What was a 2000s childhood like?

[Moresleeppleaaase]

Was talking with my dh the other day about childhood throughout the decades and I was thinking that childhoods in the 70s, 80s, 90s etc are looked upon quite nostalgically and I've seen quite a lot of threads on here with people having similar childhood experiences of those times and remembering all the things they liked to do when they were kids. It got me thinking that I don't really know anything about childhood in the 2000s. I was born in 1979 so was in my 20s in the 2000s and didn't really spend any time with kids as I didn't have much family or any friends who had kids then. My dcs were born in 2015 and 2017 so it was a while after the 2000s had ended. Was just interested if either you were a kid in the 00's or your dc were kids then, what was it like to be a kid and what was popular (like foods, toys and what were popular things to do etc) and was it a good time to be growing up.

@IsabelaYourBoyfriendsHere I meant to ask if McDonald's parties were still a thing then! I'm glad they were! I loved them when I was a child!

@IsabelaYourBoyfriendsHere DS is gay and I think he also wanted to marry Zac Efron.

@Neurodiversitydoctor ‘baby listening’ services 😱

Pregnancy fashion around 2002/3 was to show your bump, after Mel Blatt from All Saints danced with her bump out on TOTP.

Freezing mushed up veg in ice cube trays (is that still a thing?) and Annabel Karmel had her own books and range of accessories for it.

Atomic Kitten, Katy Perry (often played at the roller disco) Robbie Williams.

I was 13 in 2000.
Saturdays were for making a nuisance of ourselves in the city centre - spending ages on the headphones in HMV/Virgin Megastore before eventually buying a single by Britney. Then we’d have a browse through the posters in Athena and set off pretty much everything in The Gadget Shop. We’d buy scented gel pens in Partners, soaps from Body Shop, tops from Morgan and trainers in AllSports. McDonald’s for lunch and a bus home. My bedroom had inflatable armchairs, groovy chick bedding and Backstreet Boys posters from Smash Hits on the walls. Lunchtimes at school spent playing snake and composing ringtones on my Nokia 3310 and giving ourselves French manicures with tippex.

Really interesting to hear perspectives from both parents and those who grew up then! It's lovely to hear that kids still had freedom to play out then! I think that's the thing I'm most disappointed that my kids haven't had!

I think the 2000s were a funny time. At the start of the 2000s, it was all very anti children - they were largely seen as a feral sort of enemy and ASBOs and fines were a big thing. Teen pregnancy a big problem and extensively covered in the soaps. I don’t think there was a teenage girl in a soap who didn’t end up pregnant. I know decades are never precise but I think 1997 - 2007 are the 2000s in a funny way.

Club Penguin
Moshi Monsters

Go gos
Puffles

Both my DC were born in early 2000s. I think it was an idyllic time. They spent a lot of time outdoors - making dens and mudslides, going sledging, building igloos, camping in the back garden, having bonfires. Their state primary school was lucky enough to have an outdoor swimming pool and they spent many summers splashing around in it, cycling in the woods.

It was possible to avoid screens more in those days. They had tiny nokia burner phones by Yr 6 with no screens on, and they had a Playstation but when friends came to stay they just as often played baby football or built with Lego or swapped cards - I forget the game but they were all obsessed with it and had their special rare cards framed!

When they were preschool they watched Teletubbies, and at primary they loved Arthur.

Stat mat leave was 4 months. You could extend it to 6 months, unpaid. Many babies were in nursery at 3 months.

I was born in 95.

Playing outside on bikes
Bike rides with my dad
The Tweenies on tv
Nintendo DS
MSN
The dial up tune when trying to get on the internet
Snake on brick phones

Getting a huge trampoline without a safety net

Yes, DS was, born 1992, it was a workplace nursery and most of the DC were 3-4 months when they started.

I started primary school in the 2000s and what you wrote is totally different to my childhood (and my siblings and friends). We walked home from school without parents. We played outside all the time even in the rain. Only one person won in pass the parcel. We planned our own playdates (but asked permission) although we didn't call them playdates. We knocked on our friends' doors and asked if they wanted to play out.

Had my kids then. Remember Cbeebies (bedtime song was when they knew it was time for bed lol). Going to elc and letting them out their buggies as toys were out for them to play with. Power rangers (urgh) Moshi monsters and match attacks cards. Clark’s doodles and when older shoes with little dolls that fit in the bottoms. Getting ears pierced at Claire’s and pencil cases from smiggle. Playing out. Those bloody heavy scooters that swing all the way around and smacked your ankles if they bumped into you! Those weird scooters where the legs were splayed out and you had to wiggle to move them 🤪. Reading practical parenting for advice when pregnant as internet not widely available for homes yet.

Mine and my siblings childhood was not like this at all.

I can recall that DS had a Samsung phone in about 2008 which had a touchscreen but wasn't smart but quite expensive. The first iPhone was 2007.

