Life Lessons

One thing I hated about my childhood was that I had a early bedtime. As a parent now, I see the benefit of the early bedtime to both me and my parents, but as a child going to bed when the sun is still out in the summer and you can hear the kids playing outside, is not fun. Not fun at all.
You try and fall asleep because what else can you do, but your slumber will not come. You hear your friends under your window, birds chirping and the ice cream man slowly going down your street.
Is this familiar to anyone besides me?

I would go to school and my peers would talk about shows I have never heard of. I was left out, I was put to bed after the Muppet Show! A late night for me was 8pm on a school night. My friends would talk about all of these great TV shows that I never got a chance to see and I was jealous.
Then came the MASH finale. I am not sure I had ever watched MASH before, but I wanted to see that finale. I begged my Mom. She said no, it was a school night after all.
I did what any other third grader would do..... I cried.

I cried and whined and cried some more for what seemed like forever after my bedtime. I heard the theme music. It was time to step it up despite being yelled at to be quiet about 23728 times. I cried more. I was literally crying myself to sleep. I was exhausted, it was way after my bedtime and I was making myself stay up to prove a point. I am Irish, stubborn is my middle name.

Finally my Mom came in my room and told me, in a not so nice tone, that I could come out to the living room and watch it. She probably only gave in so she could watch her favorite show in peace. I watched it, forcing my eyes to stay open the whole time. I was so excited to go to school the next day, to talk about something that was on TV past 7pm with my peers, to finally be in the know.

You know what is coming right? Yeah, nobody mentioned the MASH finale, no one has seen it. After all of that, I was defeated.
That probably wasn't my first lesson learned in life, but it is one I still remember. I did need my sleep, everyone in the world was not watching MASH but me, and my Mom did know best, but I was too tired to admit it to her.
I remember that every time I put my kids to bed when the sun is still out, kids are playing on our street and the ice cream man passes our house.

Sniffing Markers

I was reading a post over at Kerflop where she was writing about her love of all things paper. She reminded me of those markers that you had in grammar school. You know the ones, that came in a styrofoam case and smelled like fruits? I remember just sucking up as much smell as I could be cause they smelled SO GOOD AND FRUIT LIKE. I am sure me snuffing marker fumes did nothing for my overall health but oh how I loved using those markers and always wanted a set for home but I never saw them in any stores.
I can smell them right now and it brings me back to my elementary school art room.

Other things that can transport me back to being young and where days were strictly spent playing are silly putty, play doh and anything with a heavy plastic smell reminds me of baby dolls at Christmas.
Lazy days of watching shirt tails, playing with my non ho dressing Barbies, higlights magazine, coveting of Gloria Vanderbilt and (oh, la, la) Sassoon jeans and licking our ring pops. We also loved rubber bracelets and would wear them all up our arms in all colors but black was the best and big clips on one side of our head.

All of these things are still fresh in my mind and it makes me wonder what fads, shows and smells will remind my children of their childhood. I am sure Dora will be in there somewhere.
So, I want to know, what smells bring your right back to childhood or what was your favorite childhood "thing"?