What was your earliest memory?

[NewEnglandGirl]

Mine was being in a crib which was near a window, drinking from a bottle and one of my mom's friends came in to see if I was asleep. I think I was about two years old.

[Shell Beau]

1. I haven't a clue.

:shrug:

[BarenakedLady]

2. In a crib

looking through the bars towards the bedroom door, waiting for my mom to come get me.

[NewEnglandGirl]

3. Some people's memories

go way back and other people say they hardly remember anything until about the time they went to school.

[BarenakedLady]

4. I have snap shots

like looking at pictures. Not many though. I have a horrible memory.

[ThatsMyBarack]

126. Mine, too!

Except I also remember eating raisins in my crib at one point....;)

[Sugar Smack]

5. I don't know how old I was,

but I was at the beach, looking through a translucent, sucked-on cherry safety-pop at the ocean.

[NewEnglandGirl]

9. Wow, that's pretty detailed

It must have made a pretty view of the ocean.

[LeftyMom]

6. Going camping with my dad's best freind's family. Thier younger kid was a baby.

When he got old enough to play with, he and I were friends. I swear I spent half my childhood climing around his dad's old pickup with him, or playing with sparklers while our dads lit off bottle rockets and mortars, or teaching him how to draw and make letters on the green lined dot matrix paper his mom would bring home from her job with a company that made computers.

He died when he was sixteen of a very rare autoimmune disease- he was always sick.

[NewEnglandGirl]

10. I'm sorry that you lost him

you'd probably still be very good friends today. My friends from early childhood are really special.

[Inchworm]

7. Numbers and letters doing Kung-fu!

The fours won. See how they look like knights?

4! 4! 4! 4! 4!

:hi:

[NewEnglandGirl]

13. That is cool

Four is one of my lucky numbers. Meant to tell you, your grandson is very adorable. :hi:

[Inchworm]

17. Why thank you ma'am

My daughter is going to get tired of me soon. I see where I am annoying...

Much like my grandparents may have been!

Bwahahaha!

:hi:

[Lyric]

8. I was two and a half years old.

I remember my Dad holding me, and Mom's hand stretched out to me, full of silver change. She was trying to get my attention so my aunt could take a Polaroid picture of me. I remember that it was around Christmas, and I was wearing this little plastic Santa lapel-pin that played music if you pressed a button on the back. I also remember my feet being cold and damp, so we must have been walking in the snow to get into her house.

[NewEnglandGirl]

14. Wow you have a very good memory

that's a lot of details to remember

[conscious evolution]

11. At nine months

I have a memory of a huge deer jumping across the hood of my family car while on a dark country road.

[NewEnglandGirl]

16. Hope you were in a car seat !

:P

[conscious evolution]

45. probably not

I don't think they had them then.

[fight4my3sons]

12. standing in my crib

pushing the sides to make it slide across the room. It would make a lot of noise across the wood floor and my parents had company so my mom came upstairs and said "lay down and be quite!"

The next memory I have is when I was 3yrs old. Packing my books when my parents were getting divorced and my mom and I were moving out of our house.

[NewEnglandGirl]

18. It's funny how so many

people remember being in a crib. I remember climbing out of mine.

[redqueen]

15. :(

not a good one



My first good one (I think) was looking at a stop sign, and realizing that I could now read. :)

[NewEnglandGirl]

19. I'm sorry that your first one was not good

I wish everyone's first memory could be something that made them feel secure and happy.

[Blue Diadem]

51. .

:hug:

[Arkansas Granny]

20. I've described a scene to my mother that I can see in my mind like a photograph.

I'm sitting on the floor facing an open doorway and the sun is shining outside making the room I'm in appear to be kind of dark. I can see the porch and the yard which slopes down sharply from the house with trees in the background. There is a silouette of a woman sweeping with a broom in front of the doorway. From that description, it is apparently from the house we lived in when I was about 1 1/2 to 2 years old. I have a couple of other memories that are apparently from the same house, but they are not as vivid.

[NewEnglandGirl]

22. Do you know who the woman was?

Was it your Mom?

[Arkansas Granny]

40. I have to assume it was her. I don't know who else would have been

sweeping floors in our house.

