LoVeD her! =) Fun memories….wow, I am old!
P.S. please please please come and help me change my boring wardrobe into a stylish one!!! i would LOVE to be a before and after =)
xoxo, Jenn
http://www.bridalinquirer.com/blog
Such a great post! A few things that I miss from childhood:
1. watching the same movie over & over (grease, clueless to name a few..)
2. monopoly marathons
3. back to school shopping–both clothes and supplies!
4. playing freeze out (rolling down all the windows in the car) when if finally got chilly in TX
I miss my mom dressing me and my sisters up in the exact same dress for holidays (or just shopping trips), getting a tree on Christmas with the whole family from our bush, and waiting for the bus in our little “end of the lane way house”! It was the cutest little shed like thing that we had for when it was cold, because we had a very long drive way! Also, seeing my sisters every day, because we don’t get that anymore!
Pogs, beanie babies, American girl dolls, playin hookie to watch nickelodeon! Selling magazines to win those weebles! And collecting keychains and pens.
Oh, fun!
– being dropped off at the mall with friends, to roam around with NO PARENTS!
– watching movies over and over and over and over….
– secretly 3-way calling BOYS on the phone to find out who their LIST of liked girls was
– playing and swimming in the pool alll day long, to be incredibly exhausted with chlorine-sung eyes at the days end.
My boyfriend and I are going to a pumpkin patch tomorrow, with a hay ride included!
*Collecting pogs, stickers, and beads
*Footed pajamas
*Snow days
*Watching the same movie over and over again (home alone, honey i shrank the kids, and homeward bound)
*Playing hide and seek until dark
*Jumping on my bed
*Dyeing Easter eggs
*Christmas morning
*Visiting my grandparents at their beach house
*Never having to go to school on my birthday (born on Thanksgiving)
*Dunkaroos (no one knows what this is)
*Collecting pogs, stickers, and beads.
*Watching the same movies over and over again (Home Alone, Honey I Shrank the Kids, and Homeward Bound)
*Riding my bike till dark
*Footed pajamas
*Christmas morning
*Jumping on my bed
*Mixing all of the fountain sodas together
*Jumping in piles of leaves
*Missing school for snow
*The smell of fresh cut grass
*Back to school shopping-I loved lisa frank
*Those book catalogues your teacher would hand out and you could order things through the classroom, loved that.
Dirt
Ohhhh, I love this post! Man, I’m remembering so many great things…
1.) Summer. Didn’t care back then that it was 115 and my hair would turn green in the pool.
2.) Monsoons.
3.) Making a retainer out of a paper clip. How NOT fun is that??
4.) Friendship bracelets.
5.) Popsicles that turned my mouth blue, red, or any other color.
6.) Mixed tapes.
Hmmmm, I must admit that I actually still love most of these! Wonder what that says about my maturity??
I loved getting my plate of scrambled eggs when I was a kid because my mom would draw a happy face on them with ketchup. I guess that’s gross if you don’t eat ketchup on eggs, but I loved it.
The Christmas song Silent Night.
Back to school shopping.
Summer at my grandparents’ house.
Swimming in the river.
Potato chips (because junk food was forbidden in the house)
-meream
Great post! Mine include….
1. rolling down the hill in the summer
2. Cute lifeguards – they seemed so wise and mature back then!
3. Making tents in the living room with my sister
4. Saturday morning cereal and cartoons
5. Barbie fun
I used to get so stoked for all the holiday cartoon specials that would come on, like Garfield’s Halloween, It’s The Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown, The Grinch, etc. I still have VHS tapes full of those shows that I recorded with all the great retro commercials! My husband and I always break them out for holidays and are looking into coverting them to DVD so we can show our future kids someday
I also used to love when my Mom mopped the floor. She would take the chairs and bar stools and put them into the living room while the floor dried. I would always go get my blankets and pillows and make a really cool “tent-fort” by drapping the blankets over the chairs.
So cute. Simple pleasures, I love it.
