View Full Version : What Impressed You as a Kid?
I was reading Apartment Therapy and there's an interesting blog post (http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/what-impressed-you-about-others-homes-as-a-kid-171386) and question on there: What impressed you about other's homes when you were a kid?
The blogger asserts that s/he felt that those families whose fridge's had ice dispensers "had arrived" and in my father's era, he said that having color TV was pretty darn special. For many of my friends, such as my husband, it was having atari gaming systems, and later the other ones that came down (nintendo and such).
I think i was an odd child. The people whom I envied lived with less. I remember a pair of seniors who lived on our block when I was 9-10 yrs old. They lived in one of the smallest houses on the block, and they had the most minimalist, mid-century modern furniture.
Everyone I knew at the time maligned their way of life -- it was so "spartan" which was said with a sort of distaste for it. Likewise, they were "just so poor" when they were young apparently, that they simply "never made enough to retire comfortably." As far as I could tell, this couple was quite comfortable indeed. But, they loved simple design.
I remember envying the architecture of my friend Laura Ashley's house. It was such a pretty house -- the only one in the neighborhood that was built in the craftsman style. It was very pretty and very efficient -- but I felt that it was so unfortunate at how cluttered the place was.
In fact, my overriding memories of other people's homes growing up is that they were cluttered and/or dirty. I always felt that people had "too much." I always felt sorry for them that they had to live with such clutter.
It sounds so funny, but it is so true. I still feel that way about many of my friends.
I was impressed with lots of things found in other peoples homes when I was but a wee lad. Namely, a bathroom and running water in the kitchen as well as a furnace or stove that didn't require me to bring in coal from outside.
Being a country boy, I was also impressed with some things outside others homes, such as sidewalks. They seemed so civilized.
I had a very good friend who grew up in really difficult circumstances with her single dad, who had an alcohol problem and some associated health problems and was chronically unemployed. They lived in what was essentially a one room shack. He had put in a loft, where she slept. They had electricity, but no running water (used an outhouse out back), and no oven (cooked on an old woodburning cookstove, which was also the main source of heat in the winter). But I loved their place -- it seemed so cozy. I think I had some of my first lessons in minimalism and good organization from her. Her dad was kind of a packrat, but her corner of the house (she had a corner, not a room) was meticulously organized and she could always find anything she was looking for. I loved hanging out at their place. we lived on a lake, and we basically used to go back and forth either walking or rowing boats between our houses, spent pretty much every afternoon together after school, and most days in the summer. Every once in awhile in the summer her dad would bring home a bucket of Kentucky Fried Chicken and that seemed like the worlds greatest delicacy. Looking back, I'm guessing he bought that on the days he cashed the child support check from her mom or something. Unfortunately, my friend and her dad had a serious falling out and are no longer in contact. He is still living in the shack, sober now and in better health, and he makes money by mowing lawns and doing odd jobs for people, including my mom. My mom saves newspapers and kindling for him for his wood stove. My friend and I found each other through facebook. She married, divorced and recently adopted a child as a single mom. I find it so sad that they don't communicate anymore, but I figure something major must have caused it so I haven't asked her about it. I do tell her dad that she seems to be doing well when I see him. Makes me sad that those tough but happy times they had together have turned out like this, though.
Another thing that used to always impress me in other people's houses when I was a kid was staircases, second floors, and especially attics. We lived in a rambler and it always seemed so much more interesting when people had stairs in their houses.
lhamo
We would go to town to visit the old couple that my parents bought the farm from right before I was born. You had to arrive before 4 p.m. because they'd go to bed at 5:30 p.m. Still kept to the farm schedule. I always thought their house was neat in the winter because they blocked everything off with heavy blankets except the kitchen and living room. Everything else was freezing cold including the bathroom. I always thought it would be like camping out to live in just two rooms.
I also was always eager to go visit some friends who build their house around a big tree.
We had other friends who transformed an old barn into a house, the silo had a hot tub.
Being a country boy, I was also impressed with some things outside others homes, such as sidewalks. They seemed so civilized.
I figured some of the other kids were just poor, since their homes didn't even have blocks to sit their axles on, but were sitting right on the ground, with no axles or wheels or anything. I tried not to judge.
