What is your earliest memory

[Tracey1974]

I remember the day my parents came home with my sister so I was 3. I remember it was windy and I couldn't wait for her to come into the house.

 

[apirateslifeforme]

I remember when I was 21 months old...I was at the house across the street; they had two retriever puppies, and I distinctly remember petting the black one. I remember how soft he was. I looked up at my house, across the street. That was when it was red, with a white fence along the driveway and sidewalk, and a bronze lamppost in the corner. And I also remember that I was wearing a white bonnet, blue windbreaker jacket, and very ugly blue and yellow patchwork pants (hey, it was 1976!)

 

[DisneyBlonde]

When I was three I got into the children's aspirin (the yummy orange chewable kind) and downed what was left in the bottle. I had to have my stomach pumped which required a night's stay in the hospital. There was a little boy in the room who cried all night. The nursing staff left his food tray on a table and left. I got out of bed and tried to feed him (I had a baby brother at home that I used to help feed). I remember certain parts of this like it was yesterday.

 

[Angelrose]

I remember being in the crib and sticking my feet through the bars and pushing the crib away from the wall. Then I would climb over the crib bars and fall onto the bed and get up and walk around the hall. I remember a lady called Catherine Scotch saying goodnight to me in my crib. She was a friend of the family. I also remember something kind of strange. I was on my little red tricycle in the living room and I suddenly saw a woman sitting on the couch. It seemed like she just "appeared" there. I ran into the kitchen to ask my mother who the lady was. She looked at me funny and said, "Don't you know?" I said no and she told me it was my grandmother who had visited us many times. But that was the first time I had really seen her. I must have been three at the time.

 

[Mono~rail]

What a cool thread! Now I don't feel so weird that I have very early memories!

My first memory is of my great grandmother holding me in a rocking chair at her house. It was a really old house, the kind with the open breezeway through the center and the rooms all went off that main hallway. I think it was called a shotgun house. Anyway, I remember it so clearly - even the springtime smells that were around us. The weather was warm, and we were sitting in the breezeway/open hallway in her rocking chair with me on her lap.

She got sick and died suddenly around my 1st birthday. My mom didn't believe me when I told her I remembered being at her house that day. I described everything, and I had all the details right. It is really weird how clear the memory is and how many details I remember.

I wonder what was so special about that day that it was etched so permanently in my memory. According to my mom, it was just a random visit without anything "special."

 

[spazzyjazzy]

Falling out my uncle's truck bed when I was a lil over 4 years old. My mom had told us not to play on the truck and of course we didn't listen. I was the one of course to fall out and land on the concrete.

 

[C.Ann]

When I was 3 - going to the hospital where my sister was being treated for polio and seeing someone in an iron lung.. Scared the living daylights out of me.. I can close my eyes right now and see it just as plain as I did that day..

 

[Katchakat]

 

[amy4bruce]

Somebody mentioned that some early memories are supplied from pictures and from family discussions. I have a lot of memories from when I was very young, but I think that most of them came about that way.

I do remember my father putting down llinoleum in my bedroom. I moved when I was two, so it was around then.

I can also remember boxes, and I think this was from before the move. It's kind of hazy, though.

I remember wearing a Rootie Kazootie suit when I was young, but I have the picture of that, so it may not be a real memory. I do, however, remember Rootie Kazootie, a TV puppet who wore a baseball uniform.

 

[Narnian_Princess]

I remember part of my (and my twin brother's) third birthday clearly. Our mom had made us a cake. It had white frosting and little hard SweetTart-like candies that were shaped like bears on it. The bears were in the shape of a 3, and she took a picture of it then asked us, "What's that called?" pointing at the 3. "Bear!" we said. We had no idea why she started laughing...

I also remember small things from outside myself. Things like having a cold and being held by one parent while the other used one of those evil squeeze bulb things to clear out my nose. Weirdness.

 

[DISUNC]

OK! People think I am full of it when I tell them this BUT I SWEAR it is TRUE!!!

It was Christmas time and I was in one of those baby seats on the floor in our PINK Living room(early 60's). I remember seeing the Christmas tree all lit up in the corner!
My Mother was on the Couch and my Nana was in the chair watching the black & white TV. Now my Bday is in Nov, I must have been a little over 1 years old.

I also remember sitting on the kitchen table in PJ's and My Mom playing 'Patty Cake' with me. The only light on in the room was a floresant(?) light that was on the washing machine! Years later I told my Mom this and indeed we had a Washing Machine with a light on it when I was a baby! Whats even weirder there were bananas on the table...and to this day ever time I smell a banana I think of this!