[Zavulon]

21. Staying in a Quebec City hotel.

My parents didn't even remember the hotel, but when I described it (the thing I remember most was that it had a kitchen, leading me to wonder why every hotel I saw afterwards didn't have one) I learned that it was their fifth anniversary.

My first question: "Why the hell did you bring me along?" :)

[NewEnglandGirl]

24. You must have been a very good kid

and known for going to bed early. ;-)

[Zavulon]

93. I doubt it very highly.

I have a feeling Dad spiked my Pepsi with rum. :)

[NewEnglandGirl]

103. That would be

understandable on that special occasion. ;-)

[Sheets of Easter]

23. Emptying out my stocking at Christmas and finding a Hershey bar.

It must have been right before my second birthday.

[NewEnglandGirl]

25. I'll bet

that a lot of people's early memories involve the holidays. That candy bar sounds pretty good at this hour of the day. :9

[Sheets of Easter]

26. It must have been one darn good candy bar for me to remember it.

:D


edit- it's funny this thread should come up, because I was just recalling an accident I had when I was three. I was riding on the handlebars of my dad's bike and got my ankle caught in the spokes. I remember everything clear as day, right down to the Welch's grape soda I drank in the emergency room.

[WCGreen]

27. Crawling on the floor at my second Christmas and seeing...

My great aunt's knee high nylons.

[NewEnglandGirl]

29. Did you get scared????

:P

[applegrove]

28. I remember being in a crib and looking over and seeing another

toddler/baby. My twin.

I also remember being in a baby carriage. I guess I must have been about 2 at the time. Maybe three.

I definitely remember getting my own room at three. I remember sitting on the bed with its red/pink stripped bed cover and thinking this room is all mine.

[NewEnglandGirl]

30. Twins are really special

that is so sweet. I have very special friends who are twins. They're like one person almost. :pals:

[applegrove]

46. I'm not an identical twin so I'm not so much like my twin brother as you say. We have are own

personalities.

[Gormy Cuss]

31. In a playpen, at under 18 months of age.

In the memory I think of myself as older yet in a crib but when I described the room to my mother she said that it was the dining room in the old apartment. That's where I spent my days in the old fashioned playpen, the kind with slats like a crib. The family moved from that place when I was about 18 months old.

[NewEnglandGirl]

33. My first memories are from our first little apartment too

Don't you wish life was as simple and secure for us today as it was then?:)

[Gormy Cuss]

67. The world was endlessly fascinating at that age, and there was no problem too great

for the seemingly omnipotent parents to handle. Yeah,it was great!

[CaliforniaPeggy]

32. I was about 18 months old...

And when I asked my mom about it, she verified these details...

She and I were living with her parents after my dad was drafted into the Army, in WWII.

Their house had a hallway that extended from the entry to the living room. At the end of that hallway, there was a door with glass panes, and a glass doorknob.

I remember crawling down the hallway (I walked late) and reaching for the doorknob. I couldn't reach it, and I started crying.

Someone came to the other side of the door, opened it, and picked me up.

End of memory...

My mom and I decided I'd remembered it because it was traumatic...

:shrug:

[NewEnglandGirl]

34. That probably is why

because I remember getting an electric shock at about that age and I will never forget that. I hope your Dad came home safely from the war. :hi:

[CaliforniaPeggy]

38. Oh, yes, he sure did!

In fact, he came home early...

They had tapped him for Officer Candidate School, until they found out he was red/green colorblind!

They gave him an Honorable Discharge, and he came home just in time for the birth of my brother!

And both he and my mom are still alive and in their late 80's and early 90's!

:woohoo:

[NewEnglandGirl]

53. I am really happy to know that he was ok

and that your parents are still alive, that is wonderful. :) :hug:

[pokerfan]

35. Probably age two or so

I remember being diapered a couple of times. Once because my sister dropped me and another time when my brother unknowingly pinned the diaper to my flesh.

I remember the crib and being imprisoned in a room with one of those baby fences.

I also think I may have had neonatal memories but I'm not sure. It was more of an altered state of consciousness I used to be able to slip into but I lost the ability around the time I was seven or so. It's very difficult to explain but it was an extremely strange feeling of complete and total enclosure.