This will sound snobby but I was never poor, was and am totally middle class, and my mother liked old houses so we always had nice old houses with old plumbing fixtures like claw foot tubs and pedestal sinks and "old" kitchens, and the floors were always wood (until my mother carpeted them, ugh!) and the ceilings were high and there were established old trees and garden areas.
I was never impressed with my friends' modern houses because I thought that they were lesser, and they didn't have trees and the yards were tiny and stupid. See? Snob here who still likes old houses.
Now that I think about it, my aunt/godmother had a modern house which wasn't great but she had this fabulous "modern" pink bathroom! EVERYTHING IN IT WAS PINK! OMG that was pretty cool--pink fixtures, pink tile. And then, she had a fabulous pink bedspread that was just unbelievably expensive. I know because my mom looked into buying one for me and she said that we couldn't afford it. I was only a little disappointed and I was satisfied to just visit that fabulous pink bedspread. My aunt also had a "sputnik" light fixture with star-type light bulbs. She had that thing into the 1980's. They also had a big 1960's Cadillac with long fins. But here's the best thing about that house: it had a peephole in the basement door that showed a photo of girls in skimpy bathing suits. That was my uncle's touch.
My mom had a friend who was an antique dealer, and she had a cool house on a big property. There were lots of antiques throughout the house and she had one room, sort of a parlor, that was all decorated with strawberries...strawberry wallpaper, tablecloths, upholstery, tchotchkes, pictures, pillows, everything strawberry, and there must have been strawberry candles or air freshener in there because it smelled like strawberry, too. Kind of weird but I thought it was cool as a kid.
My mom's former boss was sort of a surrogate grandpa to me, and he lived in a fancy shmancy high rise apartment on the lake. He had all kinds of cool toys and gizmos, like battery operated robots, a fake canary in a cage that sang like a real canary, and a whirlpool bathtub.
My aunt's house had a laundry chute in the bathroom---that was cool!
I was impressed by any home where no one smoked. They smelled so nice and fresh compared to my home. And anyone with a cool house in the summer. Our house, especially the attic where my bedroom was, never felt cool enough, even with central AC.
The neatest thing was a house kitty corner behind my home growing up. The second floor was divided into two large bedrooms. This was the kind of house built in the 40s or 50s here in the Midwest. Maybe there were knotty pine boards on the wall. In my friend's room, the walls were painted white with red trim. Her brother's room across the hall had the knotty pine wall boards. I think there was red shag carpet. This was the late 70s. :)There were lots of open cubbyholes in the walls - for books and such. I LOVED those! She had a window seat in the dormer.
My aunt's house had a laundry chute in the bathroom---that was cool!
The house I grew up in had that. I delighted in aiming a wet towel on my mother's head while she was leaning over beneath in the basement, sorting laundry. ;-)
As a kid, we went to visit our neighbours in the country. Most people lived in the kitchen or large food prep area but had a parlour for important visitors. I remember being in a parlour one afternoon and slapping the upholstered arm of the large chair and the sunlight caught all the dust that arose from it. Never looked at upholstered chairs the same way again.
Tradd, we owned a house similar to the one you noted - a compact story and a half, with two large bedrooms upstairs with shag, two small BR on the ground floor (guest room and sewing room), one bath, modest LR and large kitchen with great counter space and full concrete basement for water pump, furnace etc. I loved that design for its efficiency, convenience, ease of cleaning and heating. If all the world went back to that design, it would make a lot of sense for all ages and abilities.
I always thought my great-aunt's unwinterized summer cottage in Connecticut was PERFECT--because it sat across the street from the beach on a slight incline with a deep front yard so that you could sit on the porch and feel the ocean breezes, as opposed to my friends in the more expensive waterfront homes that were hotter. She had a little balcony on the second floor which almost looked like a widow's watch that I thought was so cool, and I really loved how the smell of the house was a mixture of salt and timber, because there was no insulation at all. I thought it was cool that there was an outdoor shower and the first floor toilet was only accessible by going outside and then entering it from off the porch (kind of like an attached outhouse but with plumbing).
