We all like to say we were weird when we were kids. But let’s be honest: everyone was a weird kid. The bottom line…kids are just weird and there’s no getting around it.
But it makes sense. Kids are just learning about how the world works. They’re discovering who they want to be. They have endless energy and a huge reserve of untapped imagination and creativity. And yes, that means they can be little weirdos.
Every parent has had the experience of asking their child, “What the heck are you doing?” Kids come up with some crazy ideas. Maybe they decide to eat their dinner like a dog. Perhaps they wear their underwear on their heads.
And then there are the things we all did as kids. Most of them we still can’t explain now as adults. We just wonder “Why did we do that?”
We might not ever get to the bottom of how our childhood brains worked. But at the very least, we can now laugh about it as we wonder what on earth we were thinking. These are 50 things we all did when we were kids — and we still can’t explain them.
1. Why did we all draw hair like this?
Whether or not you grew up to be an artist, you probably loved to draw as a kid. But every time you drew a lady with long hair, she looked like this. Sorry, Mom.
Even if we didn’t consciously link this to alcohol, we loved to “take shots” of water. Did we understand why we were doing it? Not even a little. But we still did it for some reason.
Trying to push two magnets together was the ultimate exercise in frustration. We knew it wasn’t going to happen, but it always felt like it might. So, we just kept trying.
Do you remember thinking that all the pregnant ladies you saw had swallowed watermelon seeds? You were convinced that plants could take root in your stomach. It was stressful, man.
5. 10 years later, these kids pierced their own ears
There was always that one weird kid who loved sticking pins in their fingers. Once high school rolled around, they were piercing each other’s ears at slumber parties and getting lip rings.
Did we really believe in monsters? Maybe not. But every time we went into the bathroom, we were convinced that one was behind the shower curtain. So, we had to check.
There was something about the shower that was really creepy to us as kids. When you were out of it, someone was hiding behind the curtain. When you were in it, someone was watching you.
These cheap, kitschy little pencils were so annoying. You got one with a cool pattern on it only to find out it was made of the flimsiest plastic ever. It was simple to peel it off. Then it was just a regular pencil.
There’s nothing like walking down a sidewalk during the fall, stomping on all those wonderfully crunchy leaves. And there’s nothing like the disappointment when one of them just doesn’t crunch.
There’s no explanation for why it was so satisfying to eat macaroni and cheese like this. But it was an urge that just couldn’t be satisfied until you stuck the fork tines inside and popped them in your mouth.
12. There was something about the corner of the pool
It’s hard to explain what happened when we swam to the corner of the pool. For some reason, we instantly became superheroes who were ready to shoot back out into the fray. Of course, most superheroes don’t wear water wings.
Remember how your desk was filled with treasures in elementary school? Funny erasers, stickers, and of course, this beauty that you had worked on throughout the entire school year.
We’ve all done this so long that we probably can’t even remember where we learned it. After a while, you started drawing it on all your papers no matter what they had on them.
Look, most of us weren’t pretending to be world-famous artists, and birds are hard to draw. Once you tried, you knew to stick with the classic Vs to keep it simple.
That oscillating fan was perfect for keeping you cool in the summer, but it also had another awesome function. It made your voice sound like a robot, which resulted in hours of fun.
It was a waste of glue and the teachers hated it, but that couldn’t stop us. Nothing was better than the enjoyment of peeling a fake layer of skin off your hand in one long stretch.
Remember when stores used to have coupons right by the front doors? We’d pull on them, get way too many, and make a mess. We probably ruined the employees’ day.
Ostensibly, this thing was for clipping the pencil onto a notebook or binder. But let’s be real — it lasted about five seconds once you started to fidget with it in class.
Ah, the memories of those ugly cinder block school walls. They were an eyesore, but they did have those smooth grooves in between each block. Kids couldn’t help but run their finger down it.
Once upon a time, these pens were the ultimate in cool classroom tools. You could write in every color of the rainbow. But instead, we always tried to write using all of the colors at once.
To be fair, when you’re a kid, eye-level is at everyone else’s waist. You’d grab the hand of the nearest woman, assuming it was your mom only to make the worst discovery of your young life.
We must’ve all been really bored in class back then — and we didn’t have fidget spinners. Instead, we did stuff like stabbing our pencils through giant erasers to quell the boredom.
Those long marker swords made you feel pretty epic. Of course, they instantly broke and scattered markers everywhere. That always derailed the class and made the teacher mad.
