Strange and Daft Childhood Pastimes

Cute!

Thank you Fanny for this inspired barmy thread a welcome break from Covid.

Following on from my own creative efforts with clods of mud and large stones which in my mind was going to be turned into something tasty, my son aged about 3 would pick leaves from a privet hedge and place them into his wheelbarrow telling me they were "PG Tips". inspired by the ad at the time, all ready to be turned into a nice cup of tea

keeping slugs as pets in glass jars! Gave them food not quite sure what it was can't remember

My Grandad use to Show pure bred Rabbits, and won many prizes at the shows. When I was about 7years old, I was sometimes allowed to accompany him to a few local ones. One Day be returned from a show with a Pure bred Blue Bevan Doe, which he gave me for my Birthday. The problem was, that from watching him and his Rabbits, I had learned a 'Little too much too soon' and allowed some of the Bucks to Run free with the Does on the Lawn whilst he was at work, and the resulting offspring were far from Purebreds, and only suitable for the local Pet market!
Needless to say, as soon as I got caught out, each hutch was fitted with a small padlock!

My dad used to challenge me as a nipper (my uncles’s word I love it - Oldham) to see which of us could empty a milk bottle of water down the sink the fastest. (Remember the days of rinsing them out to put by the front door - empties - for the milkman the next morning?).

Anyway.
He always, always won. I was just emptying mine and hoping each time I’d win.

Then he let me into his ‘secret’. Something to do with centrifugal force or some such - he was an engineer. You had to turn the bottle upside down and then spin it fast so the water inside circled the bottle and shot out faster.

Small things kept me amused obviously ...

We had a long coffee table that my dad had made in the otherwise empty front room. My brother and I would turn it upside down and it was a boat, or on its end and it was a rocket or right side up with a sheet, it was a tent, although we could only lie down in it!

I also had a pet slug, called Sooty, which I kept in an old drawer outside.

My dad collected football coupons from friends and had to stamp a reference number on them. I used his stamp in my books, like a library date stamp, so friends would return them to me.

We lived in a large Victorian end terraced house and my brother and I used to walk along the narrow outside ledge of the bannister, which went along the hallway upstairs and round a corner. Then we would climb onto the landing over it. There was a big drop over the stairwell and I am so surprised that neither of us slipped, or fell, as my brother was so clumsy and four years younger than me. Looking back - I'm horrified now.

? ? ? Urmston
Glad you’re safely back in UK ?
One of my school friends was cruelly nicknamed Nijinsky by the boys in our class. They said she had a long face like a horse.

At my secondary school, probably in Year 7, two girls used to pretend to be horses. They would ‘neigh’, shake their manes, ‘canter’ themselves around the quad... I hung out with other girls (thankfully).
?
Can’t recall their names.
Maybe Dobbin and Beauty or some such.

I used to make "perfume" too Fanny Lots of little jugs and glass jars full of murky liquid! Seem to remember using food colouring too which looked slightly better!

I had a little toy mangle which I used to put worms through....

Would spend hours high up in a large cherry tree reading. As the youngest of five it was the only place I could get any peace and quiet!

*ones

Maybe not the posh one lemongrove!

Urmstongran

In the summer months, my sister and I used to love pressing the soft tar blobs that appeared in between the cobbles in the ‘entry’ behind our rented terraced house in Old Trafford ...

Yep, two weird kids.
?

Didn’t all children do this though??
Also the rose petal water thing, and making pretend stew in the garden in an old pan, and looking in flowers for fairies.
Mind you....not many boys did the last three things.
Asking neighbouring adults if they had any bottles they wanted taking back to the shop (I knew they would give me a few pennies for myself.)?

In autumn on dewy mornings, we'd take small forked twigs and twizzle them around the spiders' webs in privet hedges. The layers of web grew thicker and stronger until it was a rubbery mess which we called spider glass as it was clear enough to see through.

Puzzler61
Not just me then! ..I just remember this as one happy summer ... it didn’t seem odd at all .... we were both totally “ in the moment “ as they say ..... wonder when I stopped being so imaginative?!

You’ve just reminded me of another one hf59.
Our secondary school taught German language and in the first summer holiday after doing it for a year, my friend and I would walk around speaking to each other in German. We thought people would believe we were Germans (although our families were well known in our town).
The innocence of being young ......

My friend and I spent one summer holiday “in character” - she was Holmes and I was Watson - investigating mysteries around the town - did the voices and I had a pretend pipe which I smoked ...best was going out digging in gardens when it got dark ... thrilled to dig up some bones ones night (lord knows what they were - chicken?

We used to have a large plastic flamingo in our rockery ( didn't everyone ? ) I remember my daily 'must- have' event was to clamber on the birds back , shouting to anyone who might be interested " I'm doing t' duck "
I hope I meant riding t' duck!

Another good thread from FannyCornforth.

I used to cut out families and furniture from old catalogues, rooms were shoe boxes and the people could shop for anything they wanted from the catalogue.

We used to get in mum and dads bed, pull the sheet up over our heads and pretend we were in a wagon train (covered wagon).

I remember swinging on the garden swing, and belting out well known songs. I’d learn all the words and was convinced I would become a singer one day. I had, and still have a bad voice for singing.
I had an imaginary friend Fanny, and that’s all I’ll say about it. My family laugh about it even now. ?

I used to catch butterflies with my fishing net and put them in my little one man tent.
When I had about a dozen I would sit in the tent with them all fluttering frantically around my head until mother would come out and demand that I released them.

I used to love watching heavy rain fall onto wet ground and said to my dad they looked like sprouts growing a field. I was quite disappointed when he told me they grew on stalks and not out of the ground!

I also thought weeping willows should be called ‘dripping wet trees’.

Hiding pennies under clods of earth to "discover" later.

Collecting dropped unused matches and trying to create a fire from twigs. (...also used a magnifying glass unsuccesfully.}

Wrapping up odds and ends from the junk drawer and giving them to my mum as a present. (She was delighted!)

Using the piano stool with lift up lid as my "office" desk. (I still love stationery.)

Digging deep holes in the garden to look for water and/or treasure.

Making a raft from stalks of grass - it didn't float well.

...what a nice trip down memory lane!

I used to play greengrocer shops in my friend Sandra's garden. We used grass as cabbage, stones as potatoes etc.
I remember the rag and bone man giving us a live chick I'm exchange for rags. Can you imagine? We gave the poor creature a bath and then made him a home out of a cornflake box. He didn't survive very long. We also painted our tortoise's name on his shell with nail varnish.

Used to climb on the wooden headboard at the top of mum and dad’s bed, (very dangerous), steady myself, then let myself dive forwards, arms outstretched, landing with a thump on the bed, probably damaging the springs.

Also used to ride on the back of the settee, pretending it was a pony.
Always wanted a pony (sigh).