How My Childhood Homes have Changed

The glorious thing about the internet, is that you can find almost anything. Including photos of all  your old homes, if you snoop around in the right place! Rightmove not only lists homes for sale, but also keeps a catalogue of sold house prices complete with the estate agent photos. This makes it super easy to look back at your old homes and see what they now look like. I don’t know whether I’m the only one who does this – tell me you totally do it too? But I find it really interesting to see how things have changed, particularly in the homes I lived in as a kid. Or even those owned by other family members, friends.. yeah, am I just a bit weird?

So let’s take a trip down Memory Lane – I lived in three homes as a kid. My parents often found the need to acquire more space, which meant re-locating further north to get more for their money. With each move we drifted further and further north. My parents were NOT DIY people, in any which way, shape or form. We moved into homes and lived in them in their exact same condition. Painting rooms was a big NO, and they even persuaded the previous owners to leave behind their curtains so they didn’t have to faff about with finding curtains to fit all the different sized windows. Everything was ready to live in, and throughout the years the homes didn’t change much at all.

My first home was in Bedfordshire; I don’t remember the finer details of this home, but I do remember it being very scruffy. I only lived in this home until the age of 5, but I distinctly remember the peeling floral wallpaper in my bedroom and on the stairs too. It looked as though a cat had been at it… And yet, we never owned cats. I also remember the artex ceiling in the living room, which I would sit along the stairs where you could reach the ceiling and pick at it. No one told me this wasn’t a good idea – asbestos and all that. Oops. It was a 3-bed semi-detatched house, no idea what era. I don’t have any photos just of the home and internal decor.. I remember often asking “can I take a photo?” and the response being “no, we don’t want to waste the camera film” – anyone else relate to that?! How times have changed! But either way, taking pictures of your home just wasn’t a done-thing, so you’ll have to look past the celebrations and people in these photos to get a finer look on how it all looked. Anyway, here’s how it looked back in the day between the years 1991-1996….

The photos have vanished off right move (boo!) – so I’ll use next door as a near-match. The house is, after-all, identical in layout and the decor wasn’t actually too dis-similar if my memory serves me right. So here’s how this identical house looked at it’s last sale back in 2004…

I much prefer the newer look! Total transformation! …I think the home needed it!

My second childhood home was a 4-bed detached house which sat right at the bottom of a cul-de-sac in Cambridgeshire. I only lived here until I was 10, but I remember the finer details very well – the wallpaper, the curtains, the carpet.. It was a fairly new home at the time, we were the second occupants, and everything was fairly new. The hallway had one of those wallpapers you can score with your nail and make indentations. I remember doing this as a kid. I remember the windows were wood framed with a diamond grids, and the carpet a very light shade of cream. Shoes were a no no, and my mum was always most displeased when I accidentally puked upon it. All the downstairs rooms had two doors, which connected each room to the next on either side. It was one of those homes where you could literally run through every room in a circle. It was much less dated in style at the time, but here’s how it looked between 1996-2001…

And here’s how it looked at its last sale in 2011…

This home hasn’t changed too much by the looks of things. Although there is a bit more colour, and the kitchen looks much fresher too!

My third childhood home was in my current hometown in Nottinghamshire. It was a big 5-bed house. Detached, brand new, first occupants, in an estate that to this very day is still being built upon. The carpets were a strange orange/gold colour (chosen by my parents!). The walls were magnolia to the death, colour was non-existent, except for the CRAZY bright yellow curtains in the kitchen. Another choice from my parents. After my parents split up, I convinced my mum to allow me to paint through the house – I did the hall a light cream, gave the kitchen a terracotta feature wall, and living room a gold chimney breast, and we even had the dining room floor tiled. I also found heaps of second hand furniture on eBay to finally get rid of the over-sized dining table which we still had back from the first home! Not to mention the same dated sofas too, eurgh! By the time I was finished with it, it looked so much more homely, and after years on the market up for sale, it also finally sold. Coincidence or does perfect looking rooms really sell homes? Either way, this house was only sold five years ago, so needless to say it hasn’t been sold since. I’m sure I’ll be checking back with new photo updates in the future and maybe I’ll share some past/future photos then 🙂

It’s crazy how fast things date, or maybe our homes were just ALWAYS out of date, ha! Would you find it interesting to look back on your past homes? Or just creepy?