Rhymes and poems that we said to our children

Well I would sing it to you, if you were here...

The lion has to roar convincingly.

I shall google it, you never know, youtube may have it hidden somewhere.

Well I never! I have found it. I can't believe it!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uQE8T6Ip6Ic

Although our version is a simplified one, of course.

Amazing!

How wonderfully innocent all these songs from the 1920s now seem.

I shall try the huggy one with my GCs!

The mention of 'Summertime' has reminded me of:

Hush, little baby, don't say a word
Mama's gonna buy you a mockingbird
And if that mockingbird won't sing ...

Oh, I can't wait for my little grandson to be old enough for these.

What a strange upbringing you had Cari - I have ever heard that one but suspect that some of my GC might appreciate it!

My elder son was called Billy when he was young.
My younger son used to annoy him all the time with this one....

Billy, in one of his nice new sashes,
Fell in the fire and was burned to ashes,
Now although the room grows chilly
I haven't the heart to poke poor Billy".

When my two were little, I used to read to them at bed-time from the Puffin Book of Children's Verse. They really liked the poems by Spike Milligan. So did I.

Taking my grandson to school this morning I was suddenly reminded of:

The North Wind doth blow and we shall have snow
And what will poor Robin do then?
But sit in a barn and keep himself warm,
And tuck his head under his wing (poor thing!).

I can remember my mother reciting that back in the 1950s, but I have no idea where it comes from.

We used to sing everything. No wonder we all sing now! We used to sing 'The north wind' too. And I remember most of the rhymes mentioned - apart from Cari's...

Which is wonderful! DGCs will love that.

My DSis's favourite was

Nobody likes me, everybody hates me,
Think I'll go and eat worms.
Long, thin, slimy ones slip down easily
Big fat juicy ones stick
So I put them between my teeth
And let the juice just drip.

Down goes the first one, down goes the second one,
Oh how they wiggle and squirm.
Up comes the first one, up comes the second one,
Oh how they wiggle and squirm.

I'll cut their heads off
suck their guts out
and throw their skins away
Surprising how us girls can eat
those worms three times a day.

My mother taught it to her because she was the chief worm-eater out of all of us when she was little, and we others would run away screaming as she chomped them in front of us deliberately. She now restricts herself to eating her chickens' dried mealworms!

My (Irish) mother used to sing something like -

Over in Killarney, many years ago
My mother sang a song to me in tones so sweet and low
Just a simple little ditty
In her good old Irish way
And I'd give the world if she could sing
That song to me this day

Toora Loora Loora, Toora Loora Li
Toora Loora Loora hush now don't you cry
Toora Loora Loora, Toora Loora Li
Toora Loora Loora, that's an Irish lullaby

I have no idea what it means but it's a lovely lilting tune.

It is a lovely tune. I used to teach singing to a group of Irish Travellers - they loved this one - but, to be honest they could not sing in tune! But they really enjoyed it!

Loving all these and they brought back a memory of a wee four line ditty that I made up to sing to DDs (1 and 2).

Princess Piddle and Princess Pong
Go to bed with nappies on.
You can bet that before too long,
Piddle will Piddle and Pong will pong.

They screamed with delight at the naughtiness but never knew which was which!

Brilliant!

Here is a song my young son sang to his teacher on the last day of term:-

One more day of school,
One more day of sorrow,
One more day in this old dump
And we'll be home tomorrow.
No more English no more French
No more sitting at the old school bench.
If the teacher interferes,
Blow her up or box her ears,
If that does not do the trick
Dynamite will make her sick.

Needless to say his teacher wasn't impressed. She said it was rather unkind to poor teachers.

Sign of the times: the line used to be 'No more Latin, no more French...'!

Indeed - tempus fugit!

Cari, we used to say a very similar rhyme when I was at school:

Slobber-dobber custard
Green snot pie
All mixed together with a dead dog's eye
Spread it on a butty, nice and thick
And wash it down with a cup of cold sick.

We obviously attended the same sort of unsavoury primary school!

My youngest GS would love that!

At Secondary School at the end of term we used to say.

Build a bonfire, build a bonfire, put the teachers on the top,
Put the prefects in the middle and burn the bloomin' lot.

We didn't say bloomin` of course.

My kids used to like this one:

Iggly wiggly was a worm
Iggly wiggly liked to squirm.
He squirmed onto the railway line
No more Iggly wiggly.

KatyK - your song bought a tear to my eye. I also had an Irish mum and she used to sing this to me - word for word the same

I went to the animal fair
the birds and the beasts were there
the big baboon by the light of the moon
was combing his auburn hair.
The monkey fell out of his bunk
and slid down the elephant's trunk
the elephant sneezed
and fell on his knees
and what became of the monkey monkey monkey . . . . .

"There was an old man called Michael Finnegan,
he grew whiskers on his chinnigan,
the wind came up and blew them in again,
poor old Michael Finnegan!"

Also one beginning "There was an old man who bumped his head" but I can't remember the rest.

My older brother also used to recite "Mr.Brown went to town,with his pants hanging down.Mr.Green saw the scene and put it in the paper!"

The last one would be hardly relevant today,as the fashion seems to be having your "pants" hanging off your bum anyway!