What was your yards/gardens like when you grew up?

[Tetters]

Cor....I just found this old thread, and thought I`d bump it up a bit. My garden when I was a child was barren, and smelt of cat poo... it was great, and my mate Glennis and I would take a bucket into the outside lavvy to get water to make mud pies - most of those had lumps of cat poo in them.....great! There were no beautiful and gorgeous plants next door either - Mrs Simpson kept chickens, and, well, at least we could squeeze through a gap in the fence to pinch the odd egg or two

 

[Esther Knapicius]

We lived on a 15 acre property out in the country. Dad had a huge veggie plot and some chickens and ducks. We had a creek to play in. He loved peony plants and planted varieties of those also. Some interesting other shrubs came with the property. One of which I still want to get, called a Carolina Sweet Shrub. It was a nice area to live .

 

[Owdboggy]

We did not have a garden when I was young. We lived in a Terraced house and had a back yard which was about 14 feet wide and 30 feet long. The outside toilet was half way down and there was an Air raid shelter in the bottom corner of the yard. The yard was covered in blue tiles. At the front of the property was a 3 feet wide patch the length of the house and which had a privet hedge behind a wall.

 

[Tetters]

Snap @Owdboggy ....maybe that`s why we love our gardens so much now - wish we had the air raid shelter, it would have made our yard perfick.

 

[Owdboggy]

I did something about it in the old back yard, but the story is a bit long to post in here.
I was actually born in a house with a huge garden, but my Father really did not like gardening so they moved to the terraced house when I was 4.

 

[Upsy Daisy]

What a lovely thread

I have lovely memories of my childhood garden.

We had a large front garden with a stream running through it, we use to love playing in it and helping Dad to keep it clean. There was a huge Weeping Willow beside it, made a great hiding place.

The back garden garden had a hill at the back which had Gorse growing on it( later Mum planted it out beautifully with rockery plants) ,I remember it's bright yellow blooms! There were steps leading up to the top level which had fruit trees, lawn and our parents made us a huge sandpit to play in.. Slightly higher up was the compost area and we loved searching for Slow Worms.

The main back garden was laid to lawn with a large pond and waterfall ( tumbling down from the hill) this was surrounded with raised rockery beds to stop us four kids, dogs and cats from falling in.......we never did

The lawn had a circular crazy paving path running around it......this was where we all learnt to ride our bikes, how we all loved going round and round, especially when we discovered that by placing a piece is cardboard in the back wheel ......we sounded ( a bit ) like Dad on his motorbike .

The flowers I most remember were Roses( everywhere!) , Lodon Pride, Daffodils, Busy Lizzie's and white Allysum.... obliviously there were more but I didn't know there names at the time

Lovely memories..... thanks for taking me back there

 

[Daren]

That garden sounds great Upsy! so much going on... Stream, waterfall & willow and all wow lovely sounding garden. I grew up with a garden path that went straight all the way to the shed we had Cooking apple tree in middle and a lilac on one side you could see all the other gardens and chat with the neighbours as everyone had low fences Mums and dads would chat while putting washing on line . a few old roses & plenty of sun from all round as the fences where low there was only shad under the tree I had a chopper bike and dad had the motorbike in the1970s

 

[Upsy Daisy]

Thanks @Daren it was indeed an idyllic garden to grow up in . I only hope that my children ( not children anymore) will also look back with such fond memories of their childhood garden it the same way...minus the stream, waterfall, W. Willow and last but not !east ...the hill!. Nevertheless we did make it a lovely place for them and with it being ( and still is) in a very rural setting they had the bonus of being surrounded by fields, woods and farmland.

I love the sound of your garden too, must have had a great sense of community spirit

What was it back then that all Dad's had motorbikes

 

[DeborahJane]

Not too many gardening memories but I loved sitting under a beautiful weeping tree in our front yard in my teens. And it's still all there, the tree, the house although now its doctors and dentists rooms, same layout. Even the tap and drain pipe at the back door takes me back instantly.

 

[Vishu1708]

A gianormous mango tree in a corner......
A small lawn surrounded by ashoka trees....
Ixoria hedges...... beds of desi roses..... best for making rose jam/gulkand.
A sickly lemon tree..... with lots of pots filled with a whole bunch of shrubs .....including rubber plants, crottons, agaves, yuccas etc.....
And rows after rows of aloe vera.
2 medium sized gulmohars near the drive way.

 

[mg guy]

wow pretty old thread, but I'll share...
I was lucky to spend all my early summers on an aunt's farm.
a small cow/calf hobby farm, where I got to do all the hay cutting and raking on those glorious sun filled days, with the barn swallows forever circling my little ford 8N tractor, the smell of fresh cut clover in the air.

We had a big veggie garden in an old orchard, always things to do, picking beans, strawberries, digging fresh potatoes........

We had a small flock of geese (watchdogs!) henhouse, raised turkey and duck as well.

ahh, I could go on and on....