Games People Played

Thinking about primary school made me think about some of the games we played.  One I particularly remember was called "Two Ball".  It basically involved juggling two tennis balls in a series of manouvres.  You also required a flat vertical surface.  The inside of the 'shelter shed' at school was ideal because the wall was divided into perfectly sized spaces by the frame.  It was a game you could play by yourself, or in competition with others.  If in competition it was your turn until you dropped a ball or made some other mistake.  The idea was to see who got to the end of the sequence first.  Let's see if I can remember it:
10 = underhand throws
9 = overhand throws
8 = under / over
7 = up
6 = up / under
5 = up / over
4 = hmm - that's about as far as I can go, and 5 might not be correct.
Strange thing is, I NEVER met anyone else who had played it.  I did find a reference to it on the internet one day, but a search just now has failed to turn up any reference, except a wikipaedia page that has since been removed.  But I know I even added to the information I found so it was some sort of forum.
Aha -  I just found this:

Two Ball is a very good game. You sing a rhyme as you throw two balls against a wall.

Here is the rhyme:

   Please miss, mother miss,          

   Come to tell you this miss,        

   I miss, won't miss,                

   Be at school tomorrow miss. 

The rules are that you are throwing the balls in a sort of juggling way and if you drop one, then you are out till it is your go again.  You can have any number of people playing but it is wise to have 3 as a maximum.    

This from: http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/domesday/dblock/GB-516000-294000/page/15      

We never sang a rhyme that I remember.

Real Knucklebones

Plastic Knucklebones

Another favourite was Knuckle Bones, or Jacks.  We often used real knuckle bones from the roast lamb, but you could also buy a set of plastic knuckles which came in five different colours.

The plastic ones I had were the same size as real ones, but later versions were smaller and had less weight.

 Knuckle Bones

The other favourite schoolyard pastimes were skippy, hoppy and swap cards. 

 

I had quite a large collection of swap cards - some had even been my mother's when she was at school.  I know I had (still got them in a cupboard somewhere!) the middle top card, and the bottom right card in my collection. I still regret swapping some of the cards that were my mother's.

Skippy was played with either a short individual rope, or one or two long ropes.  Most skipping games had rhymes that went with them.

Hopscotch was NEVER called by that grand name - it was always Hoppy we played.  Usually the grid was drawn onto the path or asphalt with chalk, but at school there was a favourite grid that had been deeply scored into the clay at the top of the oval.  There was always a race to get to it first.