20 Funny ‘When I Was Little…’ Stories

As kids we tend to say and do awkward things quite often. When we are young, our understanding of the world is limited and we tend to reveal that without realizing it in our actions. After all, life is a learning process and we start at the very beginning whether we realize it or not. One could say that our childhood experiences have made us who we are to a great extent. Therefore, it does matter that we regard those early memories in hindsight with acceptance of their teachable moments, appreciation of their zaniness and that unique element of what it shows us about ourselves. The following series is a collection of revealing posts from folks of their fond memories of their own childhood days displaying a glimpse into the inner workings of an evolving child’s mindset.

#1

My grandmother took me to the Jacksonville Zoo. I was 6. I was excited to see all the animals IRL that I saw pictures of, or on TV. I knew all their names and wasn't shy demonstrating my knowledge. When we got to the elephants, I caused a big stir. I noticed something odd and yelled out, "Hey Grandma! Look! Loook!! That elephant has FIVE legs! 1-2-3-4-5!" When she stopped laughing and got her breath, she explained that it was a male elephant.  

#2

I touched my tongue on a hot toaster to see if it would make that "sizzle" sound. It did!  

#3

5-year-old me tackled mom from behind, causing her to grab hold of the china cabinet to keep from falling. Many glass, ceramic pieces fell onto the floor, breaking. I hid under a bed until the pieces were cleaned up. Cannot recall any type of punishment for this either.  

#4

Not me but my uncle. When my uncle was very young, he was getting dressed and he put his shoes on his opposite feet. My grandmother saw this and said "Owen, you put your shoes on the wrong feet." My uncle looked at my grandmother and then his feet, "but mom, these are the only feet I've got!"  

#5

When I was little, my dad made me believe I could use the bathroom for him. Before going on trips or something, he would say, hey, I need to use the bathroom but I'm busy, can you go for me, after I would use the bathroom he would then say thank you, I'm feeling much better now.  

#6

I was four or five years old, my grandpa took me to a zoo and I saw a peacock for the first time. My delighted exclamation: "Grandpa, look, a blooming rooster!"  

#7

When I was a kid my mom told me I couldn't lay on the floor to watch TV because of the draft from the door. Only, I though she said giraffe and I spent many evenings trying to figure out how a giraffe flattened itself enough to get under the front door and what it would do to make me sick. I was terrified.  

#8

To improve memory power I would often take part in memorize and recite contests at school. My father encouraged me to do so and once while watching news in TV he said "Look at the news reporter. She is not stuttering while reading the news because she memorized the news so well . You should achieve that level of perfection!" . That motivated me like crazy. Years later I found out that news reporters read news by looking at teleprompters.  

#9

So as a kid I thought I could parachute from the loft down to the first floor... with a blanket... And my parents would never know. My giant swollen foot and me withering around crying sure hid it all well!  

#10

Well, when I was maybe 7 or 8 years old and was in Sunday school, the girl that was seated next to me had Down syndrome (still remember her name lol and I'm 44 now). One day we were in our classroom and one of the light switches was broken and didn't have its cover, so being the a*****e I was as a kid, I told the girl to shove her finger in the hole, which she told she wouldn't do, despite me insisting, lmao. She never touched the open light switch, and I was so fricking curious that I ended up shoving MY finger in the hole, and because karma is a b****, I got an electric shock and spent the rest of the class with my hand trembling like crazy...  

#11

My little brother and I dug a hole in the backyard, trying to get to China. Someone told us we could, and we believed for some reason. We ended up hitting and breaking some sort of pipe and the hole filled with water. We didn't know what to do, so we covered the hole back in with dirt, and pretended it never happened. We had a swamp for a backyard for months. Our mother called the water company to complain about a large bill or two before the "burst pipe" was discovered. We never said a word. We were rotten kids. We laugh about it together from time to time. We both have kids that are mostly grown up. We tell each stories of what they think they have gotten away with.  

#12

When I was in 6th grade, I was over at a friend's house. We decided to go to the park after dinner. We were playing on the swings, and decided that I was small enough to fit in a baby swing. I did fit. Only problem was, I couldn't get out. The parents had to come and turn the swing upside down and shake it so I would fall out. It's a fun memory to hold on to!  

#13

When I was 7 years old, the dentist hurt me with one of his little stools ( nothing serious, he didn't do it on purpose) then scold me because i moved a little , because it surprised me. I bit him.

#14

I was 9 and we were on a river trip. We had pulled off the water to have lunch on the beach and when we were finished one of the men announced that he had "to see a man about a horse" and wandered into the rushes. I immediately got up to follow - I wanted to see the horse! Needless to say, my parents were quick to hold me back, and we had a nice chat about some of the more colorful idioms and why I couldn't take them so seriously.

#15

When I was like 3, I licked all the icing off of the Oreo cookies. I kept the cookie part for some reason, I don't know why. But I had them sitting on a desk in my room for like a week. My friends came over and I gave them the stale, licked cookies, and they ate them. They didn't question why there was no icing they just ate it. And they still don't know.

#16

My mom used to mix 1 part sweet cereal with 2 parts no sugar cereal in a large Tupperware tub, and I'd always be the first kid awake of the 5 of us, so I would pick out all the sweet cereal and make myself a bowl of goodness before anyone knew about it.

#17

When I was about 3-4 my mom told me I could have a cookie if I ate at least half of a plate of grapes. I took a bite out of every grape.  

#18

I was 12 in the 6th grade. Went to a friend's birthday/slumber party. She lived in a small community. Her house was on the corner and her bedroom faced the street, and had giant picture windows that opened to the street. Her house was big and dark, spooky, and very old. Sometime in the early morning all 7 of us were watching some silly movie, we heard a scary noice and we all jumped up and ran to her room jumping on the king sized waterbed. I was second from last on the pile from the top to jump on the bed, well someone jumped right in the middle of me and it caused me to pee on everyone under me. I jumped up and ran to the restroom. I was MORTIFIED, TERRIBLY EMBARRASSED AND SCARED. My friend came to check on me and told me it was ok and no one was mad. So everyone promised to keep slumber party events secret and that was just one of the secrets. Or so I believed. The next school day, all of my boy classmates knew and I had to relive that over for years. At our high school graduation, the valedictorian brought it up again in her speech. I'm 47 now and have yet to live it down  

#19

When I was 5, we went to a wedding of a relative. My mom explained there would be a ring bearer and train bearers. I thought she said trained bears so as the bride passed I loudly said "Where are the trained bears?" Boy was mom embarrassed.

#20

  I was playing hide and seek with kids around the cul-de-sac. Competitive as I was, I sat tucked in a hedgerow trying to decide what was more important - winning the game or answering the call of nature at the risk of being found. Suffice to say I stupidly chose the former and decided it was better to wet myself. Then walk all the way back home in p**s soaked jeans. I totally got my priorities all wrong. But for whatever it’s worth, I have bloody fantastic bladder control as an adult!