7 year old left alone in house and allowed to cook supper

[FrannyandZooey]

I have been meaning to post something about this for a while but another thread this morning reminded me of it. In the Milly Molly Mandy stories (written in the 20s and 30s), MMM has an idyllic childhood, enjoying things such as fishing for tiddlers, raising an orphaned hedgehog, watching the blacksmith in the forge, etc etc. She seems to me to be between about 5 and 8 years old, although I would be interested in people's opinions of this.

Obviously a lot of the things she does were once safer, or regarded as a lot safer. I imagine children could wander about freely because there was less traffic, also I think the community as a whole would regard children's safety as a joint responsibility so if you got into difficulty a friendly adult would help you out. We have more awareness of 'stranger danger' these days although I don't know whether there is in fact more danger around. Probably.

However some of the things she is allowed to do would just be totally taboo today. She stays in by herself with Little-Friend-Susan one evening and they fry up onions and all sorts of things (although they are notably not allowed to use the bread knife, which has made a great impression on ds :))

I also find it interesting that although she is allowed more or less to get on with her life without much adult interference, she does is only given her own bedroom at this age and previously slept in her parents' room.

I am just rambling now but I wondered what other people thought about this, and whether there is any way to give our own children more of a Milly Molly Mandy type of childhood?

No really F&Z, the pig slaughtering is fascinating and not gory - its the descriptions of how they used every bit of the animal for some purpose that has me enthralled and wracked with fleeting guilt as i chuck yet another tupperware of leftovers into the bin. (I use tupperware metaphorically here as haven't seen the stuff since i was a child).

Nowt wrong with looking like \link{http://www.emmylou.net/\emmylou harris} though

and I do not feel abby should wear that fringe.

Here is another possibility \link{http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0140502416/qid=1149418622/sr=8-3/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i3_xgl/203-8941764-9861505\ The story about Ping which is from 1935}

read the first review if nothing else..I think it must be by a relation of dominiconnor if not the man himself!

and \link{http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0571202020/ref=cm_lm_fullview_prod_2/203-8941764-9861505?%5Fencoding=UTF8\ the children of green knowe series}

LOL zippi, that review is very funny :)

its quite comphrensive, isn't it, zip?

green knowe is good. bit old though, maybe?

Wow 3FJ - that's so me! (with grey dye on me hair of course) - weird with the ref to Mark Knopfler too as my dh was mistaken for the long nosed one whilst sitting NEXT to him (many years ago). And I had always insisted that i would have nothing to do with any bloke who had a Dire Straits album in his record collection - let alone looked like one of 'em.

Now the Children of Green Knowe....all these ghosts from the past

if i look like that when I'm 50, in ooh at least 47 years or so, I'll be well pleased.

I'm going to hire my own personal air-brush technician.

Oh I'd completely forgotten these, \link{http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0099411415/qid=1149420666/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl/203-8941764-9861505\ uncle..J P Martin}

"A collection of the hilarious "Uncle" stories originally told by a clergyman to his children. Uncle is a millionaire elephant who wears a purple dressing gown and lives in a labyrinth of skyscrapers connected by water chutes, lifts and railways."

making my own personal book list now..

back to something a bit younger \link{http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0723236488/qid=1149420947/sr=8-1/ref=sr_8_xs_ap_i1_xgl/203-8941764-9861505\ orlando the marmalade cat by Kathleen Hale}

even has tents in!

Franny you will like this..I still have my copy

it's not just fairy stories

\link{http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/1960s-Story-Land-Childrens-Story-Book_W0QQitemZ7036466386QQcategoryZ90577QQrdZ1QQcmdZViewItem\ Storyland}

Zippi you are just having much too much fun now :)

I wa s talking to my mum the other day who was horrified cos ds had gone to corner shop (he's 8.5) by himself.
I remember we moved to yorks when I was 7. I also remeber before we moved to yorks being allowed to walk 2 or 3 streets away to my best friend's house and then we would walk all over, to the shops, park, church green ewtc to play. Tried to point this out to me mum but...she was still horrified. So then I reminded her about, when we moved to yorks, being allowd out all day on my bike. I went everywhere, to the river by myself to paddle and swin , to local villages on my bike, everwhere. off to Brownies by myself and home again via the chip shop. I told her I am a little shocked at how much freedom I was given as a child - I wouldn't feel safe letting ds do these things now. Which is really, really sad. I actually fear being judged by others as a 'bad' parent, more than I fear bad things happening to DS. Is this skewed? Or anyone else?

very laissez fair childhood too here. Remember getting up early in the morning at 6 years old when everyone was asleep and taking the dog for a walk! and rambling about with my friends in the woods, cycling for [seemed like] miles by 8. I did get hit by a car though at 12 while on my bike, and I was in hospital for three months. I am very worried about ds when he grows up, particularly on the roads, and i am going to have to find a balance between protecting him and letting him have enough freedom. Difficult. May have to move to an idyllic village MMM style - if they exist...

