To wonder what things you miss about your childhood?

[nurserywindow]

I miss old fashioned libraries where everyone had to speak quietly and there was no running around. Nowadays my local library is like a crèche and the elderly people who used to go in there to read the paper and keep warm just don't bother.

I also miss old fashioned Sundays with church bells ringing, and roast dinners, and no one playing out because it was family day, and cheese and toast beside the fire before watching the big Sunday drama.

Just wondering what other OPs remember and regret no longer exist regarding their childhood?

Watching number 73 on Saturdays. Taking lemonade empties back to the corner shop.

Playing out all the time.

Talking of corner shops - buying my dad's tobacco, alone, aged 6/7

Some of these have had me close to tears. I am not sorry to be grown up, actually - I wasn't very good at being a kid, never really felt like I fitted in or was doing it properly, but I really, really, really mourn my loss of innocence and wonder at stuff.

I rue the day, aged 7ish when I figured out the full implications of dying - that changed my life for ever and 45 years later I still wish I could undo that bit.

I miss playing, too - wish I could go back to that a little so I could play better with my 7 year old.

I loved pacers. They were fucking lovely!

I miss wandering for miles on foot or my bike. I miss Dad's curry night once a month, when he would make the house smell like the Arabian Nights. I miss the test card, that stimulant for so many books and board games.
I don't miss the confusion I felt trying to work out what people wanted, or the cold in winter, or the fear of the base siren. Every time they sounded it I expected to be dead within 5 minutes.

Yes! Ice Magic too only lovers.

We always had it at me Nan's on Gino Ginelli ice cream for a treat.

I miss living so close to family and being able to run home from school for lunch. I miss all the wild space on the edge of suburbia where we used to be able to play freely. I miss Vesta Beef Curry and Angel Delight being the height of sophistication. I miss bad mix tapes recorded from the charts on the radio and writing letters and notes to friends before texting and emailing (even if they were just sitting on the other side of the classroom). I miss going to stay with my aunt and uncle who had no children and spoiled us rotten - they're dead now and I miss them terribly I miss God too - I believed in him once upon a time and everything seemed simpler then.

Life wasn't perfect but the world seemed smaller and easier to understand.

Oh - and my granny's birthday cakes with those jellied orange and lemon shapes on them. And the summer scheme disco - which was the most exciting thing to happen all summer :o

I miss spending hours playing out the front on scooters and bikes with friends. Run-puts and games of hide and seek. Getting paddling pool and sprinklers out in the summer and best of all our camping holidays which were the highlight of the year!

Running in the fields. Being free. Going off all day. Feeling my body was just a body,- it did what I wanted it to - it was wonderful! I never gave it a second's thought.

Now my body is too fat, not attractive, very stiff, quite achy.

I was born in the 50's .

Breaking up for the summer and feeling like September was a long while off.
Collecting stationery and having a use for it.
Related to above - being really neat in exercise books on the first day back at school.
Teenage gossip and drama seemed like such a big deal. Things you found to be hilarious aged 15 actually weren't that funny thinking back.
Feeling like you had all the time in the world.
The enjoyment from playing make believe games with friends.
Getting joy from playing computer games - it just doesn't interest me any more which is annoying as I could now afford to buy games and the choice on offer is amazing. Ditto music - it was really exciting loving certain artists and albums which I just can't get excited about anymore.
TV being good, and looking forward to when your programme came on.
Eating lots of unhealthy food and not getting fat.
Colouring in.

Playing out in the back lane with loads of other children.
Chipmunk brand Bovril crisps
Taking empties back to the wine shop for pennies
Top of the Pops and the excitement of finding out who was number 1.
Jackie magazine
Lux soap - smells of happiness

Sweet shops with jars (esp strawberry Bon bons), water fights in our street when it was hot. Ice cream vans, my chopper bike. Hubba bubba. Dukes of Hazard, Dallas, Top of the Pops, Jackie and Smash hits. Neon socks.

Being allowed to stay up to watch Dracula and Frankenstein films.

