As the weather warms and the days grow longer, I start feeling nostalgic for the summers when work didn't exist and my worries floated away like all the beach toys I've lost on Lake Michigan.
To cure my longing, I dug through r/nostalgia, which is basically a treasure chest of forgotten summer memories. Here are some of the best flashbacks for any kid who wants to reminisce about those hot days and long nights of the early 2000s:
1.A-hem, let's begin. It's not officially summer until someone busts these bad boys out.
2.Can you really say you experienced summer unless you had a proper Super Soaker war?
3.Burning your butt on a hot slide but still going down it anyways.
4.Slip 'N Slides, but more specifically, your subsequent wet, grassy feet.
5.THIS specific turtle sandbox.
6.Spending half the day filling up water balloons for an epic, but short-lived 10-minute battle.
7.Snow cones that immediately turned into syrup on a hot day.
8.Gathering all your friends at the cul-de-sac, or I used to call it, "the end of the court."
9.Drinking whatever was in these bottles after a soccer match.
10.Mom told us not to but we did it anyways: the neighborhood electric boxes serving as the local meetup spot. Safety first!
11.Orange sherbet Push-Up popsicles being the most innovative summer snack imaginable.
12.Watching the MTV VMAs live every summer. How could we forget this iconic duo?
13.Why did we all own this specific summertime pitcher?
14.This Igloo Playmate cooler that my father brought EVERYWHERE. Pretty sure he still uses the red one to this day.
15.Hunting the ice cream truck down for a popsicle that looked like a shoddier version of this guy:
16.Getting a nice slash to the ankle on any given summer outing from a Razor scooter. Looking back, naming it "Razor" was fitting.
17.Seeing fireflies and listening to chirping bugs at night.
18.Minute Maid Juice Bars.
19.The sweet taste of the copper hose tap.
20.Making lizard keychains at summer camp and thinking we were ARTISTES.
21.Reaching maximum jump height off the swingset was the greatest act of parkour any seven-year-old knew.
What else takes you back to the summers of your childhood? Sound off in the comments!