I also like my best friend's house. She had a normal three bedroom, one bath house, but as her parents grew the family to 9 children, they didn't consider moving--my friend's dad, who was a carpenter, simply divided each room in two and added bunk beds. So there WERE five bedrooms ultimately, but they were so small you basically had about two feet between the bunkbed set and the dresser. The most amazing part of this house was that it was always as neat as a pin! My friend's mom really should have written a book on clutter control.
I grew up in a stodgy, old money neighborhood not beacuse we had money but because my mom bought the cheapest house she could find in a good school district after my parents divorced. The neighborhood however was ringed with very low income households. So it was the great variety of my friend's houses that totally amazed me - everything from palatial estates to shotgun shanties. The house that impressed me the most thought was that of a girl from Denmark. Their house was incredibly clean, simple and spartan. Wood floors, no curtains, basic wood furniture - that image of simplicity and lack of chaos always stuck with me as something I wanted to emulate.
I had a friend in high school who lived in what seemed to be a giant, old, dark, mansion-like home in the fraternity/sorority section of Ann Arbor. The family was truly preppie (sp?) and their home seemed to be like something out of an L.L. Bean catalogue. In true Ann Arbor professorial style, the family car was a Volvo station wagon, I believe. I was raised in east Ann Arbor, adjacent to Ypsilanti, and the homes in my neighborhood were reasonably nice, but nothing like my friend's home. I still think "wow!" whenever I remember her house. They used these kind of stiff board "placemats" that I had never seen before. Then I saw them again, years later, in England.
And yes, seeing friends who had color television and a water/ice dispenser in their refrigerator door was something definitely gasp-worthy.
Any house that was really unique architecturally. I remember one in California we visited that was really quirky and included an outside staircase to the second floor. Being from Edmonton, the idea of an outside staircase seemed very strange.
Also always loved whatever the style of house is called that is all 90 degree angles - all very square, with lots of windows, and pale exterior. There were a few of those in the city and I loved to drive by them. And tall houses. Always liked the idea of an apartment or condo with multiple stories. Love the look of 3-4 stories, but don't think I'd actually like to live in a house with that many stairs.
For interior and the clutter vs minimalist thing that many people comment on, we had family friends that were DINKs (compared to our house with 1 income, 5 kids) and their houses were always so neat, tastefully and minimally decorated, compared to the inevitable clutter we had. Their houses were just so incredibly peaceful. I just loved going there. I really wanted to be like them, and now I am, except we don't have the house yet. I do need to get better at cleaning and putting stuff away. But the peacefulness and freedom is there.
I must have been a weird kid. I was rarely impressed by anything in other people's houses, but I was always fascinated by other people's barns. :D I grew up on a diary farm and was active in 4-H. Every summer our 4-H club would have a tour where kids from the club could show off their projects before the county fair. Since most club members' primary projects were livestock, we would go from farm to farm to so that kids could show off their cattle, sheep, pigs, goats, chickens, etc. I was always really impressed by how clean and modern some of the barns were in comparison to the older style barn that we had and the less than high-tech milking equipment that we used. I always imagined that I would grow up to live on a farm and was sure it would have an ultra-modern barn with all the latest and greatest equipment for my livestock.
... They used these kind of stiff board "placemats" that I had never seen before. Then I saw them again, years later, in England...
I know! I remember first seeing those 40 years ago in England, my mom wanted to buy some, but I don't remember us having them at home, so I think she might have decided not to do it. They always had photos of country estates or castles or olde townes.
I was impressed by my grandmother's big old five-bedroom house with a full basement and a full attic and a music room, a sewing room, sets of glass pocket doors, an imposing central staircase... She was my role model for living alone with a taste for recreational shopping. ;) And I was impressed as well with my great aunt, who lived (also alone--two widows) in the teeniest house I ever saw. I'd say it was about the size of my garage--but it did have the advantage of a site just a block or two from the ocean. Like Iris Lily, I was raised in old houses with plenty of carefully-crafted furnishings, and never did my (frustrated interior designer) mother let me forget how superior Everything Old was and always will be. This is probably why, to this day, I have the utmost respect for Everything Old, but vastly prefer contemporary architecture and furnishings. Always the black sheep.