[NewEnglandGirl]

36. So do you have claustrophobia?

:scared: about the pin.

It would be cool to remember being born. :P

[pokerfan]

43. Not really

And it wasn't precisely a claustrophobic, unpleasant feeling, but not especially pleasant either, just kind of neutral. But it was scary in that it was very strange. But I haven't been able to "get there" in many years. Like I said, it wasn't a memory, more of a altered state.

[Mutley]

133. I've read that some small children can remember being in the womb

but that they lose those memories when they are still very young.

[SidneyCarton]

37. Transitioning from a Western Airlines plane (red) to an Eastern Airlines plane (blue)

On a trip to see my Grandparents who lived in Texas. I was about three.

[NewEnglandGirl]

39. That must have been

your first plane ride. :)

[SidneyCarton]

42. Yep, I have three memories from that trip...

the planes, a general store in my grandparents home town, (grandpa was at the "watering hole" for years I thought that meant he was fishing) And sitting for the picture that we took together.

[Mad_Dem_X]

41. Watching the Moon landing on TV.

I was 2 1/2. My mother was eight months pregnant with my sister. I remember standing on the living room carpet, looking at the TV, and my mom was sitting in a chair behind me and to my right.

[NewEnglandGirl]

54. You must have been really excited

about the moon landing at that age.

[Mad_Dem_X]

134. I was fascinated, but

I don't think I fully understood what was happening.

[MorningGlow]

68. Hey, me too!

I was 3, and I was bored out of my mind--all those grainy black and white shots, and it just went on FOREVER. Plus it interfered with my TV shows! My parents and my brother were glued to the TV and when I complained they tried to tell me this was very important and history in the making, but I was such a TV addict, I just wanted my shows back. (I think I acted the same way during the Watergate hearings too.)

I also remember standing in my crib and playing with these pale pink and green wooden balls that spun around. They were the size of baseballs. And they squeaked when I spun them. I used my crib for my son, but he wasn't as fascinated by the balls as I was.

And I remember being curled up on my dad's lap in an orange corduroy chair in the living room, in the dark, watching a thunderstorm roll in across the baseball fields across the street. If I woke up in the middle of the night because of thunder, he'd sit with me (and smoke!) till it was over.

And I remember falling down the stairs CONSTANTLY (I was a klutz). Luckily we lived in a split-level house, so I only rolled down five (carpeted) stairs at a time.
:rofl:

[old mark]

44. Riding a little tricycle in the kitchen

while my mom was cooking.
( I still love my kitchen, cook more than my wife.)

mark

[NewEnglandGirl]

55. Your wife is lucky

then !! :)

[Z_I_Peevey]

47. Just learning to walk, rushing to the window of the little two-room

'court' my parents lived in in Carlsbad, New Mexico because I was eager to see my grandmother coming in on a big Greyhound bus. I tripped over a lamp cord on a model like this:



and my mother yelled from the back room, and I was very scared.

Someone who professed to be somewhat enlightened once claimed to know the reason most of our earliest memories are harsh ones, or scary ones, but I've forgotten his rationale. It was probably just bullshit anyway.

Theories, DU brain experts?

[NewEnglandGirl]

56. It's just interesting too

that some people's memories go so far back and others do not.

[trackfan]

48. I was poked with a diaper pin, while being changed on my parents' bed.

That's the earliest one. I only have a handful of pre-3.5-year-old memories. One of the others is getting a shot at the doctor; another is being bit by the dog while trying to take away his bone - apparently, physical pain is pretty traumatic.

[NewEnglandGirl]

57. I have that same memory

of being bitten by a dog because I was trying to kiss him while he was drinking water (stupid kid). Luckily he only bit my arm. I think I was about the age you were.

[ccjlld]

49. Feeding my baby brother baby asprin.

I fed him an entire bottle of St. Josephs Baby Asprin. I was almost 2 and he was approx 5 to 6 months old. JFK's funeral was on television at the time. Initially I thought it was the Thanksgiving parade, but when I told my mother I remembered it because of the parade, she told me it was JFK's funeral. I remember them shoving that tube down my nose to pump my stomach too!