Mine are easy:
1. getting a bath in the sink
2. making chocolate chip cookies and only eating the dough.
http://corksandcaftans.wordpress.com
Aw, number seven hits closest to home. School shopping is wicked :p
I love how nostalgic you are:) I think that this post and the one about your grandpa and the ice cream are two of my faves.
For me, definitely jumping in puddles and chasing pigeons, flying kites at the beach and the park near our house, playing on the tire swing in our back yard, sledding in a huge metal dish in the winter, going for ice cream inthe summer, chinese on thursdays with my family as we watched family ties and the cosby show, getting new books, playing house with my sister and cousin, getting a tent for christmas one year but still building forts, sitting on the porch with my dad when there was a thunderstorm, getting a new box of crayons! so many things to list:)
omg…someone said mix tapes! totally:) I loved making mix tapes. in fact, I still have so many of them at home. it’s just that I don’t have a tape player to put them in… lol. I don’t think I will ever get rid of them.
The pretzel retainers remind me of making a duck mouth out of pringles and sticking those Bugles chips on all of my fingers. haha. Other childhood memories that make me happy:
-Climbing trees
-Snow forts
-Building forts out of chairs and blankets
-Sparkly nail polish that when dry it smells like grapes
-Polly Pockets
-Beanie Babies
-Ring lollipops
-Making (and eating) cookie dough with my mom
-Playing “Lava” or “Lava Tag” (if you touch the floor you lose, or die as we always said haha)
OMG pogs!!! hahah the bf and i go to the pumpkin patch every year! can’t wait. i think we are going next week!!
xoxo
“camping” in the backyard… boy, do i miss that! we made some amazing forts back in the day.
oh and playing four square at recess… can’t forget about that.
Aw, this time of year definitely reminds me of childhood wonders:
-Dressing on Halloween for school
-Arts and crafts made for the holidays (especially the turkey hands and Christmas ornaments)
-Baking cookies
-Picking out a Christmas tree
-Four day weekend (well, that STILL rocks!)
-Wrapping presents
So many good times! I can’t wait to have kids of my own and partake in the fun festivities again!
Aw, this time of year definitely reminds me of childhood wonders:
-Dressing on Halloween for school
-Arts and crafts made for the holidays (especially the turkey hands and Christmas ornaments)
-Baking cookies
-Picking out a Christmas tree
-Four day weekend (well, that STILL rocks!)
-Wrapping presents
So many good times! I can’t wait to have kids of my own and partake in the fun festivities again!
Ive always been obsessed with overalls. I think thats why I love the come back of Rompers. They a Unisuit without the weird buckles. I had over 20 pairs and even made all my friends dress up in overalls for my 11th Birthday party. Barbies and babies were another thing. I wish my imagination was still kid like. Their spirits are so carefree and fun.
Em, I adore this list! And it’s so funny because all next week and the week after I have guest posters sharing their fave childhood memories on my blog, so that I can take time off for the bebe. I did a list of my own, too, which will post at some point while I’m “off”…it was such fun to put together!
pogs.
once, in elementary school, i had a slammer with a wicked New York Knicks hologram on it. I threw it out in my paper bag lunch by accident (gasp!), and made the janitor go through the entire thing to find it. ah memories. and back to school shopping WAS the best back then.
xx
Jumping in puddles is something that makes any child in any country extremely happy. Why?? I also loved it as a kid and I laughed out loud cause it was so amazing… but why is it so funny??
-gushers!
-when my mother surprised me with ballet costumes. i was obsessed with tchaikovsky’s swan lake as a small child, and so i received beautiful handmade tutus and feathery head pieces.
-bonne bell lipgloss. yup! i’ll admit it.
this post literally brought the biggest smile to my face!!!
lets see…
- playgrounds
- sledding
- eating tuna fish sandwiches at the beach and inevitably getting sand all over it
- trick-or-treating
xx
neutraltuesday.blogspot.com
Oh my goodness, I had completely forgotten about pogs until now, I was obsessed!
