My memorable childhood by Taelor Quick

Through the ages of 3-6, I was curious, creative, sassy, and a little mischievous.  I was spoiled by my parents, and I was very particular about what I wanted. I was also very adventurous and I loved the outdoors and exploring new places.

I loved to dress up, and put dresses on, put little plastic high heels on, put makeup on, and wear jewelry. My mom would always do my hair every day and put me in a cute outfit. And I never went anywhere without carrying a little purse with me. I was a diva, to say the least.

            I remember having this white, circular wooden table that I would play with when I was younger (which I still have). I had millions of stuffed animals I played with, and I would put all of them in a circle on the table, and go put a dress on and pretend to serve them food and have tea with them. My mom took a picture of me in a blue silk dress with blue slippers on, “serving” my stuffed animals, and we still have it.  

My mother and I look a lot alike. And since I loved to dress up, and so did she, we entered ourselves in a mother-daughter look-alike pageant that we heard about on the radio one morning. There were hundreds of people entered in the competition, and we were really nervous. I remember I was wearing a white shirt with a pink strawberry on it, and ruffled green sleeves. I had pink sun glasses on and my hair was in ponytails. Out of about 200 or 300 contestants, we won 2^nd place. I’ll never forget when they announced our names on the intercom, “and the runner up is… Taelor and Cindy Quick!” they said. I was the happiest girl in the world.

 My parents would always take me to the duck pond to feed the ducks. We would take a loaf of bread from our house and tear each slice of bread up and give all the birds little pieces until it was all gone. I remember sitting on the stone wall on the bridge that went right above the water and just watching all the ducks and hearing all the birds chirping.

            When I was about 4, I went through this stage where I never would wear jeans and I hated wearing socks. So when I went out, I would either wear a dress, a skirt, or any pants that weren’t denim. And for some odd reason, I hated sleeping in pajamas pants, so I would always wear like an oversized shirt or a gown because I hated pajama pants. I was also a very picky eater, and I would only eat certain things. I was very stubborn. “Quit being so hard-headed,” my dad would always say.   

When I reached the age of about 5, I started gymnastics at Roanoke Academy. In gymnastics you have to wear leotards, and my mom would do my hair and makeup for me.  And I remember I had a blue sparkly leotard that I loved and I would run around the house in. My parents said I always would twirl and spin all the time like a ballerina.

One time when I was around 6 years old, My mom and I were at Walmart, and she went to go put the buggy back in the store, and she left her keys in the ignition, and I locked all the doors before she came back, so she couldn’t get in the car. She told me to unlock the door, but I didn’t because I thought it was hilarious. So she had to borrow someone else’s phone and call a locksmith to unlock our car just because I wouldn’t unlock it for her.

            I loved cartoons. Some of my favorite shows were The Wiggles, Teletubbies, Scooby Doo, and Dragon Tales. I used to sit on the couch with my dad and watch them at night before I went to bed. Scooby Doo was probably my favorite cartoon as a kid. I loved Scooby Doo so much that I named my dog I had when I was little after him. I even had life-sized stuffed animals of Scooby Doo and almost every single one of the Scooby doo movies and episodes on VHS.

My mom would work at night while my dad stayed home with me and my dad worked during the day while my mom stayed home with me. Anyway, whenever my mom came home from work, she always brought me home toys and things like that. I loved getting baby dolls because I liked to dress them up and pretend to feed them and act as if they were real babies.

My dad is a landscaper, so all his work is outside. He would always find turtles, lizards, and frogs and bring them home to me because I loved things like that. Every time he would find a turtle, we would only keep it for a few days and then let it back into the wild. One time we found a turtle and we put my initials on its shell in red nail polish to see if it would ever come back and it did every year.

I was a very creative and outgoing child growing up. Many of the things that I said above were memories that I remember from my childhood, and things that were important to me. I’ve had a very memorable and sentimental childhood that has made me who I am today.