Do you remember calling for your friends to come out to play? What did you do??

Someone up thread mentioned Famous Five. The books were very popular with us children and if anyone had the good fortune to get a new one, we would gather together sitting outside someone’s house and take turns to read bits out loud! Some read better than others and some just listened, but all enjoyed. The forerunner of book groups?

Yes I called round to play with my one special friend she lived in a prefab , I lived in a council house in Suffolk. We made a seesaw out of a plank across a barrel she was lighter than me so needed more plank to even up the weight. Nearby was a beck that dried up in the summer leaving soft sand to play in , We caught slow worms basking under corrugated asbestos. A cart horse named Jock let us climb from the gate onto his back.

What happy days.

Love these memories. I too was sent out to play and not allowed in the house unless it was raining. When calling for friends we always had to use back doors, no one used their front doors in our terraced flats. Would spend hours gardening scrapping dirt from between the cobbles in our back street with a lolly stick. Would play all sorts of games in the nearby allotments, felt as if I was in the wildest depths of the countryside about 100 yards from our suburban terraces. Like others we would play in half demolished houses, walls partially collapsed and their papered walls, fireplaces and stairs exposed to view. One of my more adventurous friends would dare me to accompany her down drain tunnels and climb walls topped by glass. Somehow managed to grow up unscathed ?

Marbles, skipping and hopscotch as played on the road outside our house. Also use to play shops and collected conkers during the conker season. Yes friends always came to the back door and I can remember when I was in my teens a lad calling to take me to the youth club. My dad shouted XXXX theres a lad here for you, he has long blond hair like Jesus and is wearing a necklace. The embarrassment of it. He took me to the youth club on his bike, I sat on the handlebars and he peddled.

I used to play with two boys I knew from school.Usually walking to the recreation ground, which meant walking along the canal tow path. Don't know if my mother ever found out where we were going. She did find out about us playing on the railway line and that was stopped!

Yes all the time.Bulldog, hopscotch, skipping, french skipping, tree climbing, scrumpying,scooter rides, roller skating.Going to the park,swimming, bike rides.Reading, jigsaws simple but a great childhood.

I remember lying on the sidewalk wTch I never ants, swinging and teeter totter were huge! Lots of lovely cast-offs from Mom and Grandma for dress-up, my absolute fave! Had a cast-off fox wrap with head from an aunt. Hide and Seek, Kick the Can, Red River. Walked a half mile with a friend when I was 5 to catch a bus for swimming lessons. Roller skated down the basement steps once!!! Baked with my Grandma. Had to take a nap and a bath every afternoon. Dolls were a great favorite. We played "pretend" everything. Played Monopoly and Scrabble and Porches. Read. I miss those days.

Watching ants...
Played Red Rover not Red River
Finally, Parchesi not Porches ?

Barmeyoldbat

Marbles, skipping and hopscotch as played on the road outside our house. Also use to play shops and collected conkers during the conker season. Yes friends always came to the back door and I can remember when I was in my teens a lad calling to take me to the youth club. My dad shouted XXXX theres a lad here for you, he has long blond hair like Jesus and is wearing a necklace. The embarrassment of it. He took me to the youth club on his bike, I sat on the handlebars and he peddled.

? I remember a boy calling for me when I was about 12. My dad asked him why he wasn’t out playing football instead of ‘messing about with lasses’. I was mortified. The boy used to give me a ‘backie’ - back saddle on his bike - home from school. It was up a big hill so he must have been tired when we got to mine. Happy days.

When I first met my chum I was 4. My mother took me with her to see the new house we were going to live in. There was a girl in the neighbouring garden who was two years older and she asked my mother if she could take me with her. I was allowed to go with the girl who took me by the hand through her garden to her house. It was a warm summer day, and this girl's mummy was standing at a wide open sash window with a smaller girl than me in her arms. The little girl had curly dark hair and big brown eyes, This smaller girl was recovering from scarlet fever . She and I would become best chums.

We lived on a council estate in the middle of nowhere. Don't remember calling for friends but we were always out all day playing, in the street, in the fields, in the woods. Mum would have had no idea where we were but not a worry in those days.
When I was older, I remember children knocking on the door for the dog to come out to play. He was a very huge and gentle dog and loved children.

We lived right in the edge of the downs from the age of 8. There was also a golf course that was on the edge and the sole road of children used to play rounders on a teeing off square, hiding when the golfers came along.

Marbles in the gutter! Who would let their child do that today?

Make dens in hedges and secretly take matches, old frying pan, eggs etc and cook. I can remember eating egg with bits of twig in it.

Bikes, used to go miles. I can remember the feeling of elation with wind in my face and the freedom.

We used to be out all day only going back to eat when we were hungry.

Roller skates, and lots of street games.

We had so much freedom.

Not sole! Whole!

Whitewave - making dens in hedges and try to cook - these were hawthorn hedges which grew curved over dried up ditches.
We did that too and once set it alight when we tried to cook.
These memories - I used to think that I was the only one who had the freedom for adventures ( being so old) but good to know others enjoyed it too.

When we were 8 yrs old. One of our playmates died of the flu. During the holidays we used to scooter to the cemetery which was about 3 miles away with our sandwiches and pop. Sit beside her grave and have a picnic. We would chat away to her as if she was with us. The attendant would ask what we thought we were doing and we told him ‘we’re visiting our friend Pamela. He smiled and said don’t ride your scooters in the cemetery. . ?

I used walk to the beach for the day with my friend. We each had a sandwich, a drink of water (in a glass bottle), a towel and swimsuit. No sun lotion. We'd be gone all day until about five o'clock (when we thought it was time to go home, we asked strangers on the beach what the time was because neither of us had a watch). We were aged about ten or eleven at the time, definitely primary school age.