What struck me in thinking about this was that in my blue-collar/working class childhood, kids did not typically hang out at each other's houses. Everyone was outside playing pretty much year round. Houses were too small, and families too big, to have any kind of entertaining space for non-family, not to mention the cost involved in offering snacks and drinks to neighborhood kids.
I remember one acquaintence who had a semi-finished basement which I visited once and that memory sticks with me because it was a big deal.
fidgiegirl
5-19-12, 7:45pm
not to mention the cost involved in offering snacks and drinks to neighborhood kids.
It's interesting that you mention that. We always hung out at the neighbor's, but knew that when dinner started, our welcome was over. My co-worker says they have a little boy who just pulls up a chair and joins them! And since his DM is very preggo and appears to have her hands full, DCW (Dear CoWorker, lol) lets him eat every time.
I have been thinking hard about this and really enjoying this thread. I think for me it was houses that had: No TV on, at least not ALL THE TIME, and spaces that you could just USE without having to clean them first. Like, if we wanted to play a game on the floor or on a table, we didn't have to clear away all the junk and mess to do so.
Also, my friends had an older home in town and there were two stairways, one for the family and one that must have been a butler's access years ago. That one does stand out.
...
Also, my friends had an older home in town and there were two stairways, one for the family and one that must have been a butler's access years ago. That one does stand out.
I live in a neighborhood where many of the houses still have backstairs as well as front stairs. It's kind of silly, especially in houses that are less than 2,000 square feet, but it's a charming remnant of days gone by. I remember, now that you mention it, that that my mom was kind of put out that someone had removed the backstairs from our Victorian house. It had a "new" addition on the back from the 1920's and in that renovation, the back stairs were demolished.
domestic goddess
5-19-12, 8:45pm
I really liked my grandparents' house. Their attic had a storage area, and then one large dorm-like large bedroom that ran the whole lenght of the house.There were several old bed there that we kids all used when we spent the night or when the cousins came to visit. Then the basement was divided too; one side was the laundry area and had a metal Hoosier cabinet. The other side of the basement had a fireplace and some old secretaries with some old books in them. I got my introduction to Ellery Queen there, and read some of the first Hardy Boys mysteries, as well as several mysteries that featured some actresses. like Jane Russell, and a few others that I don't remember now.I read all of those, too, and would have loved to have them, but when they moved back to Ohio I think they were thrown out. My best friend in high school lived in an apartment, and I had never known anyone who lived in one, so that was pretty neat, too. Our house was a small "starter" home that my mom still lives in, or I guess I should say "lived" in, as she is now in a nursing home. I am envious of anyone who has a dining room. Our home didn't have one, and dd's home doesn't have one, but dh's an my home did. I got used to it in the 20 years we lived in it, and I miss that.
awakenedsoul
5-19-12, 10:57pm
My best friend growing up moved into a very wealthy neighborhood when we were about twelve. They had a swimming pool with a pool house. You went down the mountain from the house to change your clothes in the pool house, then further down the mountain to the pool. The path twisted and turned. I used to ride my moped up there to visit her, and the homes were just beautiful. They had racoons that used to visit at night, and I thought that was really cool. Her mother was selling real estate, and she did very well. Her parents divorced shortly after that, and her mother bought another expensive home in the same area. Her mother was the only mother in our neighborhood that worked outside the home. She bought herself a Cadillac and dyed her hair blonde. I remember my father seemed to resent her success. I was secretly impressed. She lived very well after her divorce. She was ahead of her time, as far as making money and being self sufficient. She was also an excellent housekeeper, a great cook, and a talented seamstress. Most all my friends' mothers really took care of their homes. They took a lot of pride in housekeeping. I absorbed that.
I remember going to a friend's house to play and how clean and organized it all was! My home was a pit!;)
I grew up in a home where the latest technology made it our house first. My father loved technology so we tended to have the latest appliances, gadgets etc.. before anyone else. So having stuff never impressed me much. In fact I hate shopping and dislike technology myself.