[NewEnglandGirl]

58. Wow, they probably thought

you took some too ! :wow:

[ccjlld]

66. Yep,

But my stomach was empty and all the baby asprin was in his. Probably has something to do with why I hated the taste of baby asprin when I was a kid.

[Blue Diadem]

50. I didn't have early memories until I was in my early 30's and they came back.

We'd moved to a rural town where they have the VFD whistle at noontime. I grew up in a small town with the same type of sirens and I used to get shakey and nervous whenever I'd hear it. I didn't have that when we lived in the city but the move here and those sirens triggered that same feeling.

One day when the siren went off at noon, I had the flashback. I was in a crib and it was dark and I was crying. The VFD sirens were blaring. There was yelling and then I was being carried by my Dad, Next, I am outside on the front stoop in the dark. I grew up in an area with no streetlights and we were probably about 200 ft away from farm fields. I was terrified as I watch the front door close, the sirens still blaring and I'm in total darkeness.

My Dad had died a year before we moved here..but my Mom was still alive and I verified the memory with her. I was around 2 when it happened. The good thing about the memory is that I no longer have those feelings when I hear the sirens.

Since then I can remember several things..mostly bad, also some of our house before my parents had it added on when I was 2. I can remember the kitchen when it was smaller, the yellow table and where it sat. A funny one was when I was also around 2. We were fishing on a river and my Mom put me on a potty chair. I looked down and began shrieking, there were crayfish walking out from under the potty chair. One of my brothers had knocked over the little container of them.

[NewEnglandGirl]

59. Those are some very interesting recollections

You might find that more come back as time goes on.

:thumbsup: for your avatar. :)

[Blue Diadem]

63. Oh, I've had many recollections since that first one 20 yrs ago now.

Most aren't good. It's the few good ones that sustain me.

[hobbit709]

52. My earliest memories are of the occupation troops in my home town.

We lived in Vienna which like Berlin was divided into 4 zones. We were in the American sector but most of our relatives lived in the Soviet sector. I had an American passport, my mom had Austrian papers, loads of fun every time we crossed from one sector to another. That ended in 1955 when the troops pulled out.

[NewEnglandGirl]

60. That's something that

will never leave you. I know someone who was in Germany during the war and she still talks about it all the time.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

61. Approximately age two-and-a-half, I'm told

In our dining room we had a buffet with small, high windows behind it. I recall getting a chair, climbing onto the buffet, and trying to look out the window. My mother saw me and ran to grab me off, because, you see, she had all kinds of heirloom china on top of the buffet. I distinctly remember walking around my great-grandmother's coffee pot, which at that time came up to my knees and looked absolutely huge.

[NewEnglandGirl]

69. Once I glued a picture

that I colored and thought was beautiful to the bricks that were part of the fireplace. I remember that it never came off totally. I also didn't understand the value of adult's possessions. :)

[femmocrat]

62. I can remember my mother bringing my baby brother home from the hospital.

I was two.

[NewEnglandGirl]

70. Didn't you wonder

when they were going to send him back? :P

[mina_seward]

64. I remember being on my parents bed

and my mom changing my diapers. We were going to the pool that night, the first night that our club was going to allow members after 8pm! My father was so excited that the whole experience stuck with me for 40 years now. It was probably 1967 or 68.

[NewEnglandGirl]

72. My family always belonged

to this club where they give dinners and things for different causes like breast cancer etc. They're very wrapped up in it and it's been a part of our heritage so I know what you mean.

[loveable liberal]

65. driving in 1964 1/2 mustang in back seat on a cloverleaf....

I have no idea why.

[NewEnglandGirl]

73. ,,,,,,,

:P

[datasuspect]

71. reading the words "suspended animation" in a comic book before i ever went to kindergarten

i was born knowing how to read.

[NewEnglandGirl]

75. Wow

you must have a very high IQ. I remember my cousin's little girl talking in sentences almost before she could walk. It was amazing.

[Awsi Dooger]

74. Early age 3

Specifically about 3 years, 3 months. My mom was in the hospital about to give birth and a neighbor saw me at the edge of our back yard and asked about the pregnancy. I froze and ran to get my dad to respond to her.

