Sentimentality -what items do you keep?

A small white elephant from a gypsy fortune teller who was remarkably prescient and did not expect any money for her throwaway advice.

An old plastic lettuce shaker from a dear old village ironmongers that is long closed.

A funny little tiny brass urn that I found in an old stone wall.

My son's old teddy now without his legs .

I don’t have clutter or barely any ornaments in my house, but I have kept boxes and boxes of sentimental letters, paperwork, objects, clothes - and I quite often go through a box, shed a few tears, and put it all back again. I have attached a label to most things so that when my children eventually sift through my things they will know why, for example, a cracked old plate has been kept, and then can decide for themselves whether to keep or throw away.

shysal
Love it, the idea and the cushion. ,??

My children's birth name tags.
A child's 'magic' glove worn by one of them.
A gold paper crown from a cracker.
A carved wooden necklace from a child.
A small gol***
Joshua tree seeds.
A million pounds or more would not induce me to part with any of these.
All their cards letters/notes to me.

I have a small (about 3" x 3") knitted square that was the first piece of knitting my daughter did. My better half has a tape that his dad made - it was a recording of his grandad discussing everything from his wartime job ("went to join the navy and travel the world - got a job on the river Thames"), to married life, his poverty-stricken childhood, the trainers he was given as a 70th birthday present (and "walked to the beach every day as that's what trainers are for") etc - he listens to it every few years or so and is one of the few sentimental things he cherishes. I recently shredded a few decades worth of my old diaries as part of my de-cluttering and next have to tackle a few big boxes of photos not in albums - as I can't even remember some of the people in them I'm hoping to end up with just a small box after filling the few small new albums and few pages left in existing ones. Also on my hit list is a drawer full of various cards and letters that are purely sentimental and no use or interest to anyone so most, if not all, will have to go.

We’re a sentimental lot aren’t we? Perhaps our AC will get to be more sentimental as they age.

unfortunately i "lost" a lot of my treasured items many years ago at the time of my divorce. i do still have a highland doll my dad bought for my mum, it was one of the last things he ever bought as she died less than a year later. my daughter has no such sentementality so most of my stuff will end up in the bin!

i keep photographs and a few items like cards from my daughters childhood.a few ornaments.......got my mums old coins pre-war.but as you get older you dont want all this clutter...am getting everything put on disc,so that the photos dont ever fade.

Far too much despite saying that I am not sentimental! A friend has passed to me a collection of letters written by me to her when she was at boarding school. As I am four years older, these make fascinating reading as a snapshot of being young in London doing my first job and living a very busy life on very little money. I have kept them so that if she is interested DGD1 can meet the young me and know that I wasn’t always an old lady. They detail my first meetings with her grandfather, our courtship and the run up to the wedding at which the recipient of the letters was chief bridesmaid, as well as early married life and the birth of DD and DS.

I downsized 21 years ago, and from that day I have resisted the temptation to save sentimental items. However, when the GCs were toddler,s I couldn't bring myself to clean the fingerprints off the bottom of my french windows until ages after they had visited. Now that they are more or less grown up I keep the design or message that they leave on my sequinned cushion until the next time.

I have my children's first shoes and other items from when they were small. Also i keep my mum's last handbag and everything she had in it, if i open it, even ten years later it still smells of her.

A box filled with a treatment diary I wrote when my son was being treated for Leukaemia and precious things from his time in hospital as the treatment was unsuccessful and he died .

The birth cards/tags for him and his sisters. A first dress each that the girls wore. A small china dish that my mother gave me.

Cards from my children and friends, some of whom are now dead. A set of cups and saucers and a pair of earings that my daughter bought me with her first “ own money”.

Old photos and all my qualification diplomas/degrees .

I have down sized massively when I moved house so had to let some stuff go but couldn’t throw everything out. It’s up to my children what they do with them as I won’t be here but I have asked them not to throw heir brothers things out

shizam that’s sad!

