What's the best thing your parents made for you when you were a kid?

kelle

My mother loved dressmaking, and she used to make matching dresses for me and her - I thought it was the coolest thing at the time (up to when I was 5!).
I think my daughters would disown me if I tried doing the same on them!

TeddyTedson

My parents sent me away so didn't really make me much :-/

xzanti

Ends meet.

LordSutch

Stilts > http://t2.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcRby8k0t5tEvJPKbNQ9e31oxxDUJx4Y8vtbPalsa6cwD4-8IPcA0g

M cebee

my mother made me a pair of trousers out of old curtains

sewing machine was a great invention

Adyx

A playhouse (for the sister ), a couple of treehouses, go-karts, swords, bows & arrows, a swingset, a slide and swimming pools in the summer. Since I left home he's built a massive castle tower for my younger brother. We had fuck-all money back then but we lived beside my granddad/uncle's farm so there was no shortage of tools or materials (or imagination).

Edit: Almost forgot, one of my favourites was a periscope he made from 2 mirrors and cardboard. :cool:

Skinfull

My dad made me a barbie house! It had three floors and a roof garden, with a balcony! And the middle room was lined with red velvet and had a working light, that was painted red...upon reflection it was kind of a porno room!
He also made the most awesome swing set and a fort, complete with gunslots and a slide.

And my mum knitted me a freddy kruger jumper! It was the best! I wore it out and begged for another!

aujopimur

Skinfull wrote: »

My dad made me a barbie house! It had three floors and a roof garden, with a balcony! And the middle room was lined with red velvet and had a working light, that was painted red...upon reflection it was kind of a porno room!
He also made the most awesome swing set and a fort, complete with gunslots and a slide.

And my mum knitted me a freddy kruger jumper! It was the best! I wore it out and begged for another!

Did he make anything for the girls in the family?.

WindSock

Liam Byrne wrote: »

Rubbish. Have a look around today at all those who wanted kids but didn't want to raise them or teach them right from wrong and then get back to us re what's important.

My parents gave me far more than any expensive gift or one-off "thing" ever would have been, and I'm forever in their debt for raising me and hope I've done them proud by reaching my potential.

Eh. Ok then. ZZZZZZZzzzzzzz

I'm off to win the soapbox derby. brb

4zn76tysfajdxp

My dad built us this little hut for us once out of wood and an old carpet. But then he suddenly took it down after the summer because he needed the wood and it looked filthy.

wonderfulname

The-Rigger wrote: »

Cabbage water?

Yeah, if you boil up red cabbage you can use the resulting liquid as a pH indicator and add various household chemicals to make pretty colours.
http://chemistry.about.com/od/acidsbase1/a/red-cabbage-ph-indicator.htm

44leto

My Ma knit me an Aran jumper, I still have it and treasure it a beautiful piece of craftmanship.

Augmerson

My Dad made me keep writing my name.

Jesus Wept

TeddyTedson wrote: »

My parents sent me away so didn't really make me much :-/

Poor Ted. There there.

wonderfulname wrote: »

Yeah, if you boil up red cabbage you can use the resulting liquid as a pH indicator and add various household chemicals to make pretty colours.
http://chemistry.about.com/od/acidsbase1/a/red-cabbage-ph-indicator.htm

Nifty! Very inventive.

Dudess

My mum knitted loads of ace little clothes for my baby dolls.

Micky Dolenz

Lovely dinners, a home, a beautiful life.

And they didn't abuse me.

thanks guys,

boodlesdoodles

My dad built me a two-storey dolls house. Massive thing. He hung lights from every ceiling, that were battery operated, carpeted the floors and thatched the roof! He was a trained thatcher so he thatched a pattern into the roof that made it look shingled. He also made me a sugán rocking chair and many personalised hurleys through the years. He worked as a gardener and I was forever getting flowers off him. I miss him so much.

Dudess

boodlesdoodles wrote: »

My dad built me a two-storey dolls house. Massive thing. He hung lights from every ceiling, that were battery operated, carpeted the floors and thatched the roof! He was a trained thatcher so he thatched a pattern into the roof that made it look shingled. He also made me a sugán rocking chair and many personalised hurleys through the years. He worked as a gardener and I was forever getting flowers off him. I miss him so much.

