Earlier this year, the hubster and I drove past my childhood home and I took a couple of pictures.
Some differences are quite obvious, as I look back on this picture from around 1976 (that’s my littlest sister standing out the front).
The fence has changed from the ranch style, to a picket fence.
The trees in the front yard have gone.
The front verandah has been enclosed.
The paint colour scheme has changed completely.
There was no footpath back then.
The driveway is now solid, whereas it used to be just a couple of concrete tracks.
Perhaps the most noticeable difference is that now it is one of the nicer, more well-maintained houses in the street. By the time I was a teenager it looked shabby and run-down, so it’s nice to see it looking loved and cared for!
If it ever comes up on the market, I would dearly love to see what it looks like on the inside now.
You see, I remember it in the garish colours and designs of the seventies. I’ve never quite worked out whether it was just that era in general, or that my mother had absolutely no idea about colour or taste 😉 .
Consider if you will:
- a blue and white kitchen;
- blue and green patterned lino in kitchen and dining;
- yellow and brown floral pine couches;
- pink patterned wallpaper in the lounge room;
- a yellow glass feature in the hallway; and
- dark teal curtains in the lounge.
Are you shuddering yet? I know I am!
My parents bought it as a “speccy” a year or two before I was born; it was pretty standard for those days, chamferboard up top, brick veneer underneath – three bedrooms, one bathroom. They made some changes over the years, including enclosing all of the downstairs area so they had a double lock up garage.
Before my brother arrived in 1975 (their fourth child) they added an extension at the back, which included internal stairs, a second bathroom, a large rumpus room (later converted to a bedroom), and a downstairs bedroom (which was never painted and filled with junk for as long as I can remember, except for a brief spell when my pot head stepbrother lived in it when I was about 12).
I lived in my childhood home from the day I came home from hospital as a newborn, right up until about two weeks before my 20th birthday (the photo above was taken before my graduation ball only a couple of months earlier. Don’t you just love that pink wallpaper?!).
Over the years it also changed from being a new house in a quiet street (people though my parents were moving to the sticks!) – to being on a busy main road in the middle of suburbia.
My mother sold it many years ago now; I’d love to go back and see it for myself again, one of these days.
What was your childhood home like? Or did you shift numerous times?
Linking up today with Kylie Purtell for IBOT.
My mum’s still in our childhood home and it’s changed little. My folks had it clad in the 1990s and the bath was taken out and shower put in sometime then as well but it’s the same.
I remember when I arrived home from Uni each holidays and then later just for holidays I’d roam about looking at what had changed etc…
When I was young the neighbourhood was filled with kids my age (or so), but now it’s a lot more feral as nicer suburbs have popped up and I guess… the house is over 50yrs old now.
Must be a similar vintage to my childhood home then, which I’m guessing was built around 1964/5.
Pink and purple paisley in the girls bedroom and a black and white freaky circle design in the boys room which, if you stared it long enough the circles swam and swayed. Went well with the 70’s music but not much else.
Thankfully we moved when I was 14 and they hired a decorator for the new house.
Oh yes I remember some of those psychedelic black and white wallpaper designs in my best friend’s house!
I literally don’t know how many houses I lived in. I still consider one my ‘childhood’ house though. Out in Albany Creek, was opposite bushland when I lived there, now opposite a retirement village. I think that’s why I always loved Window (http://www.jeanniebaker.com/book/window/)
I grew up not too far from you then Ness – in Zillmere. My best friend in high school lived in Albany Creek and used to catch the bus to Aspley High (no high school at Albany Creek in those days!). And the skating rink was the social centre of our universe!!!
Oh the wallpaper – love it! I lived in my childhood home for the first ten years and still drive past it today and love it. We had the biggest backyard, vege patch, citrus trees and a creek – it was such a lovely place to grow up.
It sounds lovely Ashlea, you were a lucky duck!
That was really interesting to read and see Janet. Thanks for sharing. Our daughter lived in our family home in Kellyville from age 6 to 21 (we sold it a few years after her 21st) and last year when it went back on the market again she got to go and look. She would have “loved” to buy it but the house we paid $44,600 for was on the market for close to $900K so no chance. We had added an upstairs bedroom/bathroom for us, and made the garage into a rumpus room and added a pool. The photos she took (with the agents’ permission when she told her story) indicated that whilst some things had changed, others had not. It was a special memory for us to see as well.
How wonderful that your daughter was able to visit and take photos! That is awesome!!!
I would so love to buy or at least go and sticky beak at the inside of my childhood home if its ever for sale too. In fact I’ve searched realestate.com numerous times hoping to see its listed. Is that weird? I’ve driven past it so many times and its changed so much since I lived there. The current owners have put up a huge rendered wall out the front and added a huge carport {not sure why there already was one at the side and a double garage, assuming they’ve converted the garage to rooms}. I’m so going online to search now and see if its for sale haha!
Not strange at all – I do things like that!
My Dad is still in my childhood home and although it has changed considerably or the 30 years we have had it, it is still very similar. I love going home and sleeping in my brothers old bedroom, it will always be home to me.
That would be so cool, to still be able to “go home”!
I love this trip down memory lane, Janet. It’s so interesting to see how houses change and develop over the years. I lived in two houses as a child. My parents are still in the second one, but I’d love to take a look through the first 🙂
I must confess it looked a lot smaller than I remembered it!
I went to look at my old childhood home a couple of years ago. I still have dreams about it and my grandma’s house. Great retro photo of you!
My Mum still lives in the home I grew up in. I’m a similar age to you and we never had any of the features, wallpaper or colours that was in your home. We did have amazing black and white square lino in the kitchen and walls in our dinning room were a very orange stained timber on the bottom and paint above . The house was painted in interesting colours outside. The walls were a teal green, the gutters were black and under the eaves was a bright pink colour. My Mum always swears and declares that the teal colour was not that bright on the colour chart. She said it was more a subtle duck egg blue. That may well be true, but black and hot pink??
LOL sounds a bit like a liquorice allsort!!!