Magical childhood memories

I saw this post about Dinovember (a month-long imagination invasion) on Facebook today. I thought it was BRILLIANT.

Picture of Dinovember from here - go check it out! 

The parents sound like fun, creative, imaginative people. The kind of people who probably enjoy setting up the scenes (after a few glasses of vino?) as much as their kids enjoy discovering them.

 

I love it. 

 

For two reasons:

1) these adults sound like me - still a big kid inside
2) it reminded me of my own similar magical childhood experiences...

*cue wiggly lines across screen to nostalgic flashback*

When I was small my Nanny used to do something similar to Dinovember with my colouring books. An early recogniser of my OCD tendencies, she would see me getting frustrated with myself when I would go over the lines in my colouring books. I'd only ever use pencil so I could rub it out, and I was fastidious about sticking to the correct colours - especially with Disney characters! 

 

Sometimes I'd get up in the morning and whilst eating my breakfast (porridge with lots of crunchy brown sugar and "children's tea") I would discover that one of the pictures would have been beautifully shaded in, facial contouring, light and shade and even patterns on the clothing.  Nanny would always say the fairies did it!

 

After a while I realised it was her, but I kept it up for a long time afterwards. Even though I knew it wasn't magic, it felt magical anyway!

I also remember when my Granddad used to paint big pictures on canvasses (apparently I have an arty family!) of a field or the beach or a garden, and even just the view from their front window on to the cul-de-sac (which is now in my baby bro's old bedroom at home). Sometimes we'd go to stay and a new character would have appeared in the picture. There'd be people eating a picnic on a blanket, or playing with a ball or sitting in deck chairs soaking up the sunshine. That was fun. To run in and spot any differences. Then in the morning I'd wake up and it'd be raining and cloudy and all the people would be gone. 

 

Again, I got older and eventually worked it out, but even then it was still fun to see the characters he came up with. 

 

Other magical things happened at Nanny and Granddad's house too - the family in my dolls house (handmade by Granddad and furnished by Nanny) or the workers in my brother's petrol station (again painstakingly designed, made and decorated with their own fair hands) would go about their daily business - food would appear on the tables, cars on the garage forecourt and one day even a baby arrived.

Ahhh, magic!

Baby moi!

*cue wiggly lines across screen to bring me back to present day*

Ahhh, imagination and magic. You can't do that shizz on an iPod. I'm off out to buy a colouring book.