I remember every smell I ever smelled! Certain smells make memories come flooding back!

And NOW I await the Padded Wagon to come get me!

 

[Alex2kMommy]

We lived in Kansas briefly, and I remember standing at the screen door looking outside, and the breeze blowing in and stinging my recently scraped knees. I always had scabs on my knees! I think I was about three.

An earlier one (but which may come from a photo I've seen) is when I was 1.5 or 2, standing at a window in our apartment building in Germany, watching the big kids play outside in the parking lot. My mom said I used to climb up onto a cedar chest under the window to watch the kids, wishing I could go out and play, too.

 

[wilderness01]

I was 2.5 years old. I hurt myself and had to be taken to the hospital for stitches. I remember this vividly.

 

[kbkids]

My first memory is my 5 yr old birthday party. My mom had blown up all the balloons the night before and tied them to a string around the carport. The next morning they were all out of air, and I was so sad!


But I was having a similar conversation with my 5 yr old son the other day. We moved into this house when he was 3, and I was asking him if he remembered his Thomas the Tank Engine bedroom at the old house. No, he didn't remember it - I was not pleased! - but he said he remembered his "little bed." I'm thinking toddler bed - "No, Mommy. The brown bed with the teddy bears on top that sang." Not a clue what he was talking about and then it hit me. His crib was brown, and the mobile had little teddy bears on it - only I took the mobile down when he was 5 months old.

 

[Sparx]

I remember a lot of bright colors so far back I can't tell what they are or how old I was. In all actuality, its probably a mobile over my crib or something to that affect.

My oldest coherient memory though is of me being bathed in a sink with a pink radio turned on playing what I think may have been "she's in love with the boy" if that was the right year. (1991ish)

I also remember my great grandmother freaking out over my favorite teething toy.

a red swiss army knife.

 

[PoohPrincess76]

I have had a recurring dream since I was young. It was of me behind silver bars and crying while a woman made my mom leave the room. I always thought it was just some strange dream...until I had my daughter. When my daughter was about 2 1/2 months old she got RSV and had to be admitted into the hospital. When we walked into her room I saw the "silver bars", it was the crib in the hospital. I talked to my mom about it after my daughter was out and she confirmed that when I was about 9 months old I had severe ear infections and was admitted into the hospital. The nurse had to do some testing and made my mom leave the room. And that my dream was a memory. I haven't had the dream since my mom and I talked. The next memory I have is when I was about 2. There was a shoot out next door to us and the police came and ushered us to the empty lot on the other side and put us in the back of the police car to keep us safe.

 

[rie'smom]

My earliest memory is of running down the sidewalk and jumping into my daddy's arms when he got home from work.I was about 2 1/2.

 

[Donald - my hero]

OK! People think I am full of it when I tell them this BUT I SWEAR it is TRUE!!!

It was Christmas time and I was in one of those baby seats on the floor in our PINK Living room(early 60's). I remember seeing the Christmas tree all lit up in the corner!
My Mother was on the Couch and my Nana was in the chair watching the black & white TV. Now my Bday is in Nov, I must have been a little over 1 years old.

I also remember sitting on the kitchen table in PJ's and My Mom playing 'Patty Cake' with me. The only light on in the room was a floresant(?) light that was on the washing machine! Years later I told my Mom this and indeed we had a Washing Machine with a light on it when I was a baby! Whats even weirder there were bananas on the table...and to this day ever time I smell a banana I think of this!

I remember every smell I ever smelled! Certain smells make memories come flooding back!

And NOW I await the Padded Wagon to come get me!

See we are more alike all the time! My B-Day is in Nov as well and mom says the wallpaper I remember talking to came down when I was about 1 to 18 months old!

Oh and I also have that horrid memory of being 3 , jumping on sis bed , flipping off (aka Video style) and hitting head on corner of electric baseboard heater. Ran into mom's room holding head as blood streamed into my eyes -- she popped outta her bed "DON'T BLEED ON MY NEW CARPET"

 

[Mrs.Toad]

Riding to the hospital in a police car, after getting my head cracked open at age 3.

Interesting that several people mentioned JFK's death as their earliest memory. A woman I know remembers being in her playpen, crying, seeing her mom and dad upset and watching TV, ignoring her cries. After talking with her mom years later, they figured out it must have been when JFK was shot. She was 9 months old.

 

[piglet too]

My earliest memory is from when I was about 3 years old. I had just gotten my first hearing aides and was just hearing everything again for the first time since I had meningitis the year before.