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Thursday 28 April 2016

A-Z: I Remember.......X



 I REMEMBER......
MEMORIES OF MY CHILDHOOD 

X the challenging Letter!  

I was an unadventurous child, unlike my brother, so never needed an emergency  rush to A & E and an X RAY for a broker limb - just  as well as I had a horror of hospitals as a child. 

I would love to have played the XYLOPHONE, but it was 30 years before I came close to fulfilling this ambition.    I bought my 5 year old daughter a little Glockenspiel, enjoyed teaching her first steps in music and  having  a play myself.  

Glockenspiel.jpg
*  The Glockenspiel (German "glock = bell)  has metal bars, whereas the Xylophone (Greek xylos = wood) has wooden bars.  
  
One XMAS we taped ourselves playing and singing Christmas carols for my parents.  I came across this tape years later after the death of my parents, so it was moving to hear again.
  
In my own childhood, our Christmas's were very traditional - we did not have stockings but a pillow case at the end of our beds.  

One apocryphal anecdote was regaled every year  - my mother and and aunt woke up early one Christmas morning - it was still dark (their house didn't have electricity anyway), and decided to investigate their stockings. One present they were convinced was a box of chocolates, so they opened it and bit into one - it turned out to be a box of dominoes! 
  

My mother (right) and aunt (left) 
**************
ONTO  Y  for YOUTH CULTURE
 
In Case You Missed


A-Z Challenge 2016 Theme Revealed:      I Remember......Memories of Childhood

C - Clothes + Church, Chores, Christmas, Crafts & Cars   
D - Dolls + Dogs & Desserts     
E - Events + Eating Out & Easter    
F - Food + Fads & Fashion and Freedom
G - Grandparents + Games   
H - Hairstyles + Hobbies, Houses & Halloween 
I - Inspiring Teachers 
J -Journeys & Joining 
K - Kitchens & Knitting   
L - Libraries     
M - Music + Movies     
N - Needles  + Nativity and Names   
O - Occupations  
P - Poulton - My Ancestral Home + Poems, Pets, Penfriends, Politics and Protests 
Q - The Queen's Coronation  
R  - Radio + Religion, Remembrance and Russia 
S - Speccy Four Eyes + School, Sports, Sundays, Student Days and the Space Race    
T - Toys + Treats, TV, Theatre and Technology   
U - Uniforms     
V - Village Life + Vacations and Values 
W - Wars and Weddings

Copyright © 2016 - Susan Donaldson.  All Rights Reserved

*****

5 comments:

  1. Ha! That gave me a morning chuckle, biting into a domino. You had lots of luck with the X.

    Finding Eliza

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  2. Ouch - biting into a domino! I never had an x-ray as a kid either. However, the shoe store had a big x-ray machine that checked the fit of the shoe. It was a huge box that your feet slid into. I suppose it showed whether you had enough room at the toe. I wonder when those things were deemed too dangerous.

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  3. Is that typical to have a pillowcase instead of a stocking? It must have been hard for Santa to fill a pillowcase at the end of your bed without waking you.

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    Replies
    1. Yes we weren't unusual in having pillow cases. We would wake up and pile on our parents' bed to open them to find the presents that we got most years e.g. Jigsaw, book, new pyjamas and slippers, soft toy, new pencil case.

      Delete
  4. I had a pillow case too Sue - you can fill a lot more in ! :) Great story about the dominoes too.

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