Hmmm. I see all the claims of age 18 months and into age 2. Let's just say I'm doubtful, and would love to wager no. I'd win the vast, vast majority, based on reliable studies.

[NewEnglandGirl]

78. You can base a lot of it on things

like where the person lived at certain times etc. Like I know mine is correct because before I was 3 I slept in a bed (sometimes my parents).

[Blue Diadem]

95. I agree. I was able to verify mine with not only my Mom

but after she died, I spoke to my oldest brother about the memories which he confirmed. He was much older and graduated HS and moved out when I was 3. He was the one who always tried to protect me, so he would not only witness physical abuse, he'd often be experiencing it himself.

[NewEnglandGirl]

104. I'm so sorry that you went through that

I can relate to that so much. If you ever want to talk, I am here. :hug:

[Blue Diadem]

120. Thank you,

I am sorry you went through it too.

I was lucky to have 10 wonderful years with my Dad after he had a massive stroke that gave him a partial physical disability but altered his brain in a way that he was a kind gentle soul. That gentle man was the only way my children ever knew him.

I tend to think some traumatic memories come back when we're capable of handling them.

[NewEnglandGirl]

122. Thank you also

and yes, the mind can be kind to us at times.

[Ikonoklast]

76. Standing in a crib, second floor bedroom, looking out the window

Into the back yard of the house where there were a bunch of little kids playing, and being so frustrated that I couldn't be out there with them. My brother and sister were out there playing with the neighbor kids, running through the sprinkler and screaming bloody murder.

Then my mother and another woman came into the room, and Mom picked me up...

I was 16 months old. Mom said that woman was the next-door neighbor lady.

[NewEnglandGirl]

81. That is so sweet

Did they bring you outside to play too? I think that's what we really remember, the feelings.

[mia]

77. 16 -18 months old - vivid memory of snow in this poem

Autobiographical Memory



Riding high and light on my father’s back,

I bounced up and down as he climbed the dark stairway.

While I held fast to his neck,

I twisted my body around and searched below

and found my mother entering the front doorway.

Falling snow enclosed her

as she stomped the clumps of whiteness from her boots.

Soon the stairway turned and a door opened.

Whiteness again,

as my face brushed against

smooth beads that framed the kitchen doorway.

Warm, bright light bounced up at me

from a white enamel tabletop below.

Snow still clung to the front of my snowsuit.

and I looked back, once again, for my mother.

[NewEnglandGirl]

82. That is really beautiful

:hi:

[crim son]

79. Mine is crawling

down the hallway in our apartment in Toronto, from the room in the back, up to the kitchen/foyer.

[NewEnglandGirl]

83. I bet there are very few

people who remember crawling. That is amazing. :)

[doc03]

80. I remember my dad coming out of a small food

market and telling my mother he heard there were tornado warnings for that evening. I remember them talking about how strange the sky looked, it had kind of a greenish black color to it. That night I remember my mother getting me up and we all went to the basement. The next morning we walked out our road and there were several trees downed one smashing a garage and the roof was blown off of another garage across from our house. I may have been around 3 years old.

[NewEnglandGirl]

84. That is sure

a scary memory. You were lucky to be ok.

[marigold20]

85. I was in trouble - probably why I remember it

I was around 3, my brother, age 2, we were throwing small toys down a long flight of stairs, watching them bounce and laughing a lot. Mercifully, I don't remember much after that. I know Mom was mad...

[NewEnglandGirl]

86. True,

I think we remember everything we got into trouble for. There's sure a lot for me to remember. :P

[MilesColtrane]

87. I remember just kicking it, chillin' as a blastocyst.

...pining for those care-free days as a zygote.

[NewEnglandGirl]

90. You do ??? !!!

You get the prize, then. ;) :P

And I love your "error" message. :hi:

[many a good man]

88. JFK's assassination on my second birthday

I can remember being in the car on the way to Grandma's house for my party when the news came over the car radio. I remember cars stopped in traffic and everybody crying. You could hear the newsman's voice coming out of all the car radios, set to the same station. I was terribly upset that my party was canceled and instead all these grownups came over my Grandma's house to mourn, ignoring me completely.