Right now the one that comes to mind is trick-or-treating! It was downright magical…the thought that I got to dress up and go collect as much candy as I could absolutely free!
We could all definitely learn a thing or two from our childhood selves and remember to always take pleasure in the little things!
I totally miss sofa cushion forts!
pogs! oh man, that takes me back. we used to play for keeps at recess & get in trouble cause our teacher said it was like gambling. ha!
That pic is just too adorable. I need to get some rainboats that keep my mood cheery- black Wellies seem so bland in comparison!
Jumping in puddles…will NEVER get old.
I <3 those rain boots!! Haha
http://liza-with-a-z.blogspot.com/
This list made my day!
Those rain boots are <3…jumping in puddles NEVER gets old!
http://liza-with-a-z.blogspot.com/
OMG a lot of childhood loves are universal. Back to school shopping was a favorite! Buying a new bag-pencil case-outfits.. Aah the things that excited us back then
Silly Putty
Peanut butter on a spoon
Taking care of Barbies and Stuffies
Christmas Eve
First Day of School jitters
Helping mom bake
Playing ministicks with Dad
Choosing the perfect pumpkin
Raking leaves and jumping in them
The first snow fall
Movie night sleepovers
Lip Smackers
ahh back to school shopping – i am reminded of it whenever i go shopping at Staples.
another favorite pastime is helping my mom bake or helping her clean house.
xox
Great list you have here. Looking forward on your next post. =D
Summer
A Writers Den
Brown Mestizo
Summer break…definitely my favorite, haha. Also, Christmas stocking stuffers, but I am lucky enough to keep getting those.
This post brought back so many fun memories!! I am now watching my kids relish in small (big to them) delights and it is so much fun to see! Puts so much in persepective!
Ah, the old days!! I also enjoyed collecting pogs and stickers as well as shells, pretty rocks, newspaper & magazine clippings of my favorite celebrities and movies, and songs for my mixtape. And playing make-believe was definitely fun, fun, FUN! Additionally, I miss writing letters or simple notes to my friends, talking on a telephone for hours and hours, playing cops and robbers or ice-&-water, and weekend outings and strolls in the park/mall with family. It’s just not the same now that we’re all grown up.
P.S. This post is lovely.
ha! we used to fashion retainers out of jelly bracelets. again, not as glamourous when we got the real deal. love your blog!
stirred up such sweet moments. Many of us get nostalgic this time of year, i guess its all about home, family and friends. Imiss saturday morning wathing cartoons with my little sister and eating toast and tea. sunday roast dinners, the shed at the back of the garden which we turned into our little house. marbles, barbie dolls, giant gobstoppers that wouldnt fit into my mouth, pop rocks,riding the bus to school. My first bra, ironing my hair with my mums iron! Digging for the largest worm in the garden! i coul go on and on…o sweet childhood….
Ohh I loved my dwarf hamster. My dad bought me, my brother, and my sister 3 dwarf hamsters, which we brought home on Mother’s Day as a “present.” They were so cute though, and she definitely learned to love them. Lovely post btw
I totally remember pogs! thanks for this list, it made me smile and think back to all the great things about being a kid
This is totally making me recall things I have not thought about in such a long time.. wow
I loved:
*decorating the tree and cookies at xmas, dyeing eggs at easter
* swimming in the pool for hours till I looked like a prune while
pretending to be a mermaid lol
*playing hide and go seek right when it was starting to get dark
*sleepovers at friends houses(we’d never sleep lol)
*dancing in my friends garage, making up dance routines to michael jacksons “Bad” cd lol, and making whoever was around our audience
*sitting at the dinner table at nite w/ my dad teaching me to draw
*loved feeding those little birdys that would hop all around at the park lol
*watching punky brewster on the weekends, i loved her two different colored boots! she was so cool haha
*going to the u-pick to pick strawberries w/ the family
*playing duck hunt and zelda w/ my brother on the original nintendo, which we still have lol
I could go on and on..:)
*
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