Tag Archives: Summer
I never even tried a Hula…
I never even tried a Hula Hoop until last summer – that’s right – summer 1998. Which of course I couldn’t do – but my kids had gotten a hula hoop as a gift and periodically – I mean each day periodically I would try to do it and finally I was able to do it to some degree. My friend, with a great body, had this idea that she should go to the beach and use a hula hoop and try to sell them as a great exercise method. She never did it, but my stomach muscles did hurt after I finished with my daily attempts. Before my family moved to Manhattan, we lived in an apartment building in Brooklyn, and after we had to come inside my brother would continue to use that pogo stick no matter how much our downstairs neighbors would bang.
How about “Concentration”…
How about “Concentration” The hand movements were two pats to each knee [while sitting cross legged on the floor], 2 claps, and then snap your fingers on each hand once. You kept repeating this movement while singing the verse. “Concentration . . . name of . . . GIRLS . . . starting with . . . A” Everyone sat in a circle and it went around the circle, every person doing the next letter in the alphabet. It went on and on until someone messed up, and then you would start all over again The subject [word in Caps above] could be anything you wanted, and you could start with any letter of the alphabet. Great way to kill time on a summer’s day until they opened up the johnny pump!!!
Growing up in the East New…
Growing up in the East New York section of Brooklyn in the ’50s and ’60s meant being out on the sidewalk after school and during the summer. One of the games that we girls played with a bouncing pink rubber ball; either a Spauldeen or Pensy Pinky, entailed crossing your leg over the ball as you “sang” verses that had changed names, places and products based on the letters of the alphabet. We started with: A my name is…….. And my husband’s name is……… We come from………… And we sell………… It went on as long as you didn’t miss crossing over the ball. We competed to see who could go through the whole alphabet with a mistake or repeating someone else’s choices. Lots of giggles accompanied this game as the choices narrowed and became more difficult. The letter “Q” was always a tough one. Ellen Grove
The BEST schoolyard in Queens…
The BEST schoolyard in Queens in the late ’60s – early ’70s was PS 108 by the entrance to the Aqueduct racetrack. It was relatively square, fenced all around and had poured cement “boxes” roughly 5′ x 5′. These boxes served as softball basepaths, football yardlines, stickball pitchers’ mounds, handball court short lines, and distance markers for stickball and automatics. Connected to the large square area, there was a perfect sized handball court and wall, and the “little schoolyard” – a blacktopped area surrounded by 3 walls and a fence, perfect for roller hockey. Any afternoon in the summer there could be a softball game (sometimes two), a basketball game, 3 stickball games and a handball game going on at once. Summer nights was Ringoleario and just hanging out. In the fall and winter, it was touch football and basketball. Everyone met at the schoolyard. Just show up and you’ll get in some kind of game. We’ll never forget it.
Good Ole New York. Had…
Good Ole New York. Had the privilege of returning to NY last month and all these memories came back. I even ate a Charlotte Russe. Yummy! But it had a little bit of cake at the bottom. Not as much as I remember it had years ago. I never did get a chance to eat a knish…they don’t have such an animal in this part of the USA…most people here don’t even know what a knish is. I remember that The Enterman Bakery Truck used to come around selling those cupcakes that were listed above. Who remembers the penny pickles on the lower east side…and the lemonade man that came around each summer? You could get a Italian Lemon Ice for 5 cents. Gee, I’m dating myself.
We spent every summer evening…
We spent every summer evening when I was in elementary school playing kick the can. Best places to hide were in the basement window wells and as high as we could climb in the apple tree. We also had a babysitter named Shirley Gamble and when she came to sit we played the “Shirley Gamble Game”, where she would hide everyone but the person who was It. My parents never learned that she once had my little brother (age 4) hang by his fingertips from inside the laundry shoot in the upstairs bathroom (the shoot ended in the basement!). How did we ever survive childhood?
we had a similar gun in…
we had a similar gun in the 70’s in northern nj but we used many rubberbands(the more the deadlier the sting) and we nailed a spring clothing pin to hold the rubberbands and projectile. we even fashioned them to look like machineguns. at times we even had double barrel guns by using two or even 3 pins. after a few years of this during the summer, the weapons were becoming to powerful and the projectile of choice became the round part that soda and beer cans had when you open them. they would be all over the ground in those days since they detached when a can was opened. soon after our parents banned our weapons. we destroyed most and hid some–never to be used again.
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Guess what? I still have all my marbles from the sixties. I don’t know how they survived but they are here and on the mantle piece. We used to play marbles but none of us knew any rules, so, we would make them up. I guess that’s the way it goes with marbles. In our old kitchen, the linoleum had buckled and my dad had nailed down the trough of the buckle. The coolest thing was that it created sort of an elevated highway for the marbles to travel along. The kitchen being an important place, my discovery of the unique properties of the lino forced a banning of the marbles from the kitchen floor. I guess that’s why I still have them. Last summer, I invited some kids from my block into the living room and they discovered the marbles. These two six year old girls had a chance to make up their own rules and play with my marbles. They are still asking if they can come over and play marbles. It’s great!
On a hot summer’s day, a…
On a hot summer’s day, a friend and I decided to go into business. We took one of our Mom’s glass pitchers and filled it with icecubes and lemonade. We set up a folding table in front of a neighborhood park bench, placed the pitcher and some paper cups on top, and waited … Soon, wide eyed thirsty kids appeared. We charged 10 cents a cup, and at the end of the day, we had a total of 50 cents. We split the profits and gave it all away to Jack the icecream man! ; )