Absolutely Fullmoonfeind. Have just been out to walk the dog, (dh working abroad)leaving dd1 (nearly 11) to nap in her bed as she came home from a sleepover exhausted. (feckin sleepovers - how to ruin a weekend in one fell swoop). As I walked out of the door I was heard to mutter something about the need for HV or Social Workers never to find out. On a positive parenting note, i did take my dd2 (7) and dd3 (2) with me. So busy with all the paraphanelia that dds need to take that we actually forgot the dog and had to come back. I was fortified in my decision by MMM and the fact that what else could I have done? Also told neighbour I saw to keep eye out for gas explosions etc. Did MMM have any of those?

Nope. Completely understand where you are coming from, there, fmf. Plus I think it is so hard to judge actual levels of danger in a realistic way these days. We seem to have the attitude that even if there is only a small possibility of them coming to harm, then it is not worth the risk.

However as I said earlier, generally it isn't applied to things where we are being sold something, ie TV, violent toys, amd junk food. We all know that there is a lot more than a tiny risk that these are affecting our children badly, but mostly people think the advantages of these outweigh the disadvantages. I don't get it :(

I had freedom to roam probably from the age of about 10, I remember in the winter dissapearing over the hills for a walk with the 2 boys from down the road with a slege, we walked for miles in the snow. We used to play down by the river and try to get accross it on the big pipe. I used to cycle all over the place and get the train home from school in P6 age 11. I would go swimming quite a lot straight from school by myself which involved getting the bus into town at about 12yrs.

My son is 9yrs and I let him go accross the road to the shop and walk to school with his little sister (3min) away, but I shudder to think about im doing all the things I did. Shame really as we live in a small village but the other kids that hang about and get to wander are the ones who bullied DS when we moved here and seem more interested in breaking windows than looking for tadpoles and building gang huts in the woods.

furtively interrupts to add a few more to her list

Rumer Godden the Dolls House about a doll called Tottie

and Miss Happiness and Miss Flower

Rebecca Caudhill The Best Loved Doll about which of the dolls should go the party

Mud Pies and other recipes for Dolls \link{http://www.amazon.co.uk/exec/obidos/ASIN/0802774873/qid=1149426283/sr=1-1/ref=sr_1_0_1/203-8941764-9861505\ Marjorie Winslow}

So true F&Z. DD1 refused to wear (or even bloody take) a hat with her to a tennis day thing she went on with a friend. I gave her suncream and she SAID she put it on but came home with a burnt face. I'm sure the adults in charge would have stopped the children doing obviuosly dangerous stuff - beating each other with raquets, running infront of cars etc but the slow, corosive dangers like the sun and junk food nobody seems to want to take responsibility for. DD1 knows a friend of ours died of skin cancer in his 30's but at her age mortality is just too distant. I wasn't there so couldn't MAKE her wear hat/apply suncream frequently. Pisses me off.

I think we tend to care more about the immediate stuff where we could be judged in a snapshot than the longterm stuff that no one sees as it happens incrementally day after day (sun, junk food, violent tv etc)

dd1 enjoyed Miss Happiness and Miss Flower! Wasn't there a Miss Plum too?

Have we all had the same childhoods?

think the role of business also important. Its them selling to us this crap food, crap telly (or indeed, any telly really), the idea that to enjoy yourself and have a childhood full of happy memories you must spend.

Ah, I like The Dolls House too zippi and we tried it with ds but I think he was a bit young. The brooding sense of menace that Marchpane casts over the book was more frightening than I remembered as well!

Miss Flower and Miss Happiness - I have vague memories - was it about Japanese dolls?

there were two weren't there? the sinister dolls house, with miss marchpane, like sweet marzipan or something, and the japanese doll series with the tiffany joneses.