What struck me the most and influenced me the most was the lifestyle of a woman who lived across the street from us. She was a teacher at a private girls school and valued things like books and handcrafts (knitting, quilting). She made her own jams, baked bread and went to farmers markets and lived a very simple life. She would go shopping with my mom and the other women in her circle of friends, but never purchased anything unless it was actually on her list of things that she needed to buy.
When I look at my own desire to live a simple life, it's her life that I look at.
rodeosweetheart
5-21-12, 4:13am
We went to visit my mom's friend, and her parents had a sheep farm. They had the dirtiest dog I have ever seen, and lambs, and a totally cool rugloom in the living room. I saw that place, and said, "This is it for me."
I remember figuring out that not all heat required a summer of wood chopping and thinking that just flipping a switch sounded pretty luxurious. The first color TV I ever saw, must have been somewhere around age 12, was pretty close to Dorothy stepping out in Oz.
Gardenarian
5-21-12, 4:02pm
My friend had a fully equipped underground bomb shelter. I only ever saw it once - we were never allowed to play in it - but I thought that was really cool.
When I was a kid my parents were always house-looking. They just loved to drive around and go to open homes on week-ends. My favorite house was an octagon that had a courtyard in the middle. We also went to Sea Ranch (http://www.rchrd.com/photo/archives/2005/08/sea_ranch_1.html)and looked at the houses there, which I think has influenced my taste ever since.
For a while we lived in a house with a laundry chute and I have wanted one ever since! So much fun - except when my brothers would throw my toys down it!
We were totally middle class and most everyone I knew was also more or less in the same boat as us. So I didn't know anyone that had a drastically nicer or worse house then ours. Just minor differences.
But I remember three things that really impressed me. The two main things were houses with an upstairs for the bedrooms and houses with more modern bathrooms then ours. We had an old sink that had seperate hot and cold faucets, and a non-clawfoot freestanding bathtub that didn't have a shower. The third thing, ours was a duplex, or semi-detached house, whereas most of my friends lived in freestanding single-family homes.
Overall, though, I really liked a lot of little things about our house. Like the cabinet in the kitchen that was built into a wall and was so shallow that it could only hold glasses, one row deep. It just seemed so perfect. The biggest thing I really liked about our house, though, was that it was always spotlessly clean and everything put away. I would love to have our house be as organized as my mom was with the house I was raised in, but SO just isn't going to be that way, so I've really had to learn to accept some clutter.
Regarding laundry chutes, we had one growing up too! I would love to have one now except our laundry is up on the second floor by the bedrooms so any laundry chute would put the clothes further from the washing machine! :~)
Wildflower
5-22-12, 3:54am
Stairs! I loved 2 story houses. :) I grew up in a ranch house and thought it to be quite boring as a child.
Now I hate stairs! LOL Give me a house with everything on one level. ;)
i think these answers are so interesting.
I do also remember being jealous of people who had beautiful gardens. :)
I grew up in a 1960s ranch house in Texas, so I loved going to visit our farming relatives in North Dakota with their big late 1800s farmhouses. Having only a one-story house, I was fascinated by the basements, second (and sometimes third) stories and attics you could stand up in. I think that started my love of "treasure hunting". I could spend hours poking through the attics and basements. None of them had to worry about entertaining me, as long as they didn't mind me hanging out in the attic. :)
What impressed me the most about certain other families was how much the parents seemed to like their kids! that didn't seem to be happening in our house.
We had neighbors who seemed perfect to me. They had four kids. The neighborhood kids played ball in their back yard, the family made home-made root beer,
they took piano lessons, they always had some desert sitting in the kitchen. Seemed perfect to me!
ApatheticNoMore
5-22-12, 4:47pm
What struck me in thinking about this was that in my blue-collar/working class childhood, kids did not typically hang out at each other's houses. Everyone was outside playing pretty much year round.
+1 exactly. Ok it was middle class in California, we almost NEVER spent much time inside!!! Always outside, all the time. This noticing houses thing seems very strange. What impressed me about others houses is just how clean they were (our house was not). That's about it.
I was mostly thinking about slumber parties and kitchens. I spent most of my childhood outside too. But, we also had a lot of slumber parties and such, so I was in people's homes a lot.
leslieann
5-23-12, 12:23pm
Yeah, CathyA, you nailed it. In other houses, parents actually liked their kids.
