Picture of the Day

Photo Challenge #16

"A picture of the house you grew up in"

Merced, CA

This is the picture of my childhood home as seen on Google Maps Street View today.  I lived in this house until I was 12 years old.  It didn't have that stupid arch thing and it wasn't overgrown with bushes.  It was an awesome home.  This house holds many vibrant and happy memories: 

• Playing catch with siblings by throwing the ball from the front yard over the house into the backyard
• Playing basketball in the driveway
• Playing capture the flag in the front yard
• Climbing the fence and getting splinters in my palms when dropping to the ground
• Picking peaches off our tree in the backyard and getting itchy all over from the fuzz, and sticky all over from the dripping juice when eating them
• Enjoying peaches all year round, as my mom spent a few weeks every summer bottling the gargantuan bounty of peaches our tree produced
• Swinging and climbing on our swing set
• Playing ping pong on the back porch
• Having my mom rock me to sleep in front of that picture window
• Lying on the couch and being confused when the picture window started rattling, the ground started shaking and then rolling, then running in to the family room where everyone else was watching tv waiting for the world series to start and being told I was feeling this earthquake
• Running through the sprinkler
• Riding my bike through the neighborhood
• Roller skating and holding on to a rope tied to the back of a sibling's bike seat while they pedaled and pulled
• Splashing in the overflowed gutters when it rained really hard
• Running on the hot sidewalk to the neighbor's house to go swimming in their pool
• Going on walks as a family
• Lying out on a blanket in the backyard while watching a meteor shower
• Sitting on the cross bar of my older brother's bike while he rode it around to collect money from people on his paper route
• Walking to the end of our street and watching people catch "crawdaddies" in the little canal
• Playing kickball with neighbor friends
• Monkeying up the walls in the hallway
• Playing hide & go seek in the house with all the lights out at night
• Choosing one of the many board game we had in the game cupboard and playing as a family
• 4th of July fireworks on our street with brownies and homemade ice cream, joined by our family friends, the Darringtons
• Helping my older siblings in the dark, early mornings fold and rubberband newspapers for their morning paper route
• Playing "circus" out back by walking on an empty 50 gallon water storage barrel around the backyard
• Soccer