Childhood Memories

I don't know about you, but as I get older I forget more and more about my childhood. Yesterday I got a little memory boost through watching my kids. We were at the park for a few hours, and after they had gotten all of their running, and jumping, and climbing out of their systems, they started a little assembly line. They (or should I say he, as my son was the real persuader and recruiter of the whole thing) got a few other kids to help them with a project of making mud, or chocolate as they called it. It was awesome watching them, and I was cheering them on too, because they were doing such a good job working together and co-operating.

There was this hole in the ground, in the grass near the water fountain, that had a bit of mud in it. My son asked a group of boys if any of them wanted to help him make chocolate, and out of the group one gave a cheerful "I do." And so project make mud/chocolate began. The helpful boy was asked to be in charge of getting sand from the sandbox, and my son would get water from the water fountain and my daughter was in charge of stirring. Sure their jobs changed many times and after awhile my son (sweetly) encouraged a couple of other younger boys to help, then they really had a full assembly line going. I just loved how well they all worked together and showed such teamwork. At some point the hole got full and I suggested why not use the chocolate/mud to make mud pies and my daughter jumped right on that idea. She started scooping mud from the hole and bringing it back to the sandbox where she proceeded to make said pies.

I was brought back to another time. I had forgotten how much I used to love making mud pies when I was a kid. The tactile feeling of mud squishing between your fingers, and the creativity of molding and shaping the mud into what ever you want, was so much fun. I loved it. I don't know why we forget about these things, about how different it was for us growing up, and how much more freedom we had.  I spent whole entire days outside, not just a few hours here and there. And I was able to roam around my neighbourhood with my friends with out a care in the world, we'd go to the park by ourselves and walk to school by ourselves. Now it's so different. My kids don't roam the neighbourhood, and I would never allow them to go to the park or school, by themselves. It's just a different time, but I am glad there are still some things that they can enjoy, that are just simply kid things, no matter the era. So here are some pictures of their fun yesterday, I really do love living vicariously through my children.

Here is my son putting a stick, in the mud they made. You can't really tell that it's was a hole before, because they did such a good job of filling it to the top.

And here he is showing me how deep the mud actually was, with the stick. He was really proud of how much mud they made.

Here is my daughter carrying the ingredients of her mud pie. Gotta have some sticks and twigs in there for fiber right?

 

Gotta make more mud.

Yay, for mud pies!

I know this is just a picture of dirt, but I had to put one of her creation in here, it just seemed right.

Here is my son helping.

I'll leave off here with a couple more of my daughter's funny faces, she's such a ham!

What do you think about your childhood? Do you remember much of it? And if you have kids, do you live vicariously through them?