Joining Carole Knits for her 10 on Tuesday. This week's prompt is - 10 Things You Miss From Your Childhood.
- The neighboorhood - I grew up in a small town and lived in a great neighborhood. All the kids spent our days outside - playing kickball in the street, hide and seek, red rover, hopscotch. We'd meet after breakfast and spend all day roaming the neighborhood. All of the parents got along as well and weekends meant cookouts and card playing. So much fun.
- Fields and creeks - we lived in a new neighborhood with nothing but fields behind the houses for years. We spent many years building forts in the fields and exploring the creek that meandered through the area - building dams and catching tadpoles.
- Sunday morning hikes - after church on Sundays we routinely packed the car with everything to cook breakfast and headed to Ricketts Glen State Park. We would cook breakfast over the fire and then hike along the falls. So much fun!
- Swimming - We had a pool in our backyard and I loved to swim and soak up the sun.
- Riding bikes - we rode our bikes everywhere! To our grandparent's houses - one just a few blocks away and one on the west end of town. To the library - my favorite place in the whole world. To the park; to the small store for penny candy. Oh the freedom we had back then!
- Playground - this was a program each summer put on by the school district I believe. A bus would come aorund and pick you up and take you to Ber-Vaughn Park. There were structured activities all day - tennis, crafts, volleyball - and then lunch and swimming. you could pack your lunch or buy. We packed most days - it was cheaper - and then on Fridays got to buy lunch. I think this was a 6 week program. I loved going!
- The Sno-Cone man - he had a green station wagon with the gate down and went from street to street selling sno-cones. Oh so yummy! Rainbow was my favorite!
- The Charlie Chip Man - he came door to door and refilled large tins with homemade chips or pretzels.
- Fishing - my dad worked in retail and usually worked Saturdays. this meant he had a day off in the middle of the week. In the summer on his day off we went fishing - my grandparents, my dad, my sister, and two cousins. My grandmother packed a picnic lunch and we fished for a couple of hours. There was always bickering between my sister and my cousins (both boys) as we were competitive - who caught the biggest fish, who could cast the farthest. We took teh fish home, my grandfather cleaned them all and froze them. At the end of the summer we had a big fish fry.
- Summer Vacations at the Shore - every summer in August we spent a week in Wildwood Crest, NJ at the Bali-Hi Motel. It was a small family run motel which my mom and her parents had gone to when she was a child. It was in the first block along the beach and we always went the week of my birthday. We even took our kids there when they were younger.
This was a great prompt this week and brought back lots of fun memories of a wonderful childhood! Thanks Carole!
