(Frankly, real life is just too heavy right now. I’m choosing to be utterly frivolous here this week.)
So catch the spirit! Or not!
Here’s how this works: I’ll start with the first line of a song. It’s a song I learned when I was a little kid. Maybe you did, too. First commenter says the next line. Next commenter says the line after that, until we see if we’ve got the whole song.
Bonus: Name those HAND MOTIONS!
NO GOOGLING! Although conferring amongst yourselves and loved ones is definitely acceptable.
Ready? (sing with me, now)
Little cabin in the woods …….
Hand Motion: Cabin roof with your fingers, children. No, Timmy, not that finger.
Next line, anyone?
Oh! I used to know this! But what’s the NEXT line? The hunter? The rabbit? Tracey, you totally crack me up. I’m becoming so addicted to your blog!
“Something something by the window stood…”
???
Little old man at the window stood.
(Sorry life is heavy, dear. Prayers for you!)
I think I might have been shipped here from another planet and my parents just never got around to telling me. Between this and the “eaten and torn to pieces” stuff I’m having a totally d…..uh kinda’ week here at Casa de Tracey.
And yes, I realize that is not the next line in the song.
Sorry, forgot the motion!
Hands make “spectacles”, held up to eyes.
little man by the window stood… da da da da da da da… da da da da da da da da.
hmm. those last two lines just escape me. no hand motions come to mind at all.
How can you say no googling?!? I have no idea what the next line is…
but how about this song I learned at camp… boom, boom, ain’t it great to be crazy. (unfortunately that’s all I remember!).
Haha! I’m throwing in the next line, you guys:
Saw a rabbit hopping by …
(hold 2 fingers up and “hop” your hand around)
Next?
Okay it’s coming back to me.
“Little man by the window stood” you trace a square with your index fingers in the air for the window.
Then after “saw a rabbit…” its:
“knocking at my doooor.”
and you do the knocking thing with your fist.
No its:
“Frightened as could be” Cross you arms and shiver!
“help me help me, help he said”…………
I know it all.
I have NEVER heard this song. But I am enjoying your walk down memory lane. Keep it going!
and now that it’s all been recalled, that’s one of the dumbest things we ever could have sung.
oh yeah!
“Help me, help me, help me he said!”
“‘Fore the hunter shoots me dead.”
“Little rabbit come inside” (rhymes with “cried” I think I learned a different version…)
wave your hand in a come here motion
safely to abide.
Hahahaha! We did it!!
Now, seriously, what the HELL??
What were our teachers/camp counselors trying to do to us with THAT one??
Good job, Missy and Sal and Chick Voice and Sarahk …. Gold Stars for EVERYONE!!!!
in our version, it’s
“Help me, help me, help!” he cried,
See, then it rhymes with “inside”.
Obviously, there are regional variations.
The hand motion is the the flapping your lower arms in the air thingie, hands at shoulder level.
Did you mention that then you sing it through several times, dropping a line at a time and just doing the motions?
Hilarity abounds!
Oh, yeah, Sal. That’s right, I forgot.
You start doing the hand motions without singing, until you’re just doing the hand motions and giggling hysterically because it is the FUNNIEST THING EVER when you’re 6, right?
These were the lyrics I learned:
Little cabin in the woods
Little man by the window stood
Saw a rabbit hopping by
Frightened as could be
Help me! Help me! Help, he said
‘Fore the hunter shoots me dead (WHAT??)
Come, little rabbit, come inside
Safely to abide
We had Friday Singalongs every week when I was in grade school — the whole school in the auditorium. We learned the WEIRDEST songs, frankly.
Maybe we’ll do more Singalongs here. Just takes me back to a weird and funny time.
I’m too late! But the song was coming back to me sloooowwwly. I think my sister was actually the one that learned and I only learned it second-hand.
I was cheated.
Sorry, ASM!
Did your school do anything like this — have Singalongs?
It seems so weird to me now. I mean, I loved it at the time because I’ve always loved to sing, but I don’t know of any schools that do this now, really.
It was the whole freakin’ grade school, for like an hour in the auditorium, singing and doing hand motions while teachers played guitars and pianos and such. I think one old lady teacher played an *autoharp*!
I found her mesmerizing.
I mean, obviously, some of the kids liked it better than others, but I was easy to please. Just play me a song — even about hunters killing little bunnies — and I was hooked, apparently!
Is this weird? The whole thing just seems so weird to me now.
Not as weird as some of the 4H camp songs I learned as a kid. One was about a little frog who got run over by a Mack truck and then eaten by a dog… Oh yeah, and then barfed up.
Swear to Pete.
Oh, Tracey –
Thanks for reminding me of one of my favorite teachers. Mrs Nelson was my second grade teacher for all of two months – we’d moved to town in April- but I remember her vividly.
In her class, every Friday was basically Hang Out and Play Day. After we took and graded our spelling tests, we just did fun stuff.
We went to the gym and played Dodge Ball and sometimes the boys would enact the final battle of the Alamo, to the soundtrack recording. When they’d all killed each other, the girls would go out and dance among their fallen bodies. I don’t know what we were supposed to be – the angels of death, perhaps? The spirits of the revolution?
