I have this great book that I own Reflections from a Mother's Heart. The idea of the book is a personal history written by a mother and given to her child. Each page has a separate writing prompt and the rest of the page is dedicated to answering the question.
I was reading some of the prompts today and was reminiscing about my childhood and thought I'd share.
Did you ever have a special hideaway or playhouse? What made it special?
Well, first of all, I think that having special hideaways is what childhood is all about. There is a talent that children have of making any place special and secretive. So, I'll share a few of my favorite hideaways.
1) The first one that came to mind was the cupboard under the basement stairs. There was actually a little storage room created with plywood and the door hinged and closed with a latch. My brother Robert and I discovered it and found that it was being used to store things like old paint cans. We quickly emptied the storage room and turned it into our secret place. We found a scrap of carpet and moved that in. Got one of those under cabinet lights and hooked an extension cord up, so we could have light in our special spot. It was such a magical little place for us.
2) Under the quilts. My mom made lots of tied blankets and quilts when I was growing up. She had a homemade quilting frame and we loved it when a quilt was ready to tie. Up went the frame and on went the top to our newest hiding place. Usually mom set it up in our living room, but I remember on a particularly sunny day, she set it up in the front yard. That was fun. I would guess that any child who had a mother who quilted, has identical feelings for the quilting frame.
3)Discarded refrigerator boxes. What is better than a cardboard box in the eyes of a child? I can't think of much. So many possibilities! Whenever we would spot a large box that was being thrown away, we would drag it home and take it inside. Then we would design our newest fort. The windows would be cut out and the door would be created. Do kids still do this? I sure hope so.
So what was your favorite hideaway?
4 comments:
We had a bamboo patch in our back yard for a little while when we first moved in. We hollowed out the middle and would spend entire afternoons holed up in the bamboo patch. It was a sad day when mom and dad tore it out to make room for their garden.
I had a stuffed dog whose ear was torn at the seam. I would write little personal notes and stuff them into the ear. I can't even remember what happened to it and the notes. Hopefully someone found it and discovered the longings of a child.
Mom Knecht
I never had a hideaway. Our house was too small with a lot of people in it.
I was just lucky enough to get a moment alone to use a bathroom...
I completely agree with Liz's bathroom comment. That's probably why I like to take long showers-It was the only "me" time I got!
As a kid, I always shared a room. We got a homemade bunk bed(s) from some friends. And I can't remember if it came with the drawers, or if we added them to take advantage of the nearly 2 feet of space under the bottom bed. They were 3 HUGE drawers, stretching all the way to the wall. so, if you pushed the clothes to the sides, and lied(?) down, you could close yourself into the drawer.
We all loved hiding there--and often slept in the drawers instead of our beds!
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