Question of the day: Sunday, Jan. 26

I went to a dinner party tonight with some friends from school. After everyone had eaten and we were sitting around the living room chatting, someone (I think my 11-year-old daughter) started playing with the empty Solo cups on the coffee table. Eventually she and a couple of my college friends were playing "The Cup Song," as seen in this YouTube video. It was pretty interesting to watch and I eventually learned how to play it, as did some others in the group. We had a lot of fun with it. 

Anyway, it reminded me of some of the things I did with my friends as a kid, like sitting across from each other and singing songs while clapping our hands together and against each other's to a beat. I don't remember what we called that ("claps," maybe?), but I do remember it was great fun and we were very creative in our routines.

What creative games like these do you remember from your childhood?

Elastics, where you have a person up each end and you do fancy footwork in the middle.  And all kinds of long rope skipping with 'ditties' of course. 

Building a really classy tree house with my brother and another 'ground house' below it .  Playing pirates in the creek out the back, using the dog bath and various other things as 'ships'.  And a friend and I used to make up ballets. 

It's a shame we grow up really   Kids are so creative.

 First thing l thought of too. Elastics!! l LOVED that game.

We played Strings too. l think it may be called cat's cradle over here, but it's not a solitary thing, it was for 2 people using the same strings from each other.

l had a pony as a child and l was horse crazy. My friend and l had all kinds of plastic horses that we used to make leather saddles and bridles for. We were quite innovative looking back, we always found something that would make each saddle look like a perfect miniature.

I used to practically live outside as a kid. Riding bikes, playing in creeks, playing any sort of make believe...back then we NEEDED "play clothes in order to keep our "school clothes" decent.

The game was called "What's in the Refrigerator". We lived and I still do, in a row home up what most people would call a small street. We had at least 25 kids up our block when we were growing up. Our family had 4 kids. During the summer months we all had the same curfew, 9 pm, then we could sit in front of the house either on the steps or on beach chairs. The street bustled at night, the parents sat with other grown up and us kids got to play until 11 pm outside or until our parents went inside. It was cool outside, no body wanted to go into a hot house to sleep. Nobody had air conditions you were lucky to have a window fan. We because we were so many kids we needed games that everyone could play. So one of the older kid was the moderator if the game. All the kids had to stand in a straight line on the curb of one side of the street. The moderator would call out items that were stored inside a refrigerator, like milk, then all the kids would run to the other side if the street. But if he called out something like sneakers and you steped off the curb and into the street you were out of the game and you could now cheer on your friends or brothers n sisters. It was so much fun. It was a great time, when kids were kids and girls and boys played together. When children had an adolesant period in their life. And dating didn't start until you were at least 16. It was nice.

^ That sounds like so much fun. I lived in an apartment complex for most of my youth, and we'd spend so much time playing outside, especially in the summer. In the winter, we spent a lot more time inside, and my female friends and I would play Barbies. LOVED THEM. We had lots of accessories and we'd use everyday items and turn them into things. Like the little plastic thing they put in pizza boxes to keep the box from touching the cheese, those work perfect as end tables for Barbies! Haha. Decorative wash clothes would become comforters on Barbie beds. Stuff like that. And we'd come up with these really elaborate story lines. It was like soap operas with Barbies. We could keep ourselves entertained for so many hours. 

We played orphanage (not house)....... this was because we were two little girls taking care of 16 dolls!

I was a bit of a tomyboy, so I was always outside on my bike somewhere. There was an old quarry not too far away from our house and we spent a lot of time there, riding bikes up and down the hills....I'd never do that now; I'd probably kill myself. As it was, I remember wearing a lot of mercurochrome (is that how you spell it??) and band-aids. But the point is that we were always outside, doing something. My parents took us camping quite often, so we never watched a lot of television or anything like that. I don't remember specific games that we invented, not right off the top of my head. 

Even when I lived with Grandma in the summer, my cousins and I were always outside. We lived along a creek with an outstanding swimming hole, so you could always find us there. Or playing cowboys and indians on her front porch...she had these great porch rails with cannonballs on the top that made wonderful horses. Or I'd be sitting up in the tree with water balloons and trying to bomb my cousins when they came over.

(I found out that bombing cousins with water balloons were wonderful. But one never, EVER bombs one's grandmother's friends. EVER Boy, did I get in trouble for that one. But you know, I just couldn't resist. I mean, she was right there! Right beneath me. That's just ASKING for a water bomb! Even if she was in her 70s.  )

Growing up in the 70's, kids were full of bad ideas in my neighborhood. Like bike jumping off rickety ramps over trash cans-- no helmets, of course. Back then, riding a bike with a helmet would get you made fun of to no end.  Or, playing tackle football on asphalt-- just cuz some idiot suggested it, and the rest of us idiots wouldn't back down. Or, donning football helmets and goggles and playing war with real BB guns.  And don't get me started on the dangerous stuff we'd do with firecrackers. Funny, but parents back then seemed  never to probe too much about what you did that day- even when you came home a little skinned up and bruised. Of course, we'd always have some crazy explanation at the ready, which theyd usually buy. Actually, they probably didn't really want to know too much about the craziness we were up to. Never doubted their love for us though.  Thank Goodness, these days we're much more involved and attentive to the safety of our children. But God, I miss those days!    

Haha, I agree. We did some really ridiculous stuff as kids. SO dangerous! And yea, moms didn't seem to care what we'd been up to. We came home alive, so good enough.