I always thought that was my first memory, and I mentioned it here before. But now that I think about it, I do have one memory that must have taken place before that. I remember my big brother, 19 months older than me, stealing my baby bottle and whacking me over the head with it. It was excruciatingly painful because back in those days bottles were made of glass, not plastic!

[NewEnglandGirl]

91. That must be sad

to have to think of that on your birthday.

:-(

I hope you gave your brother a big old bop on his head for that. :P

[Mobius]

89. In a crib as well 18 months old

crying because me panda teddy bear that was missing one eye had fallen out of the crib. I also remember seeing the green carpet and thinking that I didn't like the color.
I was about 18 months old.

[NewEnglandGirl]

92. I remember my favorite little animals too

I bet you don't have green carpeting now.;-)

p.s. I love your pics, they're great. :)

[Ysabel]

94. i remember being born...

i didn't always remember this...

i remembered clearly most everything back to about age one and a half (i remembered a couple things farther back but these were more vague) but then i went into menopause and started remembering more all the way back to being born...

- however my shorter term memory is not working as well since the onset of menopause...

[NewEnglandGirl]

105. I'm sure it will come back to you

:)

[DarkTirade]

96. Damned if I remember.

:shrug:

:P

[NewEnglandGirl]

106. I bet if you did

it would be about music. :)

[Roon]

97. I remember being in a crib and looking at a cat on the dresser

I remember thinking that one of the black ceramic cats hanging on the wall somehow come to life. I was very afraid. I also remember being in a high chair wearing a bib with a bowl of oatmeal in front of me and my strick, catholic, Grandmother taking my hand and crossing myself.

[NewEnglandGirl]

107. My Gram had these

snake figures when I was little and I was afraid of them too. :scared:

[EstimatedProphet]

98. My earliest memory...

I was 2 years old, standing in the kitchen throwing an "I Want" for a product called "Shake-a-Pud", which was an instant pudding made in a hand shaker.

[Sheets of Easter]

101. Shake-a-Pud.

:rofl:

I sense a soon-to-be-made-unfunny Lounge meme.

[asthmaticeog]

102. Shake-a-Pud!

Some states you can go to jail for that shit, man.

[NewEnglandGirl]

108. Sounds good,

I don't blame you. :hi:

[EstimatedProphet]

129. From what little I remember it was horrible

[yellowdogintexas]

99. my grandaddy bringin my Mom a kitten. I was around two, I think.

Cat was a big orange tabby male. We had the cat a while so I remember him well, named him Buttons (don't know why, unless he chased buttons on the floor, or chewed on them or something)

Now the visual memory is just a flash of him coming in the room carrying the cat and my mom getting up to get the cat. (Any visual memory of my Grandaddy is a good one though because he was my favorite person in the whole world. and a Yellowdog par excellence too.)

This has been reinforced by Mom later telling us how sweet it was for him to do this since he HATED cats, but he brought her one because he knew how much she missed having a pet and a kitten was better for where they lived and he knew she loved cats.

I think we had Buttons until I was about 5, so I remember him. He was a big boy, and we even had photos of him stretching up to get a treat so he was a long tall drink of water.

[NewEnglandGirl]

110. Sounds like a beautiful cat

and that you had a really nice family. :)

[yellowdogintexas]

115. he was and I did. Thank you

Still do in fact, just some of them are no longer with us.

I think I have the best sisters anyone could want and some truly awesome nieces, nephews, cousins and brothers in law. Even my cousins' spouses are pretty neat folks.

And of course, Mr YDIT and the Tattoo Artist are perfectly awesome

[Rabrrrrrr]

100. What *was* my earliest memory? I have no idea, since I've forgotten.

[NewEnglandGirl]

111. You're right

I should have written "what is." :blush:

[JTG of the PRB]

109. My mom was lifting me up toward a tree...

...and I was reaching out my tiny hands to grab a green apple that, at the time, looked enormous.

I have no idea how old I was, but I'm guessing I was about 2 or so. It was at the first house I lived in in Longmont, which we moved out of when I was 3 1/2.

