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Share a pic of the house you grew up in and win £100 John Lewis voucher -WINNING PICTURE ANNOUNCED

126 replies

RachelMumsnet · 08/07/2013 16:34

To celebrate the publication of Lisa Jewell's latest book The House We Grew Up In we're inviting you to send in pictures of the house that you grew up in with a short caption.

Whether it's a shot of the exterior or a room indoors, a garden or even piece of furniture or ornament but all pics must be evocative of your childhood. Post your pics up before the end of 22 July, write a short caption, and we'll create a carousel of our favourite ten pics on 23 July. Each person who makes the shortlist of ten will receive a copy of The House We Grew Up in. Author Lisa Jewell will then choose the winning photo from the ten and we'll announce the winner on Thursday 25 July. The winner will receive a £100 voucher for John Lewis.

More about The House We Grew up in by Lisa Jewell

Meet the Bird Family

All four children have an idyllic childhood: a picture-book cottage in a country village, a warm, cosy kitchen filled with love and laughter, sun-drenched afternoons in a rambling garden.

But one Easter weekend a tragedy strikes the Bird family that is so devastating that, almost imperceptibly, it begins to tear them apart.

The years pass and the children become adults and begin to develop their own quite separate lives. Soon it's almost as though they've never been a family at all.

Almost. But not quite.

Because something has happened that will call them home, back to the house they grew up in - and to what really happened that Easter weekend all those years ago.

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Tee2072 · 08/07/2013 17:16

I have no pictures of the house I grew up in. Bummer.

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YouveCatToBeKittenMe · 08/07/2013 17:34

I have a picture of ever single stage of the house I grew up in
from the brochure of the street when the estate was planned, to the house from 2 bricks high to completion (1962) and the house prices list.
I do not have a photo of it when it was sold as it was too hard and a bit neglected by then
Think it might be too soon to scan some in...but I'll try.

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katelordbrown · 08/07/2013 17:44

My father built the Devon house I grew up in. In the mid 70s we moved to a tiny village, the highest point between Exmoor and Dartmoor - my childhood was like 'The Good Life' meets Enid Blyton. This was taken the winter day the first fire was lit - no floorboards, no windows, snow outside. A magical moment when the house finally felt like home.

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DuchessofMalfi · 08/07/2013 18:16

Wish I could but it was demolished 10 years ago :o

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MaggieMaggieMaggieMcGill · 08/07/2013 18:20

What if you didn't grow up in a house?

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RachelMumsnet · 09/07/2013 10:38

@MaggieMaggieMaggieMcGill

What if you didn't grow up in a house?

Sorry we didn't mean to exclude anyone from entering the comp - we're just using 'house' as a generic term for 'home' as it's the title of Lisa Jewell's book. Post up pics of where ever you lived when you were growing up.

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griffster · 09/07/2013 10:52

Our house...in the middle of our street! we always used to sing that well known song as our house was at the end of the culdisac in Breadsall in Derby. I remember warm afternoons with the aroma of tarmac, riding our bikes with plastic bread tags on our spokes, gulping down bottles of Cronona limeade and saving the bottles to get 10p of our next one. Fond memories..although my brother and mine's matching haircuts had been forgotten until I dug these old pictures out...mum...what were you thinking?!

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SoupDragon · 09/07/2013 10:54

This is easy to do if you were born in the digital age. Less so with a film based childhood.

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RachelMumsnet · 09/07/2013 12:07

Oh sorry we didn't think this would be difficult. We just thought people would take a picture of a photo on their phones and upload. Don't stress about the quality of the photo - that's not what the comp's about - it's more about gathering pics that are evocative of the places you grew up.

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SoupDragon · 09/07/2013 12:37

I could phone my parents and ask them to sort it. But they are in their 70s and every time they try to scan a photo and email it it involves several hours on the phone to me before they finally print it and stick it in the post. :)

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ouryve · 09/07/2013 16:45

We moved a lot, as my dad was in the army. The first two houses I lived in are now demolished (one was a congrete low rise block of flats, the other a concrete prefab). No photos, I'm afraid and no one house counts as the one I grew up in.

