Win a Roberts radio and a copy of The Double Dangerous Book for Boys *NOW CLOSED*

Swimming of Formby beech also walking and playing hide and seek in the woods

Collecting wild flowers on the Derbyshire hillsides with my Nanna. She knew the names of all of them, and she bought me a flower press for my 9th birthday so I could press them and make cards from them.

Playing war games. A well-shaped tree branch would swiftly become a gun and our hand-knitted balaclavas, rolled up, transformed us instantly into commandos.

Books have been my greatest love always, but I did love my bike and the freedom it gave me!

Holidays at our cottage

We lived in a cul-de-sac backing on to an ancient woodland valley and as kids we loved playing unfettered there, and my best bit was fishing barefoot and bare handed for sticklebacks and minnows.

Oh, so many!
At junior school we had 'seasons' for each game and I never knew how we guaged when it was time to change seasons/games. In the playground there was French skipping (when elastic was more readily obtainable than it is these days) and rope skipping, which I absolutely loved, especially with songs like "Here comes Peter, here comes Paul" and we had to get in and out of the twirling rope without tripping up.
We had two-balls, bouncing them off the wall to the tune of "One two three o-lera, I know Sister Sarah ..."
Indoor games (also played outside) were board games like Scoop, Totopoly, Cluedo and Monopoly. I also played a lot of card Patience.
When living in Yemen there was no TV so Family Favourites (for the Forces) was a good for keeping up with the pop chart in England. Once back in the UK we would watch black and white Sunday afternoon matinee on the TV with half a crown's worth of sweets from the garage (I still have my own teeth).
As I got older, but still pre-teen, we would roller-skate on the airfield runways, play in the air-raid shelters or the woods, climb the grass covered hangars (forbidden activity!) or concentrate on our stamp collections or Enid Blyton books. There was always kiss-chase in the surrounding fields or roaming the countryside on our bikes. I even used to go to the village church and weed the graveyard - I still like things tidy.
And the summer always seemed so much sunnier in those days.

Etch a Sketch , reading Enid Blyton and listening to The Clitheroe Kid on the radio.

Haven't seen anyone playing with a whip and top for years! It was one of my favourite pastimes! Chalking a pattern on top of the top first!

Lying on my back, smelling Sunday dinner and watching clouds go by

I loved cut out dolls, with all the cut out clothes. Keep me busy for hours.

Reading ! Malory towers, Narnia books and the Secret Garden were all my favourites

I used to love crabbing in Christchurch harbour competing with my brothers to see who could catch the most and then watching them race back into the sea

I just YEARNED for a pony.
A palamino , 15 hands high preferably, or a chestnut, second choice.
Never mind that I lived in a small terrace house with a tiny back garden and six siblings.
I would turn the draughty outside toilet into a stable, and save all my Saturday 6d’s so that, like Jill in the ‘Jill’s Gymkhana’ books by Ruby Ferguson, I would be ready when a friendly farmer offered me a spare horse to look after. And of course my mother would let me keep it because she knew I would get up at the crack of dawn every day to muck it out. ( A good horsewoman always puts the horses needs before her own.)
I really fancied a pair of jodhpurs too.
I bought a tin of saddle polish, (2/6d), ready for the day, from a startled ‘Field & Country’ shopkeeper, and tied a pillow over my headboard as a saddle, using yards and yards of string to fashion a bridle, snaffle, stirrups, girth and reins so that I could practice my rising trot, and mounting and dismounting technique. This lasted one long, magic, imagination-fuelled summer. Where was the next pony-club gymkhana ...because I was ready for my rosettes!
I still have ALL the Jill books, but alas, never even sat on a pony.
Ahh, happy days!

Riding my bike all day

Building tunnels and secret dens in the hay bales. Hours of fun.

I loved my Spirograph, I could spend hours creating ever more complicated designs.

My favourite playground activities were leapfrog and skipping. Skipping was a communal activity with a long rope turned by a child at each end. I loved jumping in, singing a rhyme then out the other side and back round to join the queue for another go. Sometimes we got really ambitious and used two ropes at a time turned in opposite directions. With a really long rope we would see how many participants we could get clearing the rope before it got caught up in someone’s legs. Hours of fun at no cost at all.

playing "peavers" on the pavement at our front door. The "bed" was chalked out and an old polish tin was the peaver. We would play for hours

Loved hopscotch ,skipping reading Enid Blyton books and colouring with my pencil crayons.
Now in my old age I still love to read and sketch.

Catching minnows on family walks in the countryside and crabs on family holidays to the seaside - we always put the crabs back in the water but I think I remember taking the minnows home (and I'm really not sure what became of them then!)

We lived in a crescent with very little traffic so played on my tricycle and used chalk for hopscotch with my friends.

I used to love den-building or damming the stream. Still do these with our Grandchildren!

Growing up in London & being a tomboy, riding my Chopper Bike & playing with marbles in the coal hole covers on the pavement.

Big family get togethers playing palour games for me

Loved going to Brownies and just playing 'tag' in the street before being called in for tea and Batman!