[NewEnglandGirl]

112. My friend who lives

in Kansas now lived in Longmont for quite a while, she loved it, wished she could have stayed there, although she's now with her husband which is great. :)

[Boudica the Lyoness]

113. Being born

I'm not kidding. People think I'm mad but I do remember my birth. I remember almost panic as I was squeezed through the birth channel. The coldness, the dim room and bright blurry light from the window. I was born in my parents unheated bedroom in the winter.

I remember the wallpaper and layout of my parents room because they had my cot in there for awhile. I drew the layout for my mum and described the wallpaper colours and she said I was spot on. We moved from that house before I was three and I only spent a short amount of time sleeping in my parents room. The only thing that I remember about the room I shared with my sister for about three years is the window that she lifted my up to look out of and scared the hell out of me. She was only 18 months older than me and I thought she was going to drop me out of the window! But I do remember seeing the view of the roofs as she held me there on the window sill.

I also remember many other things, like being held by my mother, my Welsh grandpa talking to me as I dozed off in his arms, trying to walk and falling down. My memory gets fuzzier the older I get and my last really vivid memory was at age three when we moved from that house, after that I can't remember much, so it's probably like most peoples memories of their childhood.

[NewEnglandGirl]

117. There are theories that people can remember

their own birth. It's an interesting thing to read about.

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/09/08/the_odd_body_birth_memory/

[MsKandice01]

114. Being thrown in the pool by my uncle...

I was 2 at the time. He has this tradition of throwing young children who visit his house in the pool (when something is already in there to catch them, of course) to discourage them from getting too close to the pool and falling in. He's really paranoid about some young child drowning in his pool. It seems pretty cruel but all of the kids in the family have gotten the treatment at some point or another and, while it was pretty traumatizing at the time, we're all okay now.

[NewEnglandGirl]

118. Some people do believe in

that practice of throwing kids into water. That must have been really scary for you. ;(

[tigereye]

116. running by a lake when I was very little

or being shown my younger sister when I was in my crib...


not sure which one was earlier, actually.

[NewEnglandGirl]

119. Thanks for replying

:) I love your username.

[tigereye]

121. thanks!

part tai chi move, and part semi-previous stone!

[RFKHumphreyObama]

123. It must have been when I was approximately one or so

I remember being carried in the arms of a servant who used to work for the family for a family photo

[moriah]

124. Almost burning the house down is the first one I can tell you when it happened.

But all of my memories from living in the trailer I lived in until I was just under 3 are a bit bunched together.

I think the absolute first was sometime around when I turned 2. I remember waking up early and it was snowing, and it was a weekend. My mother was working all week on the road and coming home on weekends to sleep, so my sister didn't want me to wake her and Dad up. She took me outside and we made snow ice cream. It was sometime during the winter I turned 2 -- my birthday was in February.

The next clear memory was during the summer, and we still lived in the trailer, so I was 2 or two and a half. I remember waking up early on a weekend, my mom was home, and wanting to make her breakfast in bed. I decided to make her toast.

I got the bread, put butter on the bread, put the bread in the toaster...

Wow, there is fire! How do I make it go out? I know that cord plugged into the wall is what makes things work, so let's unplug the cord... It's still burning! Oh, there's my sister's wet bathing suit. It should put out the fire!

Then I got a fork and dug the toast out of the toaster, put it on a plate, and marched proudly to my parents' bedroom, and presented Mom with the burned toast. And let the smell of the fire and my sister's scorched bathing suit into the room.

I was grounded for a day.

--------

We moved into my grandparents house that fall, and I remember having my third birthday at my grandparents house.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

125. I forget.

:evilgrin:

[Left Is Write]

127. It was 1968. My grampa and my dad were building a screened porch in our backyard...

I fell on a cement block. I remember my dad scooping me up - I can still remember what it felt like when he was carrying me into the house at a run, calling for my mother - and my mother washing the blood off of my face.

I had just turned two.

[NewEnglandGirl]

130. Injury like that we usually never forget

Especially as a young child it's very traumatic, glad you were ok. :)

[Left Is Write]

136. Thanks.

:)

The injury did wind up bruising the bud of my permanent tooth, which came in years later discolored.

The memory is pretty vivid for someone so young.