And I really REALLY wanted "wall-to-wall" carpeting. Our house was old and had spectacularly beautiful wood floors. My stepmother still lives there, and the floors really are gorgeous. I remember whining to my mother that I wanted to have wall-to-wall like my friend's house. She was unsympathetic. She liked all things old, too, though the furniture was Sears Roebuck "colonial" style complete with gold-colored eagles. But the old house was right up her alley, and she was dismissive of my appreciation for my friend's ranch-style with carpeting.
Of course by now I am hugely appreciative of the older parts of my house, including the lovely wood floors. I wouldn't have carpeting for lots of reasons, including dogs and allergies but also aesthetically. So mom was right. About that, anyway. She didn't like kids at all, though, even her own, until the day she died. We were okay once we grew up but the child thing was tough for her.
We had all wooden floors growing up and they were always covered in dust and fuzz balls, so I always thought they'd be way to hard to keep clean. Come to find out.....it was my mother's problem, not the floors. hahaha
But I do like wall to wall carpeting now, since I think I've inherited my mother's housekeeping skills (or lack thereof!).
i always felt enjoyed in my home.
i hope DS feels the same way. I really enjoy him. He's a love, a real delight.
I'm no fun though. I don't really like to play the things that he does. I don't show any passion for it. Unless we are outside. I like hiking, running around, parkour, and so on. But blocks and legos are not my favorite.
For me it was houses that were not shabby where furniture/hardware weren't broken or missing and a home that was neat and tidy with things put away. If the house looked pulled together and cared for I was impressed. In my house (5 children) there was a perpetual shortage of everything. Also, the stairs became the dumping ground for every item that needed to be put away but hadn't. There were always countless pairs of shoes, books, jackets, toys and sporting equipment stuffed between the stairway railing rungs. The household was run with such chaos.
Also, until I was 10 we lived in a suburb in a northern city with sidewalks, public transportation, streetlights, city garbage pickup, extensive public parks all withing walking distance. When we moved south none of that existed. Streets were pitch black at night, no curbs or sidewalks, no summer programs for kids and everything was so far away. I remember how I didn't like that.
I agree with several others. Having parents who like you and siblings who like each other and aren't constantly fighting is always a plus.
What a fun thread this is! Lovin' reading everyone's entries.
Stairs, dedicated (formal) dining rooms, area rugs, games rooms, and fireplaces, impressed me as a kid, as did upstairs bedrooms. Somehow, being on a whole other floor, away from ones parents, struck me as being the coolest thing!
My baby brother loved holes! (Any kind of holes). When someone in the neighbourhood was excavating to build an addition, he'd always be there watching. One neighbour, I remember, let him try his hand at using a jackhammer. He was never the same after! That's all he talked about for weeks and months on end.
awakenedsoul
5-23-12, 10:11pm
i think these answers are so interesting.
I do also remember being jealous of people who had beautiful gardens. :)
I loved beautiful gardens, still do! (And now I have one!) We had neighbors who had an incredible Japanes Tea Garden. It had the the paths, wooden bridges, ponds, statues....etc...The energy there was incredible! They were older, and he spent hours each day on that garden. It seemed huge to me, and very professionally designed.
We had a lawn and some nice flower beds. People always complimented my mom on the garden. "That's because we have a JAPANESE gardener", she would always say. The implication was that he was far superior to the other gardeners in the neighborhood. She made a big point of that. I still remember his name, Mr. Hanada. He was so sweet and kind. He had the magic touch, and was a true master. I remember you could feel his energy, and the energy of his work in the garden. It lingered.
morning girl
5-24-12, 7:53am
Living in rented houses and apartments, I believed if you lived in a house your family owned you were rich. I also believed if you had a piano in your home you were rich.
I remember the first time I noticed a house that did NOT have a piano. I remember wondering, what do they do if they need to play something?
Yes, pianos, too. Any musical instrument for that matter. Travel-trailers/tent-trailers/campers, too!
I still remember his name, Mr. Hanada. He was so sweet and kind. He had the magic touch, and was a true master. I remember you could feel his energy, and the energy of his work in the garden. It lingered.