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Livvylongpants · 09/07/2013 16:47

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

piprabbit · 09/07/2013 16:57

I grew up here - we moved in when it was new.
There was a lovely garden with lots of fruit trees, a bug veggie patch etc. It backed on to open fields and a small lake (nesting swans every spring).

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JakeBullet · 09/07/2013 17:44

Think I might win the prize for one if the crappiest places to grow up. Funnily enough I remember it all being quite fun though, I even belong t a Facebook group called "I grew up on the Five Links estate and survived"

Couldn't find a photo of the actual house though...not posh enough for that!

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Breezy1985 · 09/07/2013 18:24

I live opposite the house I grew up in, my mum still lives there and it still feels like home to me

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MikeLitoris · 09/07/2013 18:26

I lived in about 10 different houses by the age of 16 and I have no pictures of any of them.

Surprisingly depressing thread

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KnittedWaffle · 09/07/2013 18:36

Thanks for starting this thread! I've really enjoyed reminiscing about my childhood. This is the house I spent the first 13 years of my life in (thankyou Internet). I can still remember the house phone number!
The memories I have in that house are really special, particularly as my dad died when I was a teenager so we didn't get to make many more together.

The gates on the left used to be wooden and painted white and my parents have a photo of me aged about 2 poking my head through. It was a very sunny day and I had a floppy flowery sunhat on. According to my dad, just after the picture was taken I got my head stuck!
I also remember standing on top of the porch holding my dad's hand thinking I was so high up as I could see all around.

You can just about see that the neighbours don't have a garage - obviously they still haven't replaced it after the hurricane in '87 blew it down.
I also remember the time my friend was riding his bike too fast, the handlebars came off and he went head over heels into my Kim's flowerbed where I'd been digging up all her slug pellets :)

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KnittedWaffle · 09/07/2013 18:40

Just wanted to share this one too (thanks again, Internet!)
My dad was a keen craftsman (he made all out furniture/wooden toys etc.) and on the left is a banister with an acorn on the end that've made from scratch way back in the 80s
He would be proud to know it was still going strong over 20 years after we moved out!

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ItsSoFluffyImGonnaDie · 09/07/2013 18:44

I lived here until I was 4, in north London before moving out to the shires. We had red patterned carpet and black and orange sofas! I can't be sure if my memories are real or whether I've matched them up to stories I've been told

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KnittedWaffle · 09/07/2013 18:46

*mum's flowerbed, not Kim's!!

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Sneets · 09/07/2013 19:39

My house (maisonettes on council estate) has been knocked down.

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GibberTheMonkey · 09/07/2013 20:42

Seeing as I love floor plans. This is more how the house is now than when I grew up. My parents still own it though they don't live their anymore. I had a brilliant childhood growing up here.
My bedroom was the larger of the singles on the top floor

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KnittedWaffle · 09/07/2013 21:02

I didn't add a caption to mine (and am rubbish at this sort of thing) but here goes . . .

For my second picture, which has the banister my dad made still in it:
This house was built with love, improved with memories and long after we sold it I still remember it as home.

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CalamityJ · 09/07/2013 21:37

The house I grew up in is currently for sale and the owners have RUINED the interior. It was early 80s when I lived there so 70s decor but boy have the owners who bought it off us turned it into an even worse decorated house (and it didn't seem possible!) So because the interior is so different and they've paved over the beautiful front garden my mum cultivated (including the very low branched tree we used to sit in) I thought I'd include a picture of the back garden. My dad who has 0 DIY skills laid the patio when I was 2. My mum left him in charge of me running around the back garden and I now have a Harry Potter scar where the patio slabs left their mark! One of these slabs has my blood on it still!

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CalamityJ · 09/07/2013 21:44

Maybe my caption should be "This house really left its mark on me"

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