[NewEnglandGirl]

141. Oh no,

were you able to do anything about the discoloration? That happened to my friend's child when she fell and knocked out several of her front (baby) teeth. It was soooo long waiting for those second teeth to come in!:-(

[TrogL]

128. Standing beside (and under) the kitchen table asking for hot chocolate

Which makes me about four. What happened to one, two and three?

[NewEnglandGirl]

131. People's memories start

at all different ages, it's amazing how it varies.

[Mutley]

132. Playing with my sister in some tall grass on the day we moved to

Virginia Beach. I had to have been two, because I also remember my third birthday in that house later that same year.

[NewEnglandGirl]

138. Your avatar is so cute

Thank you for sharing that, I'm sharing these replies with my friend's middle school daughter, she is very interested in this topic. :)

[intheflow]

135. I have three early memories but I'm not sure which is the earliest.

I remember being in bed, waking up and seeing flashing lights outside--really strange because we lived in the country. I think that was when my dad had his first heart attack.

I remember stealing my mother's Avon lipstick samples and putting it on my Huckleberry Hound doll--and then deciding the kittens our cat had just had needed some lipstick, too.

I remember my mother carrying me and tripping over a rolled-up carpet, going down, and shattering her elbow as she cradled my head to keep it from bumping the floor.

I think I was 3 years old in all of these memories. The earliest memory I have that I can date for sure was my mother having me read The Sneetches aloud to someone who came over to visit. I'm not sure I was really reading it, I think I was reciting it rote, but I really was reading not long after that.

[NewEnglandGirl]

139. That's interesting about the reading

at such a young age, that's funny about the cats and the lipstick. I remembering cutting my bangs right to my head when I was about that age and was going to give the dog and cat a trim but my mother caught me. :P

[intheflow]

142. Yes, the kitten incident

is not a particularly happy memory. To hear my mom talk about it now, it was cute, but I can tell you she was freaking out at the time.

[TankLV]

137. In my mother's arms looking up at my Dad finishing up shingling the kitchen wall

I had to be about only a few months old...

The other was being in the kitchen when all the relatives were over and some would come up to me, grab my cheek and say "Oh what a cute baby!" and thinking how I wished I could talk to say "STOP IT!!!"...also a few months old. I was one of those "chairs" with holes cut out for the feet and a "table" in front like a high chair only a couple feet off the ground...

[NewEnglandGirl]

140. Sounds like those Look Who's Talking

movies. :P You were very advanced. :)

[Maccagirl]

143. I believe it was my 4th birthday and I was having my tonsils

out. The nurses brought me a special pencil and a nurses cap and made a big fuss over me. I wouldn't drink the orange juice that had a sedative in it because I wouldn't drink anything with pulp in it. After the surgery I remember watching Romper Room and spilling grape juice on my pajamas and my mom changing me.

[NewEnglandGirl]

147. I had mine out as a teen

I would never forget that either ! :hi:

[Frank Cannon]

144. An evil galactic overlord named Xenu put me in a volcano...

and then blew me up with a hydrogen bomb.

[NewEnglandGirl]

148. That's one trip

I'd love to be on too. (Especially today!). :P

[raccoon]

145. Sometimes our "memories" are false memories.

For years, I believed I had seen my grandmother die. She died when I was 3 years old. She was walking in the hall to my parents' room, had a heart attack, fell down and died.

Then some years ago, I started to think about this. This happened in the middle of the night, or the wee hours of the morning. How likely was it that I would have been out of bed at that age, and seen all that? Maybe some kids wander at night, but I didn't.

I figure in this case, my mother was right. (Yeah, for once! LOL) I had heard grownups around me talking about it and my mind created the "memory."

[NewEnglandGirl]

149. I agree with you

that memories can be created by hearing adults talking. That has been addressed when children testify at trials etc. Also occasionally kids can dream things that they may believe really happened.

[BreweryYardRat]

146. About 3 seconds before I did a header off a picnic table.

Landed mouth-first on concrete. I was 2. Most of two decades later, I've still got the scar on my lower lip.

[NewEnglandGirl]

150. Wow, that's a terrible

first memory. I'm glad that you didn't have even worse injuries !!!