What is your favorite childhood memory

[Heather Shay]

I know all of us here have had many struggles and hardships in our lives and a lot of pain. BUT if you dig down deep there is something in your life that makes you smile when you think about it.

For me I remember visiting a cousins home and learning to make pot holders on a frame. That was in a neat house with a warm fire and a loving family I got to watch.

[Betty K]

My first experience of snow in Tasmania aged about five. And singing "What Shall We Do With the Drunken Sailor" around the piano at the hippy school I went to around the same time. Tasmania always seemed like Eden to me when we moved away.

[Heather Shay]

@Betty K now that is a cool memory..........I once did a bizarre version of Drunken Sailor in a trio I had at one time - audience didn't know what to make of it..... oh well..... I love the image of finding your Eden.

[Jackie C.]

The time I spent with my grandparents at the beach house they rented every year. There was no TV, just the radio, whatever books we brought and the lake. Sometimes we'd go sailing. Other times we'd swim or take the canoe somewhere, but that was always my favorite week of summer vacation.

 

Hugs!

[Ivy]

7 hours ago, Shay said:

I remember visiting a cousins home and learning to make pot holders on a frame.

I remember doing this.

 

2 hours ago, Jackie C. said:

There was no TV, just the radio, whatever books we brought and the lake. Sometimes we'd go sailing. Other times we'd swim or take the canoe somewhere, but that was always my favorite week of summer vacation.

My family had a "camp" on a lake in upstate NY.  It wasn't anything fancy, but I remember just floating around in a small boat or canoe.  That's still one of my favorite things, to take a canoe or kayak into a small inlet and just float around.  Sometimes I pretend to fish for an excuse.

[KymmieL]

every summer we would visit my grandparents in North Carolina. I always loved going down to Tryon. Then they moved to Black Mountain,in a retirement community. Which was fun too. We'd camp. Have a lot of great memories, of down south. Some of my better memories.

Unlike most Michiganders we went south were most went up north.  Jackie can attest to that fact.

 

Kymmie

[Jackie C.]

Very true. My father in law is living in the cabin that he used to take my wife and her sister to during the summer. There is literally NOTHING to do at the cabin and it's roughly 20 minutes from everything. My spouse is set to inherit when my father-in-law passes. It's a lot of land, but it's small and not close to anything. Good for surviving a zombie apocalypse I guess but I guess I'm more of a city girl at heart.

 

Hugs!

[KymmieL]

My father in law owns property up north too. Rosscommon Mio area I think. Never been their.

 

Kymmie

[Ivy]

5 hours ago, KymmieL said:

we would visit my grandparents in North Carolina. I always loved going down to Tryon. Then they moved to Black Mountain,in a retirement community. Which was fun too. We'd camp. Have a lot of great memories, of down south. Some of my better memories.

That area is beautiful.   The Black Mts and Blue Ridge are wonderful places to camp.  

[SheenaT]

On 2/18/2021 at 3:47 AM, Shay said:

I know all of us here have had many struggles and hardships in our lives and a lot of pain. BUT if you dig down deep there is something in your life that makes you smile when you think about it.

For me I remember visiting a cousins home and learning to make pot holders on a frame. That was in a neat house with a warm fire and a loving family I got to watch.

I will always remember when a neighbor dressed me in her mothers wedding dress.  I was in heaven and at that time had no idea why. Later at age 19 a friend helped me dress up in one of her dresses and wig. We went out and I passed. (Pics in my folder of that day)

[MiraM]

There is nothing from my childhood that anyone but me would consider positive, and what I would consider my best memory of the time is also something that would wind up almost killing me later in life.  I guess we all have different different views on what the best part of our childhood are.

[KathyLauren]

I had a hard time thinking of good memories from my childhood.  I have few memories from back then anyway, and most of them are blah.  But, thinking back, there was one summer when, instead of the whole family going on vacation together, we split up.  My older brother went away to scout camp, my parents went off together to the west coast of Scotland, and my younger brother and I were sent to stay with my aunt and uncle in the Highlands.  (We lived in Glasgow, Scotland, at the time, so the trip was less exotic than it may sound.)

 

My aunt and uncle lived in a remote hamlet near Loch Luichart*.  I must have been 8 and my brother was 6, and we stayed with them for maybe 10 days or 2 weeks.  We played with toy boats in the creek that separated their place from the neighbours' and played with the neighbour kids.  We would play with the old cars in the barn, old enough to be antiques, but not restored, just old, figuring out how to put them in gear and make them move by turning the starter crank at the front.  In the afternoons, we would walk down the hill to the railway line to wave to the tourists when the daily passenger train went by on its way to Kyle of Lochalsh*.  (That train still runs, and is considered one of the most scenic rail lines in the world.)

* Place names included so map freaks can look them up and see just how remote from civilization we were.

 

My uncle was at work all day - I think he was a gamekeeper on some rich guy's estate - and my aunt would kick us out of the house after breakfast and call us in for lunch, not to disturb her in between.  For a couple of city kids who were used to living in a 4th floor walk-up apartment, it was heaven.

 

At the end of the vacation, my father picked us up.  But instead of going home on the train, he took us to Inverness airport, and we flew back to Glasgow, my first airplane ride ever!

 

Thanks for making me remember that.

[Heather Shay]

@MiraM I hope I didn't trigger painful memories. I was looking for some little diamond in the rough that brings you joy. Doesn't matter what anyone else thinks but if you can think of anything that was something you can find a little sunshine then mission accomplished. Hugs

[Heather Shay]

@KathyLauren that is such a cool memory. It triggered a couple of mine I had totally forgotten about. Thank you.

[Heather Shay]

@SheenaT what beautiful memories. I always had to hide the dressing and felt shame until I finally figured out what was going on. I will have to check out you photos. You avatar shows a very beautiful young lady.

[MiraM]

@ShayYou didn't trigger any painful memories.  I did not have a good childhood, and find it hard to find any traditionally "positive" memories of the time.  The only thing that really stands out it the first time I discovered, at the age of 10, that alcohol (and drugs) could make everything else go away for a while.  That quickly turned to addiction and almost killed me.  I have been drug free since 1988, and after finally making peace with my past, I have been sober from alcohol for 2 years.  The memories of my childhood are not good, but they no longer have the power over me that they once did.  That was the past:  things I had to experience to become the person that I am today.  The memories that really matter are the ones I am making now.

[Heather Shay]

@MiraM Well a bad memory served to bring peace - I have been of pot for 25 years and alcohol for 15 and I agree with you 100% about the ability to move forward once you rid yourself of things that help relieve the pain yet cause far worse issues. I am so proud of you choosing to be YOU and that is an amzing woman I am lucky to now know. HUGS.