I would love to be a little like that when I grow up.
Radicchio
9-16-13, 12:43pm
I was looking through older posts and couldn't resist adding my thought. One impression I have always remembered is going to a good friend's house and spending the night. Their kitchen floor was always sticky, and I hated that feeling. Nevertheless, I spent a lot of time there because she was such a good friend, and her mother was so fun. Her mom was exceedingly patient and good-natured, and I loved that she spent lots of time cooking with us and teaching us to cook/bake things. (Perhaps that's why her kitchen floor was so sticky ??!! At the time, I never thought of my contribution to the sticky floor.) My mom, who was an immaculate housekeeper, never allowed me to do anything other than occasionally stir something when she was busy doing something else in the kitchen. It's a good memory, even though the thing I remember most about the house is an uncomfortably sticky floor.
I grew up in suburbia. When we went to visit my grandmother in Brooklyn I remember as a very young boy being extremely impressed by those little rooms that you step into, the doors would close and a few seconds later you would be on a completely different floor. No elevators in suburbia so I thought they were magical.:laff:
I also clearly remember believing that the little room would stay stationary and the buildings themselves would move up and down into the ground. Still remember the day when I finally figured out that no matter how many times I watched the buildings from outside I could never catch them going up and down. Finally I surmised that the little room must move, not the whole building.
My aunt's house had a laundry chute in the bathroom---that was cool!
Yes! I had an aunt with one of those!
Great question! What I remember being impressed by was:
My best friend had 6 siblings when I first met her and it grew to 8 siblings over the next few years. Her dad was a carpenter and he turned three bedrooms into five and each room was JUST big enough for bunk beds and a dresser. As I got older I definitely was VERY impressed by the amount of order in that house--I guess they ran a tight ship, but the Mom never seemed to be overly strict. I loved her.
My uncle had a pretty modern house for the 60s, almost a Brady Bunch looking house. They had the laundry chute. They also had a brook flowing through their back yard, but my uncle who was incredibly resourceful had cemented off a section so the kids could swim in it. (Don't ask me how he kept it sanitary, but It was the first "natural" pool I ever saw. He also had built a 12 x 12 platform in the back so the kids could have a tent to sleep in with a real floor. Also, it was cool that when I stayed over night and stayed in my two girl cousins' room, everything was built in, and they accommodated me with a simple plywood plank that they rested on the frames of the two twin beds, so it was like one giant bed we all slept in where we would rub each others backs and talk for hours.
Then there was my friend who invited me down to his basement where his dad had a bar with topless calendars and gross topless women drink pourers--but I was impressed in a much different way with that house.
ETA: I just noticed that this is an old post (thanks for resurrecting, Radicchio).. When I realized that I had to look back to see if I had already responded :|(
it's cool to respond again, though, and it's cool when a thread resurrects.
now, i find myself jealous of solar panels and paid off mortgages. :D
ToomuchStuff
9-20-13, 10:15am
interesting old thread. Not much impressed upon me about houses. Some closets with hidden spaces (taken out of attics), and one house where they had a pool that we went to for a picnic once a year (the only time I got to swim).
I was more impressed that they had grandfathers that were alive and such.
It just occurred to me that my grandparents' house had a set of back stairs. They were quite steep, and led from the second floor to the kitchen. They did have live-in household help, but I'm pretty sure they used the regular staircase. :) It was a grand house, but they had a big family.
My grandparents had a kind of sketchy propane heater built into the wall of the bathroom just below the window. It was amazing if you ever got to take a bath there (34 grandkids, 1 bathroom, space was limited). You could get all toasty drying off and looking out the window over the red dirt hills of NW Oklahoma. Guessing you could see +/- 20 miles, but it felt like a million. I'm still a little jealous of that 5' x 8' bathroom.
I was reading Apartment Therapy and there's an interesting blog post (http://www.apartmenttherapy.com/what-impressed-you-about-others-homes-as-a-kid-171386) and question on there: What impressed you about other's homes when you were a kid?
