What did you save money for as a child?

got 1shilling and six pence a week, sixpence for sweets, sixpence for a stamp (can't remember if Prince Charles or Princess Anne) on a card to save for a £1 premium bond and 6d for the Satuday morning pictures, but I had to take my little brother and sister. Never taught me to save I'm almost 70 and been in and out of debt all my live

I used to save up for Xmas and my Dad told me that whatever I had saved by Dec' 01st, he'd double it.
I can remember going to the post office with my savings book for the first time and having the princely sum of £6.00 to spend on gifts.
I was so proud of myself.

I was forced to put my birthday money in the bank for years. Then when I was twelve I desperately wanted ice skates. To my surprise I was allowed to withdraw my money from the bank and buy them! My parents were right all along lol.

I was given three pence a day, (a threpenny bit), to spend on sweets or anything else at the tiny shop next to the primary school. "Oh I wish I'd looked after me teeth!!"

I remember saving up my own pocket money for the first time to buy a small flowering pot plant for my mother, for Mothers' Day. I'd seen it in a local greengrocer's window. It was a begonia, I think. It would have been very cheap, but at the time I thought it was a really special gift for her. Bless her, she made a really big fuss when I gave it to her as if it was a diamond necklace.

I remember the stamps with Prince Charles and Princess Anne, - no idea really what they were for. But I tried to get a Lucky Bag on Friday's - again no idea how much they were, but I did not always have enough money - and then Bunty comic - remember those.

I got all the way down to the jeweller's aged 16 and they refused to do it .. I needed written permission from the parents...dear☺️☺️

That should have said drat ?

Sago Brutus jeans - I've been thinking about those recently. They were the best!

I saved my pennies in my moneybox for my summer holiday at our caravan. We had to save or we didn't have money for the amusements and candy floss. Once your money was finished that was it, you had to make sure it stretched for the 2 weeks.
I also remember saving for a red skateboard that was in a toy shop window. I rode my bike down to town the day I finally had all the money for it. I put it in my basket on my bike and rushed home to have a go on it. I was lying on the pavement more than I was upright on the stupid thing.

I used to save up for records and cassette tapes. Once a week I'd buy 'The Bunty'. I always wanted my pocket money in lots of small value coins as it looked more]grin] and was easier not to spend it all at once.

I saved up to buy my parents and sister their Christmas presents.

Not because I was a saintly child, but because this was the only form of expenditure my mother would let me use savings for without criticising my choices.

If I tried saving up for anything else, rollar skates, which I so badly wanted when I was eight, or a bike later on, I was told I couldn't have them, as the roads were too dangerous for me t use them.

Anything else I wanted was vetoed on similar, never very good grounds. So I learned that there was no point in trying to change my mother's mind.

When I started work, I bought my mother a present with my first earnings - this was customary in Glasgow. I don't know whether it applied elsewhere, but both girls and boys bought their mother a present with their first earnings.

After that I saved hard for over a year to buy a travelling alarm clock I had fallen in love with and finally bought it.

I was thrilled with it, until I got home and showed my mother it and she immediately said sourly, "Fancy paying that amount for an alarm clock!"

Once I left home, I tried hard not to show her anything I had really wanted and bought for myself.

I didn't manage to hide the gorgeous summer dress, full-length in unbleached cotton with inset crotched bands, the year being 1973, which my mother greeted with, "What a lovely nightie!"

I never put that dress on again without hearing that remark!

I knew even then that she didn't mean to be unkind, she just was one of those who "spoke as they felt" and considered it a virtue (in themselves).

Heaven help my sister or I if we had made similar remarks about anything my mother bought!

I saved every penny I was given to buy a pair of Jacko roller skates. They were the first rubber wheeled skates made. It took the best part of a year to get enough money together. I was only around eight years old. The joy of getting them has never left me, especially as I had to find the money myself. I appreciated them far more than if I had been given them.

Shinamae

Callistemon

I kept saving for a pony but I never saved enough.
Goodness knows where I would have kept this pony - in the back garden with Dad's shed for a stable.