In 2000 I was 10 so just starting secondary school.
I think we still had a degree of freedom and innocence. Going out with your friends to the beach/cinema/ town, agreeing to meet somewhere at a certain time as we didn't have phones. Woolworths, pick n mix, new look clothes shopping, Topshop if you was feeling flush!
Interesting fashions, bubble bags, the trousers with attached skirt (why on earth?) Cargo trousers with tassels, baby G watches.
Britney spears, steps, destinys child, s club 7.
Dance mats, the Sims plus endless extension packs, game boys. Dial up internet...
I loved my childhood and early teen years, I feel lucky we was perhaps the last generation to not get swallowed up by social media and the internet.

My DC were born late 94 and mid 98. I remember:

Angelina Ballerina
Thomas the Tank Engine
Big Cook, Little Cook
Auntie Mabel
Arthur
Massive
Dora the Explorer

Tinkerbelle T shirts
Floaty Boden skirts
Short socks
Start rite sandals
Nursery smocks

Light up trainers
Hama beads
Poll pocket
Barbie
Heelies
Mini scooters
Pokemon
Game Boys
Tamagochi
The spiderwick chronicles
Ravens Gate
Harry Potter
Wolf Books by Michelle Pavier
Alfie and Annie Rose
The Fairy Books
Lemony Snicket and the films
Roald Dahl

Swimming
Football
Tennis
Rugby
Cricket
Rainbows
Beavers

The park, a lot

Awful school lunches
Cursive writing
The Oxford Reading Tree
World Book Day
School summer fetes and winter fayres
Videos
Snuggle sacks
Getting our first computer and making sleeping beauty pictures

Flute and Piano
Bucket and spade holidays
Legal and Chessington
Dinosaurs and the South Ken Museums

Dairylea dunkers, winders, little boxes of raisins, cheesy strings, mini milks

I think they had a nice childhood.

Omg 😆 flash back to Water Shine Diamonds lipstick 😍

My nieces and nephews had a 2000s childhood and I think it was a lovely time. CBBC was at its best for a start. Harry Potter. Sure Start centres. Barney and Radzi on Blue Peter. Club Penguin. Pokémon!

Born in 1995

Teletubbies, Thomas the tank engine & postman pat, then art attack and chuckle brothers & Tracey beaker later

Soft play places when toddlers

Into year 5 + 6 they would go to the local park with their friends and just play for hours

They would come over to our house and camp out in our garden in the tent

There wasn't any internet apart from dial up

Had a PINGU game on a CD for the computer

I think there was much more imagination in their play than now and they would actually talk and laugh together in the same room.

The only screens were tamagotchi that I had to keep alive during school time

Later on a Gameboy with a lion king game

Then Harry Potter books came out

Yes light up flashing trainers

Yes Aunty Mabel, Pippin and Arthur

Dipsy and La La
The Night Garden
Charlie and Lola!
I got my first phone at the grand age of 40 in 2002! My kids were born the next year and in 2005. No smart phones or tablets (my husband had a BlackBerry for work).
My kids fondly remember our Friday night visits to Blockbuster to get a few videos out for the weekend! No streaming! Ahhh, those were the days, my friend...

Born in the early 90s

Beginning of the 2000s was blow up furniture, Cartoon Network (Angela Anaconda anyone?), Busted, playing out a LOT (makes me so sad my kids won’t really have this), Angel delight for pudding, Ant’n’Dec Saturday night takeaway, blind date, Airline, the advent of texting and the infamous Snake game (did anyone manage to get the snake in that perfect spiral?), Woolworths for pick’n’mix and smelly gel pens. Every few weeks you would go round your parents friends house for a ‘party’, the adults would get blind drunk and play loud music while the kids ran amok and someone usually ended up at minor injuries. Would be seen as neglect now.

As I got into my teens there was a lot of house parties and under 18s nights. Drinking Bacardi breezers, Smirnoff and Malibu and Coke. Smoking Marlboro lights and roll up Golden Virginia (cheap and easy to buy if you looked 14 or over), drugs everywhere mainly weed, Mkat and MDMA. Texting boys but no photos or videos so you had to hope it was the intended recipient and not his mate having a wind up 😂 MSN messenger where you could strip off on a grainy webcam, and insist they switched their camera on too so you knew they didn’t have their mates watching you as well 😱 Frankly we were all sex obsessed, everyone had lost their virginity by 15 or 16 tops and we were in & out of the local GUM clinic for the MAP every five minutes.

The humour was pretty offensive - lots of accusing people of being gay, or using ‘gay’ as an insult. Mean Girls is pretty accurate in terms of the mindset and dynamics of teen girls back then.

I was 13 in 2000. It was brilliant. I had a lilac, blue and pink bedroom with a mini stereo in it and played whichever Now that’s what I call music CD was the latest one out. Robbie, steps, Britney etc were always on them!

used to try and straighten my (very thick and wavy) hair with ridiculous bablylis steam straighteners that you had to put water in and it was never very successful

would chat to my friends for hours on the landline but only after 6 when it was free.

had a Nokia and was delighted when the 3310 I think it was came out and you could change the covers. Used to buy new ones in town and new ringtones too. Made text messages as short as possible saying things like g2g nw spk l8r because you got charged per text

having arguments with my mum because I was on msn messenger and she wanted to use the phone!

going to town with mates and looking at the posters and cds in h and m

going to parties and drinking lots of alcopops. Getting in night clubs from 14 because they didn’t care about ID

great times!!