The blogger asserts that s/he felt that those families whose fridge's had ice dispensers "had arrived" and in my father's era, he said that having color TV was pretty darn special. For many of my friends, such as my husband, it was having atari gaming systems, and later the other ones that came down (nintendo and such).
I think i was an odd child. The people whom I envied lived with less. I remember a pair of seniors who lived on our block when I was 9-10 yrs old. They lived in one of the smallest houses on the block, and they had the most minimalist, mid-century modern furniture.
Everyone I knew at the time maligned their way of life -- it was so "spartan" which was said with a sort of distaste for it. Likewise, they were "just so poor" when they were young apparently, that they simply "never made enough to retire comfortably." As far as I could tell, this couple was quite comfortable indeed. But, they loved simple design.
I remember envying the architecture of my friend Laura Ashley's house. It was such a pretty house -- the only one in the neighborhood that was built in the craftsman style. It was very pretty and very efficient -- but I felt that it was so unfortunate at how cluttered the place was.
In fact, my overriding memories of other people's homes growing up is that they were cluttered and/or dirty. I always felt that people had "too much." I always felt sorry for them that they had to live with such clutter.
It sounds so funny, but it is so true. I still feel that way about many of my friends.
Looking back, I see my parents were very frugal, spartan and uncluttered. No style at all. I'm not saying that in negative sense. The outside was well groomed. Clean lawn, raked by hand, mowed by a push mower and edged with a hand clipper by us kids. perrenials in the beds. Everything was basic but tended.
smellincoffee
9-22-13, 7:53pm
Basements and attics. I grew up living in a trailer and so did most of my friends, so houses that were actual buildings almost always impressed me (the older the better). Those were homes with actual dimension.
A really big yard impressed me as a kid. All that space, with trees and a garden and grass, you could do anything you wanted there. Somersaults. Run at full tilt all the way across. Put in a killer slip-n-slide. Grow vegetables. Loved to have room to stretch out! I was a strange child.
I think as a kid just about any common house was fine by me. Only in my later years did I become more discriminating. The houses that did impress me were the old turn of the century large two story homes in the older parts of town. This was probably on the beginning edge of the popularity of renovating these old homes and many were Adams family like and smelled of old wood and wet wool, some of which might have been haunted. Those did impress me. We also had a very poor neighborhood of almost shacks where a few friends lived. I definitely appreciated the small simple frame ranches that were in my neighborhood.
One day my grandfather and I were by ourselves in his house. He took me up to his library and it had a ceiling fan--fascinating! As was his big glass water jug in a wire thing on the kitchen floor that allowed him to tip the bottle to pour out of it. Fabulous. Otherwise, living in Texas, a lot of the houses I went into were very dark. I realize now it was to keep them cool, but to me it was frightening. I also remember my aunt-in-law's mother, from Germany, had two milk-glass chickens on her mantel that were like little boxes in that they opened and she could have put small things inside them. I think it was the big, dark houses that led me to preferring small, spare, light houses with lots of windows, open when possible. At our own house we had a dutch door--top and bottom could be opened separately. I loved opening the top and swinging on the bottom half. I've never seen a door like that since. When the wind blew a certain way, it whistled between the two halves when they were closed. We also had an ice box and a man came once a week or so and brought in a big block of ice with tongs and set it in the bottom or top half of the ice box (which wasn't very big). I loved watching him do that, but I think I was too young to realize this is how the food kept cool. The first time I visited friends in the country who had an outhouse I was freaked and only peed in the jar under the bed but didn't poop for almost the whole weekend until I told one of the kids that and her mother kindly had me brave it.
HappyHiker
10-1-13, 5:13pm
I grew up in a rather small house--a row house in Phila. area. All my friends had virtually the same house. But I used to babysit for my parent's friends (honorary aunt and uncle). They had a quite large house in an upscale suburb--decorated by an interior designer. It was worlds apart from our little box. I was afraid to touch anything there...
But what impressed me was the woods behind our little row house. It was my playground/fairyland...a creek for hunting crayfish and minnows...big rocks to hide behind, birds to watch, mulberry trees to snack on, rabbits for my dog to chase, trees to climb, garter snakes to discover. I loved being back there with my dog...and to this day, I'm happiest in nature, being as wild and free as I can...
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