Do I need to mention that this was in Texas – and a long time ago?
Then, we’d have a class singalong – to her autoharp! “We are the British Soldiers”, ‘The Fox Went Out on a Chilly Night’, stuff like that.
We’d have a mini-Field Day at recess – run races and have jumping contests or a whole class game of ‘Duck, Duck, Goose’.
It was something to look forward to all week long.
I think I’ll sing silly songs in the car today, in memory of Mrs. N.
Okay, Sal… I really want to jump in your head and relive all those mem-ries. RIGHT NOW.
I thought I was the only one who was cursed with the dreaded autoharp memory. Not unusual when I was a child, but as and adult I’m like, “Autoharp?! Whatthe?!” Makes about as much sense as the sticks. Did y’all have the percussion sticks in TX? Ours came in three colors — red, green and blue. I can still hear them…
ANNNND Field Day… GLORIOUS, BEATIFUL Field Day… Aaaaahh… Except dodge ball. Dodge ball is evil.
ah yes, field day and dodge ball and four square. four square rawked.
and i think that hunter / bunny song was just our bleeding heart teachers trying to tell us it’s inhumane to go hunting or something. maybe the smacking hunter was starving and couldn’t find a 7-11 at which to buy processed food and really just needed something to eat! the poor hunter is what the song should have been about.
Just the guys played Dodge Ball – back then, girls could be delicate and not have to be all feisty Disney heroines.
Looking back as an adult, I wonder if the guys were peeking under our skirts as they lay on the gym floor. Prob’ly not – they were too busy being dead and it was a different time.
For future sing a longs……..how ’bout “Do Your Ears Hang Low”?
Sal — I can’t get over the little girls dancing over the fake dead boy bodies …. what???
sarahk — /the poor hunter is what the song should have been about./ Hahahaha! Yeah, the poor hunter! Stupid talking rabbit.
“Jump in my belllayyyy!!”
I’m with you on 4-square. Awesome!
WG — I’m sorry you are haunted by the sticks. I’m not familiar with them. ‘Splain, please.
Chick Voice — “Do your ears hang low” — I have a vague recollection of being confused about that one.
It was Interpretive Dancing, you see.
Fortissimo battle music for the guys, followed by lyrical melodies for us girls. Iirc, there was some flower strewing mime, too. It looks pretty bizarre in print, but it made sense at the time.
To an eight year old.
Field day was a candy haven. Or Candy Heaven for me. Nerds. I ate Nerds and those lollipops that were green and red and yellow on a stick, and they were triangular in shape and after licking it for awhile it turned into a formidable weapon. For the tongue at least.
Dooooo youuuuur ears hang low do the wobble to and fro? Can you tie ’em in a knot? Can you tie ’em in a bow? Can you throw ’em o’er your shoulder like a Continental soldier? Do your ears. Hang. Low?
Do your ears hang high? Do they reach up to the sky? Do they drip when they’re wet? Do the wobble when they’re dry? Can they wave to your neighbor with a minimum of labor? Do your ears. hang.high?
Are my lyrics even CLOSE? Sad thing, I was a senior in high school when I learned this.
We had a piano in my 2nd/3rd grade room. Mrs. Gangle used to play it. I actually had one of the songs in my head the other day.
“Give me gas for my Ford, keep my truckin’ for the Lord. Give me gas for my Ford I pray, I pray! Give me gas for my Ford keep me truckin’ for the Lord, keep me truckin’ ’til the break of days. Sing hosannah, sing hosannah, siiiiing hosannah to the King of Kings. Sing hosannah, sing hosannah, sing hosannah to the King.”
The song was prophetic. It takes $96 bucks to fill up our truck. no lie. I need to pray this song!
Sorry for the epic Tracey. You got me going now.
AS Mom,
I learned the “Oil in my lamp” version, which I think we’ll all agree is a little more Biblical.
Now, I’m remembering our Girl Scout campout campfires, but will not recount – don’t want anyone going into a glucose-induced coma. Let’s just say there was a lot of Peter, Paul and Mary being sung. Soulfully. And with meaning.
Ah yes, Give Me Oil in My Lamp. I knew there was a first verse in there somewhere. Pity I only remember the secular version.
I was never a Girl Scout. But. I WAS a Pioneer Girl. Any fellow Pioneers out there?
“Iiiiiiif I had the soul of a Pioneer, PIONEER! Off the to the words I would trot, WOULD TROT. There to remain as a Pioneer. PIONEER! There to remain ’till I dropped. I DROPPED.
CHORUS! Oooh-la-la oooh-la-la oooh-la la REPEAT! OOooh-la-la oooh-la-la oooh-la la
AGAIN! Oooh-la-la oooh-la-la oooh-la la
ONCE MORE! Oooh-la-la oooh-la-la la la.
The end.”
This has been such a trip down memory lane. I thank you.
Good Lord! This whole thing is two or three blogposts AT LEAST! Too much gold to mine here for just one outing!
Do your ears hand low? Do they wobble too and fro? Can you tie them in a knot, can you tie them in a bow?………etc. Lots of hand motions. It all seemed perfectly normal as a 2nd grader at church camp…….in retrospect…WHAT????