Oh pleeeeeease let me have one!!!

aren't you all lucky, I didn't get anything for passing the 11 + [ well, praise of course.]I do remember those bonnets I think [or some sort of bonnets]
but always hated any kind of hat.What I yearned for was a bubble perm {my friend had one and she was aged 10!}I also hankered after a little case with a small umbrella threaded through it at the side.Needless to say, didn't get that either.

Did all this wishing for things make us shopaholics?

I always wanted a pet, didn't really care what. DF would have more than happy for us to have a dog. DM couldn't stand the thought of the mess.
I too longed for slip on shoes. I did have jellies but they were only for playing. It was red T-bar Kilty sandals otherwise.

I always wanted a bike - my brother got 3 but not one for me!! To this day it is a family joke that when anyone complains about anything everyone says "your lucky - S never got her bike". I am visiting my Mum in December for her 90th birthday and she says she has a surprise for me - when I asked my brother what it was he joked that perhaps it was my bike at long last!!

sunseeker my first bike was a second hand one that dad hand painted. I was about 8 at the time.

Born in 1940, I was, as a child, used to the 'make do and mend' habits developed during the war. The only thing I yearned for and requested from Santa was a black doll. On Christmas morning I woke up to find her on the end of my bed, dressed in a pretty spotted dress made by my Mum who enjoyed dressing dolls. She adapted hand-me-downs from my cousins and knitted cardigans and jumpers. Clothes rationing ended in 1949 but the habit of economy lasted right into the 50s and I never pestered my parents for items of dress. When I was a student, I bought myself a pair of white winkle-picker stilettos and my father reacted as if I was selling myself on the street!

I bought my first bike out of my savings, aged 11. All those birthday and Ch....... postal orders had mounted up. I was off to grammar school and cycling was the only practical way to get there.
Forgetting clothes, and as we have moved on to other things, I asked every Ch....... for a monkey. Someone in a children's book had one as a pet and I would have loved one. Failing that, a dog like Timmy in Famouus Five. But we had 2 cats and dogs, apparently , were a nuisance. I got my way with the dog in the end, some 40 years later and he lived for 17 years. Still miss him.

What month anno ? I'm September '40

I can imagine your dad,s reaction to the winklepickers !

Bellanonna, you've just reminded me! When I was about six I wrote to Chester Zoo asking them to send me a baby monkey - I stole the stamp to send the letter from my Granny's stamp book...

Apparently they wrote back explaining why they couldn't do that, but I never got to see the letter, I was in disgrace for ages...(still don't know why, I was only six )

I had one of those hats, but I am sure DM must have knitted it, as everything was home-crafted!

What I longed for was a fringe, and I wasn't allowed one. So I snipped off a few strands of hair every night, until DM said 'Don't think I don't know what you're doing!'

It was a dog - my parents didn't want pets and my pleadings had no effect till I was 16 and they agreed on condition I paid for its upkeep and took it for walks. Don't know how I managed it at first but I did and he lived long enough to meet my first child 11 years later.

More than the bonnet, more than the jellies, more than tutus or bikes or 'shop made' jumpers and cardigans, I wanted long hair. My sister had lovely long, wavy hair, but because I showed up with disappointingly straight hair, I wasn't allowed to grow it. As soon as my hair was below my earlobes, my dad, who was a barber, would get his scissors out and tuck the horribly itchy blue and white gingham cape round my neck, and get to work. Oh how I cried myself to sleep each time I pleaded in vain to be allowed to grow it. As soon as I reached my teens I rebelled and refused to have it cut again - by then straight hair was all the rage thanks to Cathy McGowan so my long straight hair was bang on trend!
When my DD came along, I vowed never to stop her doing what she wanted with her hair. Thankfully she never wanted to do anything really crazy

DGD1 desperately wanted a fringe like her sister but was not allowed one, although she seems to have got over it now.

I was tempted to tell her about my little trick with the nail scissors, but thought DIL would not be pleased with me.

Ana, all respect to you as a six year old for writing and posting a letter to the zoo!Monkeys are over rated as pets though, and swing about on the curtains and use up all the tea bags,
Indinana, they should have allowed you your long hair, it would have looked great in a pony tail.

Ana you must have been the inspiration for the book 'Dear Zoo'!

Ana that was wonderfully resourceful of you - and only six. You deserved a pet monkey
roses I agree. Actually, now I think of it, I was younger when I rebelled, about 10, and my long hair did look good in a pony tail. I was so proud of it!

I always wanted a jumper but my overbearing granny with whom I lived, always made my mother knit a cardigan for me. Although the cardis were lovely and usually knitted in a pretty colour I wanted a polo necked jumper. I finally got one from an aunt for Christmas when I was a obout 14. Trousers too, I longed for and was not allowed until puberty then my horrid granny said it was ok to wear trousers as it would take a man ages to get them off if I was attacked. The first day I wore my trousers and polo neck jumper I felt fabulous, so grown up.

I always had good, sensible, shoes as a child - Clarks, Norvic or Birthday - but I longed for a pair of sandals for the summer and my mother would never buy them. "Your dad won't be able to mend the soles if they wear out!" Was the excuse. The only other thing I hankered after was a racing bicycle with loads of gears, but my father disapproved of girls riding bikes with drop handlebars, so I had to make do with a sensible model with three gears you changed with a little lever on the handlebars! Not as much fun, but we did some miles together, cycling round the Peak District. The hills were a mare though!

When I went to grammar school my mother made my blouses out of Viyella to keep me warm. (We had recently moved up to the frozen north - Stockport) Everybody else wore white cotton, mine were cream.
The school supplied only faint sketches so all my home made uniform was noticeably different from those bought from the school outfitters. My mother insisted that home made anything was SUPERIOR to anything bought.
I also desperately wanted proper glasses instead of NHS pink wire ones.

I wanted a pony. I REALLY wanted a pony, from a very young age. I had it all worked out, my grandparents were farmers so I could ride it in the holidays. Then when I was nine I entered a competition (I spent a week's pocket money on the stamp!) to win one, was showing the magazine to my sisters and my mother hit the roof and was really nasty to me.

My father came in to see what was going on, and my mother told him. He started to say, it wouldn't matter if I did win, there would be room on the farm, and then he went 'Ahhhh.....'

My mother has a real fear of horses. I didn't win the competition, although I did end up with horses eventually, but she was nowhere to be seen if they even came near the fence. I was tempted to let one loose on occasion - she really did say some nasty things when I entered that competition!

I had a pink witch bicycle for Christmas and I loved it . When I had the first of my two daughters and had a 14 night stay in the maternity hospital I longed and longed for someone to buy me flowers presented in a pink lacy crib thing. I can remember laying in bed seeing the nurses bringing the deliveries for the day down the ward and wishing and wishing that one was for me and my daughter. Of course I got flowers and cards but I never did get a pink crib not then or for the next baby. Haven't thought about it for years and now I feel deprived all over again when I just mentioned it to my DH he said Oh you should have said I would have bought you one.......

I remember the Pink Witch bicycle chloe1984! Didn't it have a lipstick holder?

Oh chloe1984 I feel for you.
I had one of those cribs with artificial flowers when DD was born and one in the shape of a pink teddy. I kept them for years.

Greyduster I had forgotten about 'Birthday' shoes!!

I also longed for a pony, my DGU used to promise me one when he 'came up on the Pools!' I read all the pony books I could find, my favourite was 'Wish for a Pony' and DD is called after the main character.

I also wanted to go to boarding school, it sounded such fun, but the reality would have been different I think.