Your dad seemed ace. The doll-house seems amazing - I always wanted one.

boodlesdoodles

Dudess wrote: »

Your dad seemed ace. The doll-house seems amazing - I always wanted one.

He was, we were very close. When I worked in our local town, every second Saturday he used to come in for the afternoon and we would have a few pints together. Gas man really!

JustAThought

My dad used to make obstacle courses for us in the back garden!!! I still have some old grainy pics of us shrieking with the madness of it & climbing over mini Walls & through tyres. Just brilliant!!!

AudreyHepburn

Time.

They always made me feel loved.

They gave me my little brother .

And they made the woman I am today.....and I will also be thankful to them for that.

Dudess

boodlesdoodles wrote: »

When I worked in our local town, every second Saturday he used to come in for the afternoon and we would have a few pints together. Gas man really!

Legend. Heck, I'd even love a handmade doll-house now.

Carverkid

My Dad does everything to keep me outside, he's made me catapults, ramps, bows and arrows, everything. As I grew older and my interests changed, surfboards, spear guns and on one occasion a massive storage unit for all this stuff started to come out of the shed. He always includes me in his projects and he's retiring on Wednesday so I can't wait to see what he starts at next. Mam is an amazing cook/baker/foodie and she always makes delicious food out of nothing. She also has spent the last six years getting up at half five in the morning to drive me to the pool and really back-arse surf spots. Amazing woman. They both gave me strong independence and a love of reading I can't say enough about them.

Dudess

skirtgirl wrote: »

My mam... used to make cups out of silver packaging from ciggie boxes. I thought she was brill!

My nana did that - I loved it, she did such a pretty job of it too!

naughtysmurf

Two wooden box's containing three flashing bulbs with red, blue & yellow lenses, Tadaa, disco lights

Pretty impressive for the late 70's

Yes yes that's the late 1970's

Dudess

Matchboxes, thumbtacks, square of cardboard covered in tinfoil - voila, a (albeit small) Barbie/Sindy dressing-table.

citytillidie

My mum made a cake for my 6th birthday like a snooker table

Karona

My parents never really made me anything, they would tell me to try to make it by myself and I would although I wouldn't get very fair.

My Dad preferred to buy us things as he went with so little when he was young, he swore his own children would get things they really wanted. He would buy us Barbies anytime he went away to rugby matches so I had the most Barbies in the street and the best ones too.

As for my Mam she gave me great advice although I didnt listen to her a lot of the time. :rolleyes:

Chuck Stone

My Dad used to take us on what we called 'adventure walks'. My Granny on my Mother's side lived in the countryside about 4 miles from the town we lived in by road but only about 2½ as the crow flies i.e. the 'adventure walk' way.

Adventure walks involved going through fields, crossing little streams, climbing hills, avoiding bulls, pushing through thorny thickets etc. Pure excitement as a kid going the 'adventure way'.

When we got to my Granny's house there was always a cup of tea in Granny style cups and fresh scones - real country Granny she was.

sbsquarepants

When i was about 10 my da made me a peg gun shaped like a machine gun - it was cool as fúck! When my friends saw it they all pestered heim to make them one so he spent a whole weekend churning out peg guns.
We were, at that stage, the mosty heavily armed gang in tallaght, nowadays he'd need to be enriching plutonium to make a claim like that!:D

Sleepy

Any other parents reading this and taking notes?

Conall Cernach

My da was a joiner so he was always making us stuff like bird houses and that. He made us a gun out of wood like one of those elastic band things but this one shot big thick black rubber bands that were very sore and had an effective range of about 10 yards. He used to make us bows and arrows too. If he had an interesting shaped off cut of wood he'd take it home along with some smaller bits and pieces and let us build something out of it. I remember I built a battleship once out of a piece of mahogany that was near two foot long.

kylith

My dad built me the most amazing dollshouse with working electricity. I had hours of fun rewiring it

My mum once made me a birthday cake in the shape of a stable, with boudouir fingers for the roof, and the windows picked out in jelly tots. It was amazing, and chocolate.

lubo_moravcik

Chicken pie, then my Dad stuck my face in it because I never liked it

jester77

My mam got up a half hour before me every morning when I was going to school. I had a massive appetite back then and was playing sport for a number of different teams with a few games a week and training every day. A normal bowl of porridge was not enough so she would serve me a large pyrex dish full of porridge instead. That was then followed by a small fry-up with sausages, rashers, boxty, pudding and eggs and washed down with tea and a few slices of toast. She would then make a packed lunch before I left.

