What’s your first memory??

[Goodnightjude1]

I was just discussing this with my OH who said his first memory was from when he was around 2yo and his cousins had come over and they were trying to get him in trouble by telling him to hit them, then they’d go in and tell their parents.

I sat for a while thinking but I can’t remember anything from before I was about 5yo.... I remember nagging my mum to play a game with me and she said no, because she’d just sat down to read the paper. I don’t know why I remember that but nothing before then...or nothing more important.

What are your first memories?

Banging my head when I fell over at nursery and needing stitches. My mum worked at the nursery at the time so I was about 2 or 3 ish.

Reaching up on tiptoe and finally being able to reach the frontroom door handle and open the door myself. Around 18 months/2years old. I can still remember the feeling of triumph and excitement at suddenly being able to touch it (must’ve had a mini growth spurt).

I can remember lying on my back looking up at the kitchen light. I think I was having my nappy changed.
I can also remember crawling up and down in my cot, roaring, pretending I was a lion in the zoo. I had measles at eighteen months and when I was a bit better, they brought my cot downstairs in a corner of the kitchen and I remember being there, playing with my grandfather, while my mother was cooking.
I also remember how much I hated having reins on, how snug and warm I was in my pushchair with the cover on and being put on my pony for the first time, at about two.
Actually, the more I think about it, the more flashes of memory come back...

Just under three and my little sister coming home from hospital. She gave me and my older sister gifts - a couple days old and already so smart!

My parents bringing a baby home and me being utterly aghast at it. I was 3 1/2 at the time.
With hindsight I can't believe that even they wouldn't have mentioned an impending baby, but it was certainly never made that clear what was actually going to happen

I remember being in a cot with my twin sister and the cot had a yellow spotted sheet and a yellow blanket that was scratch and had holes in (a cellular blanket) we must have been between one and two

I am pretty sure I remember my baby sister coming home. I remember lying on a bed next to her looking at her and feeling happy. I also remember being given a gift that day, a little tea set. I would have been two years old.

The other very early memory is not so nice. I think I was in hospital getting my tonsils out. I was in a dark room and felt scared. I was crying and a nurse was cross with me. I am not sure how old I was but I was in a crib.

My dad carrying me out of hospital and the nurses shouting him as the children on my ward had made me a card. It was a day or two after my second birthday.

Being potty trained. It would have been the summer nearest my second birthday (which is when you were meant to do it back in the olden days ), so I would have been about 22 months. Mum put my teddy on the potty and poured water into behind its back as if it was weeing. I thought "If he can do that, so can I" and so I did. The thing is, I knew what she was doing and I was aware that I was meant to think/do that.

@StCharlotte That made me smile, I too was very aware of when I was being made to think something.

I remember being in my cot, which was white.

Aged two or three, I had shoes similar to these. I remember putting them on my bare feet myself, and running away from my mum, who pursued me round the room so she could "do the buckles up". Although I loved the shoes, I didn't like them done up, because my feet felt trapped, and I couldn't take them off myself.

I remember being at a party, aged four or five, watching the other children playing pin the tail, and not understanding why they all got it in the wrong place. Then it was my turn; the party mum blindfolded me, and it was a shock when I couldn't see a thing! I spent the rest of the party wondering why I couldn't even see the colourful scarf when it was tied over my eyes.

My earliest is my brother being born at Christmas when I was 2 nearly 3. I have lots from when I was 3 and 4.

I’m loving this thread. My eldest is 5 and my twins are 2. Going by this, the eldest is certainly collecting some lifelong memories and the twins might keep a few vague ones.

What I love about these memories is that most (but not all) are quite innocuous. Or at least innocuous from an adult perspective. It makes me reflect on how the world is so very different from the perspective of a very young child, and how the mundane can be magical.

Sitting in a bus shelter waiting for an ambulance after our family was in quite a serious car accident. I was 3

It makes me reflect on how the world is so very different from the perspective of a very young child, and how the mundane can be magical.

@PaddyF0dder

Another of my early memories is sitting in the (real life!) boat that was in the outdoor area at playgroup, singing 'Row, Row, Row Your Boat' with my mum. It's the first memory I have of really appreciating her instead of just taking her for granted, and feeling overwhelmed with love for her. I was 2.

There are some lovely memories here! I’m trying hard to remember anything pre 5/6 but I can’t! I’ve seen so many photos of myself at that age, that when I think of myself as a 4 year old, I just see the photos 😕 oh well, it’s nice reading about everyone else’s memories!

My Dad took me out for the day and bought me a big red balloon. Recently I spoke to him and mentioned it, I was 2 😊

My earliest memories are age 3, but I don't know what order.

• Falling in a local pond. I'd been eating hula hoops and my dad took me home for a bath. I don't know how much is 'reconstructed' from hearing it but I distinctly remember the hula hoops and the bath afterward!

• decorating a paper plate with green glitter in nursery, and the day we had a Teddy bears picnic there.

• Being given a red balloon after we'd been to the cinema (Beauty and the Beast). My older brother had one too, and my parents kept warning him to keep it away from the prickly hedge. He didn't and it popped!

A cake covered in pink buttercream on a blanket on a concrete floor (courtyard of the army flats we lived in at the time) and me standing with a birthday present refusing to smile for the camera. I liked the present but I recommend a strong feeling of not wanting to smile just because I was told to. It was my second birthday.

I remember my 3rd birthday. I desperately wanted a specific gift and I got it and was utterly delighted. I don't have a great memory but that one is very clear. I can even remember the wrapping paper.

I cannot remember how old but before I started school. I told mum I could not wait! Er yes I could. Hated it from the first day until I left!

I can pin point it accurately. 2 years 8 months. Being held up to a window by my dad and peering through it to see my new born baby brother. It was the maternity hospital - no mums just a room with lots of babies in cots.

Quite early. I remember my little sister having naps in the massive old silver cross pram. She was born 18months after me. Using a potty on the stairs. Being a naked toddler in the garden. Lots of snapshots with grandma who died when I was 4yo.
Both my children have good memories from young. My 3yo still points out the holiday cottage his cousins stayed in last year everytime we go past it.
My 5yo often pointed at a spot in the woods where he saw a digger once when he was 16mo. Don't know if he still remembers it. I'll test him.

I sometimes think I remember something, then wonder if it's because I've been told it as a family story. Apparently if you have a image of yourself as a child in the memory it usually means it's òne you've been told about. If you see the memory as if through your eyes, it's likely to be true!

My pushchair tipping backwards in the chip shop because my mum putting too much shopping on it.