I miss my grandparents. I miss staying at their house so much. I miss my Grandad teaching me how to use his Navy whistle to call everyone for dinner and him taking me swimming in the sea. I've never been terribly athletic so people are always amazed when they realise I can swim really well even in a rough sea.

I miss shutting myself in the pantry which always smelled of tomatoes. Not the awful ones you buy now. Real tomatoes. I miss my Nan letting me try on all her jewellery.

I miss school concerts and plays. I loved performing in those. On the 'big night' my friends and I would stay after school before the performance started and have money for McDonalds. I loved being 'back stage' and trying to spot my family in the audience.

My Nan and Grandad were the best! I could, and did sit and chat with them until my late teens when Grandad died. I swear he was my best friend. Really wish he was still around to advise me.

I miss so much stuff from when I was a kid but we were never allowed to see Noel Edmonds or TOTP - we had to endure things like Songs of Praise. We did watch a holiday program on Sunday night with places such as Majorca - and we then went on holiday to a caravan in Totnes...

Staying in a caravan (not a mobile home) on holidays and the wonder of pull down beds.

Fighting with my siblings over who got the top of my Dad's boiled egg

Budgeting meant working out the best value combination of sweets and crisps out of the 20p my lovely great aunt gave me.

The coal man delivering coal on his horse and cart.

So many things we took for granted and thought would be around for ever.

I love this thread. Lots of happy memories. I wonder what our kids will come up with in 30/40 years time?

I loved being able to take risks. Climbing trees, rope swings from 6 foot railings or over embankments, hunting for frogs in the swamp. Making dens, exploring derelict houses.

My mum ran a playscheme and would take a double decker bus of kids, 3 to a seat, on day trips without a single consent form, a handful of parent volunteers, no ratios to speak of. They would just count heads on and off the bus. We would go to places like Delamere Forest. Never did a child get lost or seriously hurt. And would all turn up within ten minutes of home time. They would keep an eye on the little ones but the older kids wouldn't be seen for dust.

I also loved going on union rallies and marches or going on the open top bus shouting vote Labour on polling day. Going on holiday to wherever the T&GU happened to be having their annual conference. Getting dragged to union meeting when I was off school sick was less fun although they did usually end up in a pub with a packet of crisps and a bottle of Coke

I miss the freedom to play all day without parents knowing or caring where I was. As long as I was home for tea.

Seeing my grandmother most days.

Being free

I miss falling asleep in the back of my Dads old Volvo on the grey velour seats.

I miss the yellow candle wick bedspread I used to have over me on the settee when I was home from school ill.

Miss going to the newsagents to get the Beano and a Caramac.

Mostly miss my mam and dad being together.

Oh and Coconut cake on a Sunday night watching Heartbeat in my nightie having huge crush on Nick Berry. :)

My brother.

The sense that anything was possible.

My Mum.
Cuddling up in bed with my brothers and sisters on weekend mornings while our parents were still asleep.
Playing out all day long in the summer.

Oh, I used to love Sunday nights! Roast dinners, bath, and then watching Heartbeat with some toast and tea before bed

I also miss the nights in bed when I'd read a book by torchlight under the covers. I used to read LOADS of novels when I was a kid, especially horsey ones like The Saddle Club. I really wish I had more time to re-read those now instead of boring old uni textbooks

My mum's cooking. OMG she is a good cook. I can put a meal together but I can't COOK like she can.

I miss that base knowledge up to the age of about 11, that however bad things were I only had to get home to my mum, and she would take over from there. I hate knowing that I'm the grown up and I have to try and take over for my son, despite not knowing what the hell I'm doing.

My grandparents. Their love was unconditional and I want that back!!

My Mum. Though to be fair I did "have her" beyond childhood - she died when I was 37.

The future. The thought that everything was still to come and that I could shape things.

Our family home. Sold by my Dad a couple of years ago as he moved away when my Mum died.

The excursions we used to go on as a family.

Holidays at my grandparents' houses.