She's awesome I'm lucky if I have a slice of toast for breakfast these days

Nothingbetter2d

zerks wrote: »

This was inspired by Japanese woman who built her 4 year old son a replica F1 car from cardboard,looks pretty cool too.

http://l.yimg.com/bt/api/res/1.2/LeCf7XxACv3Finoc3fRX1A--/YXBwaWQ9eW5ld3M7cT04NTt3PTYxMA--/http://media.zenfs.com/en/blogs/motoramic/rb8minicardboard.jpg


http://autos.yahoo.com/blogs/motoramic/mom-builds-4-old-spot-replica-red-bull-175055702.html

My father built me a go-kart when I was young,those were the days when parents built stuff rather than forking out hundreds for it,plus it could be modified any way we wanted.Amazing what could be done with some pram wheels,pieces of wood & rope.

Did anyone else's parents build them stuff,be it a go-kart or a tree house?

i remember when i was about 6 my uncle building my brothers and i a go kart too my uncle knicked my grandad's lawn mower engine and hooked it up to the go kart... it did about 40 miles and hour lol. we used to race up n down the road in it.

we had it for about 5 months before the gardaí eventually took it off us

Stinicker

My dad built me a "playhouse" when I was 7 or 8, it was no different to a garden shed as it was before you could into a DIY store or order a mass produced piece of crap from a garden shed store. It was cool and all my toys and stuff were in there.

As these things were either very expensive to buy at the time or just not available, I think our one would have cost £1,800 to buy and every so often random strangers would come in asking where we bought it and loads of local people asked my dad to build one also for them.

It is 18 years old and each year we give it a paint of ronseal and eventually last year the roof had rotten off it due to the felt deteriorating and we put a new roof on it and changed a few rotten boards and I have no doubt it will last another 18 years or longer.

I can remember building it my dad, handing him nails and hammers and when it was finished we had enough timber left over to build a dog kennel for our little terrier, the the kennel has since rotten and was broken up for firestarters seven or 8 years ago and the little terrier since died but the playhouse stands to this day a testament to my dads skills for someone who never had any carpentry training and worked in a total different industry.

Funglegunk

My Mam made me a massive hovercraft cake for my 6th birthday.

Chuck Stone

My Dad made me a Duffle coat out of left over plywood.

All the other kids laffed but I just sang my 'sticks and stones can't break my bones because I'm wearing a wooden jacket' song.

fusuf

M cebee wrote: »

my mother made me a pair of trousers out of old curtains

sewing machine was a great invention

I bet they looked rad! You must of been the coolest dude on the block!

Best thing my da made for me has to be a wooden slingshot when I was about 8.

fryup

my mammy made school book covers out of leftover wallpaper

come to think of it every irish mammy did that

jackie1974

fryup wrote: »

my mammy made school book covers out of leftover wallpaper
come to think of it every irish mammy did that

My mam used thick kitchen contour on mine, my bundle of books was three times taller than anybody elses, mortified haha

Jesus Wept

Just remembered that my dad and my uncle made stone soup once.

Bullchomper

My parents made me - socially inept.

Johnny Foreigner

A mistake.

Kirby

This one sums my parents up perfectly.

As a five year old, they got me a "thomas the tank engine" train set for christmas. Being a small kid, this was great. Unfortunately there was a problem.

You see, in the train set Thomas raced against Bertie the bus around a track. In the cartoon of the same name, Thomas the tank engine would beat Bertie in the race. But in the toy set, Bertie was much lighter and would keep winning. This was very upsetting to my five year old self.

My parents, being the lovely folk they are, purposefully wasted a set of AA batteries down to near empty and stuck them in Bertie and also weighed him down with random stuff so that he would be slower and Thomas would once again win. Cue a very happy child

Other great gifts included a Super Nintendo when I was seven and a truly massive scalextrics set with a dozen loops when I was eight or nine.

But the sheer determination to make Bertie slower always sticks out in my mind.

kfallon

They made me part of their family and given that I am not biologically theirs I think that is the greatest thing they could ever do for me