DH says if we ever leave here we will have to hack the plaster off of the wall with the height markings on them. At the moment though, it is still being used GS has grown 4 inches in the last 6 months and now pats me on the head......

I have taken photos though, when we redecorated we painted around it, so it’s looking a bit grubby, well after 16 years it would be!

Also. Have just got decorator to paint over height chart we did in kitchen. Took a photo. And decided it had to go...

I’ve binned virtually everything bar degree certificates etc. There is still a huge box of photos to deal with. And much more. Honestly think next generation do not want to inherit this load of memories. They have their own to make.

I forgot to mention my collection of Royal Ballet programmes from the early sixties, some of them autographed by Margot Fonteyn and /or Rudolf Nureyev. I was a student and sat in the very cheapest seats, miles from the stage, using the opera glasses provided for sixpence in the slot. It was very difficult to get tickets, and we often queued all night.

I kept lots of other theatre programmes, too, but decided to throw them out when I discovered them in an attic at my parents’ house many years ago. Now I wish I’d kept them.

My grandma's baking tins which I still use regularly. A pottery black cat with a broken ear that sat by my grandfather's chair on their hearth. Hospital tags from dc etc are precious but my grandparents things remind me that they were born in the Edwardian era and lived to see man walk on the moon

I’m incredibly sentimental and have quite a lot of things from both grandmothers. I was very close to one of them and when she died a few years ago my parents found a huge cardboard box in her wardrobe that was full of my drawings and things I’d done over the years. It still makes me cry to think she kept them all, the box is now at my parent’s house as I can’t bear to throw them out. I’ve also got a collection of resin bears that used to reside on my grandma’s dressing table, my toddler (who is named after my grandma) is now attached to them and carries them all over!

I have kept waaaay too much stuff! Birthday cards, my daughter's baby books, their first drawings at nursery (they are 35 and 40 now). Clothes that I wore when I was a hippy chick in the early 70s , my dear old dad's army book and a myriad of photographs etc etc. Oh dear, I must clear stuff out before I die and otherwise my children will have a hell of job!

Unwashed..... So I could smell baby ?

A gold pendant my father bought my mother for their silver wedding anniversary, he died only 2 years later when I was still in infant school. It is too precious to me to wear because I'm scared I'll lose it.
My mother's first passport from the days when you could add a child to an adult passport. She only got it so that me and her could go to visit my brother and Sil in North Africa where he was working.
A birthday card handwritten by my brother, a rare item because my Sil always wrote the cards and a cross stitch card my Sil made for me on my graduation.
A lock of my niece's hair and a recording of my nephew with his band.
The first card my WP (wonderful partner) ever sent me and the first valentine gift he bought me, a love spoon.

When my son got married and moved to the other side of the world I also remarried and so had to have a clear out as we were putting the contents of two houses into one.

I made up an album and a box for my son. It had his hospital baby wrist band. Romper suit he wore for a photo on his first birthday. His grandfather's work union card, Pipe, penknife and baccy pouch. The album had photos and also his first school report and his last school report before uni. And a copy of his Ph.d certificate. His first swimming certificate for 50 yards.

His christening certificate and the Bible he was given in BB. Plus other small items.

When his son was a few months old he sent me one of baby's winter hats, unwashed. I treasure that hat. It hangs on the corner of my bedroom mirror.

My Grandma's China tea set and my Great Grandma's brass bell which was on the counter of her grocers shop. I feel that I should label these items as my family may forget who they belonged to. I'm sure one of them may want to hold onto them.
I have the children's name/weight cards from their hospital cribs and their wrist name tags.

Al the letters my husband sent me during the war and when he was working in Italy. Photos of myself three moths old and nine months old, hospital note about the birth of my son, mine and my sons school reports. My school certificate and typing and shorthand certificates. Homemade birthday cads made by my children when they were little. My and my husbands army passbooks. Wartime ration books. My sons boatshaped feeding bottle. Etc.