Back then, alcohol was known as a “grownup drink,” but that didn’t mean you couldn’t pretend. If you were extra careful, your mom would let you play with a wineglass.
Remember how we all told the story of the kid who swung all the way around the pole? We never found out if it was true, but we always believed the tale just a little bit.
Remember putting your pencil through your ruler and spinning it really fast? Or better, watching the kid next to you do this and accidentally hit himself in the face?
When you were a kid, bus rides were long and could get really boring. But on cold days, you didn’t have to look elsewhere for entertainment. You could draw all over the windows.
Smoking is frowned upon these days, with fewer people doing it than ever before. But that doesn’t stop every elementary schooler from pretending to light up a cig when the weather’s cold.
Why did we make these spectacularly unimaginative Halloween decorations every year? The color in the Tootsie-Pop wrapper always ended up bleeding through the tissue and getting all over the wrapper.
It was the law: once you finished drinking a Capri Sun, you had to blow it back up again and claim it was full. Those were just the rules; we didn’t make them.
Walking on crosswalks when you were a kid was an exercise in concentration. You had to step on the stripes or…well, you didn’t know what. You’d break your mother’s back, maybe?
There was nothing like blowing everyone’s mind with the old “rubber pencil” trick. Of course, there was always the one kid who called you out on it right away. What a dork.
Anything can be a toy when you’re a kid — even static electricity. It was everywhere in the winter, making you shock yourself and standing your hair on end.
35. We were all experts at balancing a broom on our hands
Every kid imagines they can do the coolest tricks ever — and even if they can’t, they’ll try. Just take the old broom balancing act that earned us all some bruises.
Remember middle school when all the boys decided they had to jump up and touch the doorframe every time they walked through it? I still don’t know what they were trying to prove.
38. Putting Bugles on your fingers to make witch claws
Bugles were the underwhelming but still tasty snack of our childhood. It was less interesting to eat them than to stick them on your fingers and pretend to be a monster.
39. Combining all the flavors of the soda fountain
You’ll still see it today: a group of kids goes over to the soda fountain and giggles as they fill their cup with every single flavor. Does it taste good? Nope, but we all did it.
Here’s something you’ve probably forgotten: those cheap rubber balls that came in gift bags. No one knows why we bit them, but it’s a sensation you’ll never forget.
42. Climbing up the slide and making everyone angry
There’s always one kid who tries to climb up the slide at the playground, causing a traffic jam and some minor injuries. The slide is supposed to be one-way traffic only.
We all saw “A Christmas Story: where the kid gets his tongue stuck to the pole. But we still tried it and were terrified when it panned out exactly the way you’d expect.
44. Getting to push the grocery cart at turbo speed
Every once in a while, your parents would let you push the cart at the grocery store. That meant you could race it along the aisles and cause a ruckus.
45. The basement turned evil as soon as the lights were out
When the lights were on, your basement was an interesting place full of weird knick-knacks and odd corners. The moment it was dark, it turned into a place of horrors.
Getting hit with the old “I-C-U-P” prank was absolutely devastating. You’d fall for it and everyone would laugh. For an elementary schooler, it was horrible.
No, not literal hornets — those wadded-up pieces of paper that earned their name from their sting. Everyone has been on the receiving end of one of those.
48. Making all the teachers furious by paper toweling the bathroom
Every elementary school bathroom looks the same: the long row of stalls, dirty mirrors, and of course, paper towels on the ceiling. It was disgusting, but kids thought it was hilarious.
The Naruto run has regained popularity recently after the planned raid on Area 51. But for real: we all knew a kid who ran exactly like this for some reason.
Remember freaking out all your friends by pretending to give yourself a shot with a mechanical pencil? We must’ve been extremely bored back in school. Or maybe we were just having fun.
We all like to say we were weird when we were kids. But let’s be honest: everyone was a weird kid. The bottom line…kids are just weird and there’s no getting around it.
But it makes sense. Kids are just learning about how the world works. They’re discovering who they want to be. They have endless energy and a huge reserve of untapped imagination and creativity. And yes, that means they can be little weirdos.
Every parent has had the experience of asking their child, “What the heck are you doing?” Kids come up with some crazy ideas. Maybe they decide to eat their dinner like a dog. Perhaps they wear their underwear on their heads.
And then there are the things we all did as kids. Most of them we still can’t explain now as adults. We just wonder “Why did we do that?”
We might not ever get to the bottom of how our childhood brains worked. But at the very least, we can now laugh about it as we wonder what on earth we were thinking. These are 50 things we all did when we were kids — and we still can’t explain them.