Does anyone remember taking money into school and we would get a Post Office savings stamp to put in a book then they were paid into a PO savings account?

If it’s the same one I’m thinking of the blue one had Prince Charles on and the green one had Princess Anne on, but I can’t remember the amounts they were for....

Prince Charles was 2/6d but poor old Anne was only 6d. Even at the age of 6 I felt that was unfair! We were given money every Friday to buy the stamps at school.

I also used to love books, Enid Blyton and Noel Streatfield are the ones I remember buying. I also used to love the I Spy activity books. When I got older I used to save to buy records.

Sago I too saved up to have my ears pierced. Had enquired at local jewellers who only provided gold loops so quite costly. After what seemed an eternity I marched off with a friend to have the deed done only to be told by the assistant I had to have an adult with me, I was 12. Returned home absolutely devastated. Eventually DM got it out of me why I was upset and relented to allow me to have it done. However as secondary school did not allow wearing of earrings (can you imagine that nowadays) I had to wait until the next summer holidays so that my ears would be healed enough to take out the sleeper type earrings and go without for school days. Still enjoy wearing my earrings.

I remembered that Charles was 2/6 and Anne 6d and did save those in school too. I found this when I googled to check
www.ebay.co.uk/itm/373404324803?chn=ps&norover=1&mkevt=1&mkrid=710-134428-41853-0&mkcid=2&itemid=373404324803&targetid=1140163972769&device=c&mktype=pla&googleloc=1006886&poi=&campaignid=12128858833&mkgroupid=117045676459&rlsatarget=pla-1140163972769&abcId=9300480&merchantid=101713887&gclid=Cj0KCQjwsLWDBhCmARIsAPSL3_0AOG-0KcHjOa7MlhX0buhmJtq1DQJdiGHYKRBRAG7jGeLUKi9-4H0aAlKfEALw_wcB

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/I-B-National-Savings-Princess-Anne-6d-1960-/363319144063?var=0&mkevt=1&mkcid=1&mkrid=710-53481-19255-0&campid=5338268676&toolid=10044&customid=Cj0KCQjwsLWDBhCmARIsAPSL3_2QlzY4pcWzR7gDtQ_NgDVIYgw5sKK4IJjelNeFyuM-77L7sfG-KxIaAoSjEALw_wcB

I used to buy matchbox cars, and save in my big yellow piggybank for our summer holidays (a fortnight in a caravan in Swanage - I loved those holidays), on holiday I would buy Enid Blyton books; mainly Famous Five ones, but my absolute favourite was a different one called the valley of adventure (or something very similar)

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

I did save and by the time I got married aged 19 I had £1,000 saved. When I was little I had my shilling pocket money changed into pennies and I put them all in the bubble gum machine outside the sweetshop. I was always pleased if I got one or two of the little trinket gifts as well as the gum balls.

We didn't have pocket money - times were hard when I was a child, as some of the grans here have posted. But occasionally one of my Grandmothers would give my sis and me a sixpence. We would always save them to buy family birthday and Christmas presents in the future. My children (born in more affluent times) thought this very strange; the money they were given went into their money boxes to spend on stuff for them. Times are even more different now - my littlest grandson told me the other day he has five hundred in his money box!

I was about 13 too when I went and pierced my ears against my parents wishes, but I did have proper gold studs put in I'm just surprised my mum just didn't make me take sleepers out so the holes would heal.
As for pocked money I saved it and bought things my parents would not buy me, books, comics, magazines

As a young teenager I saved like mad to buy a guitar,(Saturday job on a market stall) but after about 3 lessons I couldn't get the hang of it. I have no patience! It's somewhere in my loft now. Wonder if it's worth something!

Hearing about some of you having your ears pierced- I was TAKEN by my mother on a 'buy one get one free' promotion, when I was 12 I was devastated and I let them heal over on purpose, pretty soon after,

Nothing...money burned a hole in my pocket and has continued to do so!