31 Days - The worst Christmas I ever had

I can't remember what year it was. I think it was the Christmas just prior to me starting Secondary College. It was hot, I remember that much. Funny, but our Australian Christmases don't seem to be as hot these days as they were back then, but then again...maybe that's the "back in my day" old lady coming out in me.

Anyway, possibly about 24 hours before the big day I came down with gastro.  Gastro at Christmas is not fun. No yummy Christmas lunch - heck, I didn't even feel like eating Christmas lunch. All I could do was lay on the couch, half heartedly unwrapping a couple of gifts and feeling miserable. I remember having a persistent headache and unrelenting nausea. I received a transistor radio that Christmas which kept me company.  I think ABBA's "Gimme Gimme Gimme" was pretty up there on the charts that Christmas because I remember hearing it a lot - which makes me think this happened in 1978. We also got a trampoline that year but the sheer thought of even trying to bounce on it made my head pound in protest!

I was feeling a lot better after Boxing Day was done and dusted so you can bet I made up for the lack of trampoline jumping after that!

31 Days - My earliest childhood memory

When I actively think back to the earliest memories I have I see them as hazy and full of sunlight - almost as though I am looking into the sun's glare on a bright winters day. I find myself wondering if this is what it is like for other people. Sometimes I see the same effect depicted in movies, so perhaps this is indeed so. I kind of like it. It fills me with peace, contentment and warmth.

If I push my mind as far as it will go I get an image of a very little me, standing up against a screen door, or a partition across a door. I can see cows and fields and grass. I know this memory is true. My mother tells me that she found me standing up against the door watching the cows once prior to my brother being born. My brother is 17 months younger than me so I must have been very, very young.

My next memory which is a little more definite and much clearer is that same brother and I sitting at the kitchen table eating dried apricots whilst our mother breastfed our baby brother. I would have been three. Eating dried apricots always takes me back to that time - a time of feeling safe and loved.

What are your earliest childhood memories?