Hellobee Boards

It will be. I hope I can replicate it in some way. I had a great childhood....we ran around the woods in the summer and picked blackberries and raspberries. Played at the beach all day. I remember going to sleep upstairs in the winter and listening to the woodstove crack and burn while my parents played music softly. I have a ton of nostalgia tonight! I hate that I don't live in nature like that. We live in a suburb, far from my home state. It's not the same.

Ours are very similar - growing up in a NYC suburb, surrounded by extended family. Only real difference is that I was an only child. Of course there's so much more technology today which I find both a blessing and a curse.

Very Different.....I grew up in Souther California. Not near the beach, in the suburbs. With divorced parents, a full time working mom, a stepdad and a sister. We live in the PNW and I currently stay at home and there will be no divorce (hopefully!). We are closer to the city then I was when I was little so Im hoping my son is exposed to more then I was. We are also a lot closer to nature, being in the PNW so Im hoping he will grow up loving nature. At this point, he will be an only child but that may change.

So different. They have two parents. Parents that are fully functional. They get to have so many more experiences than I ever did, things like travel and extracurricular activities.

So different. My parents were miserable people, in a miserable marriage, and were totally unable to cope with the demands of parenting. My childhood was really sad, often scary, and generally nothing I want to replicate. I've been able to do a lot of work on myself in recent years, which helps me to be a far better parent than they were able to be. Our financial circumstances and general stability are also much better than theirs were, which really helps. But generally I hope that they're having the happy childhood that I never had.

There are a few similarities, as well as differences.

Like me, my kids are growing up in a two parent family with a sibling of the opposite sex, in a suburban setting in the northeast.

On the surface it's similar, but I think our family now still has a lot of differences. For one, I was not close to my dad as a kid. He had a temper and I was a sensitive kid. I was also much further apart in age from my brother than my kids are. I feel like our family is gentler and more of a focus on being together and having a good relationship. It's also important that my kids are close to each other and I hope to foster that. My brother and I were always just doing our own thing.

Mostly technology speaking

I had maybe 4 TV channels my kids have unlimited
No cell phones - DS has friends with cell phone (he doesn't)
No internet , had to actually go to library to research, DS uses the internet to look up anything he can imagine

As far as experiences its pretty similar - family outings, pets, fun holidays, vacations

Household - yes! I did chores every Saturday from a young age and my kids have the same rules.

Freedom to roam was awesome growing up - I am struggling with this now that DS is 8. I kinda want to attach a GPS tracker to his shoe! haha