Stayin’ Alive // You’re Favorite “Ordinary” Moment
When Heather leaves me and the kids alone for a night, or 5, the first thing that happens is usually the destruction of the sofa and the cushion jump of death.
Hopefully my kids will remember that their dad was massively in love with them.
What is one of your favorite “ordinary” moments with your dad or mom or parental figure growing up.
One of mine is when my dad would let us get in polyester sleeping bags and slide head first down the carpeted stairs.
I’m still bruised.
Building a tree house? Building a fort of bed sheets? Stories in the closet? The rope swing? Or nothing at all?
Please tell…
Los
RAIN IT DOWN
I remember as a kid me and my sisters would take the mattress off of my sisters bed and slide down the stairs together when my parents were not home.
One of my favorite moments with my parents was when we would go sledding out in the snow. As well as playing catch with my Dad in the back yard and him hitting pop flies until it was too dark to see.
Great times had by all.
Grapefruit. My dad’s all-time favorite is grapefruit and he always wanted to share one with me. He’d cut it in half, and cut each piece away from the side so I could scoop it out easily with a spoon. Every time I started out hating grapefruit, but doing it anyway ’cause it was our thing. And half-way through every grapefruit half I was loving it.
My dad took me to school every morning and picked me up every afternoon from the time I was 12 till I was 16 and got my own car. We had some of our best conversations on those drives. I think I learned more about life in that 30 mins a day than most kids get from their parents in a month…
Baseball….we used to throw 3-4 times a week for probably 5 years. It was wonderful.
We would all pile in my grandma’s Lincoln Town Car, White withEmerald green leather seats. We would go to Baskin-Robbins and get ice cream and then sit in the car and people watch everyone going in and out.
My other fav. memory is just the fact that we would play rummy all the time.
I would ride my Dukes of Hazzard Big Wheel (with a CB) to the park. Play my little guts out and then my dad would carry me home on his shoulders while he carried the Big Wheel all the way home.
Fly fishing in Missouri. Every summer till I was “too cool” to hang out with dad. Can you say “idiot”?
My mother has a beautiful voice, she would always sing and know all the words to songs. I would stare at her while she sang in the bathroom in the morning getting ready for work and I would try to sing with her.When I go to her house or when she comes here, we always go do Karaokee cuz’ we all love to sing together. My dad left when I was 1 but we went to see him once a year and he would Jitterbug with us to Elvis, Buddy Holly, Jerry Lee Lewis. I loved that.
my favorite memory is when the power would go out in the winter. We would light a bunch of candles and make a huge fire in the fireplace. Then my dad (who is normally a very mellow and mono-tone type guy) would take our camping sleeping bags (the black polyester kind with the red fuzzy insides) and hide in them around the house in dark corners that the candle light didn’t reach. He especially favored the laundry room between the kitchen and our rooms. My mom would inevitably send us to our rooms to get something or to get our PJ’s on, we would be sent with one little flashlight to guide us. We KNEW what was waiting around the corner but it still scared us every single time. I used to love power outages, no tv, no radio, no video games, just family time. Board games, scary stories, or self-written, self-staffed plays/dances. Fun times.
My dad would never let us jump on the bed. I can remember the first time we stayed in a hotel and my mom said “okay girls (I have two younger sisters) – let’s have some fun.” From that point on, every time we go to a hotel we “initiate” the room by jumping on the bed. I still do it to this day
My Graddaddy would take me to the barbershop once a week, so that we could “catch up on the news.” We went for several months before we ever got our hair cut. I remember the first time that I got my hair trimmed, he made the barbers and other customers stand up and clap for my first step into manhood…I was 5.
My dad built me a three story fort out of telephone poles and scrap lumber. And if that wasn’t dangerous enough, he attached a home-made zip-line that went through two acres of woods, and ended at a tree that he tied some old couch cushions to. He attached one of my old swingset swings to the pulley, and I would go flying through the woods all the time at 8 or 9 years old. He also let me spraypaint all the walls with random stuff.
I also loved when we would walk through the woods and he would teach me the names of all the trees. And occasionally, I’d eat some random leaves. I just wasn’t allowed to eat the ones on the ground. Which seems totally arbitrary if I was already eating leaves anyway.
Taking all the pillows and cushions off the couch, making beds on the floor, and sitting as a family reading like that for hours.
Going to boyscout camp with my dad and brother.
Family dinners on our birthdays – out to eat, of course.
Sitting on the kitchen counters and watching my mom cook. I learned how to cook by observing and taste testing.
Definitely playing football in the house with my dad… don’t tell my mom that…
My grandma would bring me every blanket, sheet, and clothespin in the house and help me line up diningroom chairs, etc to turn the giant living room into the largest blanket fort on earth… then she’d serve me dinner in there while I read books. Lots of books. Sometimes she’d grab sleeping bags and let me sleep overnight in there… LOL!
that was massively epic.
my childhood for full of a lot of nothing fun. lol.
When I was 5, my dad woke me up in the middle of the night to make rice krispy treats. Just the two of us. My mom didn’t know until I told her years and years later. He died when I was 6 and I still treasure that memory.
My dad has a set of upper partials from knocking out teeth as a teenager. He can pull them out and make himself look like a werewolf. When we were kids he used to have a beard and would chase us around the house! Either that or when he would ride us around the yard on the tank of his motorcycle!
My favorite times with my Dad was when he would sit with my sisters and I on the couch watching movies and eating his “made-up” dessert. Vanilla ice-cream with eggo-mini’s on top. He “invented” that when we asked him for ice-cream cones and we had none. But I’d take his version anyday…it’s delicious! Try it!
I would always watch tv with my dad…one time we watched the entire story on Hank Williams Junior. haha. and him, me, and my brother would have annual pool basketball tournaments.
In honor of this post, you might really dig this website if you haven’t seen it already…
http://myparentswereawesome.tumblr.com/
We would have WWF wrestling matches and I would dress up all crazy and my dad would too and then we would try to do all the crazy fake wrestling moves. I remember one time getting Ketchup and putting it on my face to look hardcore! HAHAHA…I love my dad
i dont have much memories. my childhood was dark. i am now trying to make up all of my lost childhood by creating a lot of wonderful memories for my son….and they are mostly inspired by your wife (like family nights).
Dominoes and going to Friday night football games with my grandfather. But with my parents? I can’t think of anything.
Steamroller Baby : dad would tickle and wrestle us and all four of us (mom, dad, sister, me) would get in a laughing tangle as mom (pretended) to help us escape.
dad teaching my sister and I how to throw and catch a football/softball… he didn’t hold back when he threw it.
cuddle time.
sooo, it’s true what they say: “kids bounce”
lol
dude, you are so setting up your ones for a career in stunts
I’m a couple of days late here, but… my dad always knew when the great meteor showers would be. He would lay out these big pieces of cardboard in the backyard, we would fall asleep in our sleeping bags that were on top of our bedcovers and at the peak time during the night, he would come in, pick us up in the sleeping bags, take us outside and lay the sleeping bags on the cardboard so we could watch the show. As a kid, I never thought it was a “big” deal… cool, yes. Fun, yes. As an adult, I realize how much forethought and effort it took!