A friend of mine and I wanted to play catch, ages ago. We had the gloves but no ball. I remembered seeing a baseball in my father’s closet signed by the players of local team (Montreal Expos) so I used it… I mean it was a baseball after all!!! Well my father was less than thrilled with me. I don’t remember a punishment but I remember a lecture!
Learning to drive, I backed my dad’s Camaro Z28 out of the garage but caught the doorframe on the way out. On Father’s Day, no less! :smack:
My older sisters and I once lit the Advent wreath candles while my parents were gone one afternoon. Then we forgot about it until we smelled smoke. The very expensive dining room table had not one but two wooden panels burned through, but at least we didn’t catch the house on fire! Or so we rationalized.
In both cases, I have to admit, my parents took the news a lot better than I would today if my boys did something similar.
Aiee. I don’t have advice, but just wanted to suggest to you that you might consider making this its own thread, in order to attract more attention.
I have to say I am a lot like your parents. I tend to shrug this stuff off as long as there are no ER visits included in the mix.
However, I don’t have any “prized possessions”. Stuff is just stuff in my world.
I wouldn’t have paid whether I had the money or not. They were four and why wasn’t she watching them?
I vaguely recall my younger brother and me destroying a large number of very old (one-sided) 72rpm records. Some music, some radio-play stuff (like vintage Lone Ranger LPs). I’m pretty sure we also scratched the everlovin’ balls out of an original pressing of Elvis’s “Hound Dog”/“Don’t Be Cruel” 45rpm single. Maybe not hugely valuable (eBay has them for around ten bucks) but still senseless. The 72s, I’m sure, were worth a lot more.
Ugh - that reminded me.
My Aunt was a huge Beetles fan. When she outgrew them, though, she gave a bunch of her albums to me. I promptly ground them out on my cheap phonograph. And sold a few at one of our garage sales.
Broke her heart.
My mother and her two sisters each had a son born in the same year.
Myself and my two cousins were decent enough kids but couldn’t stay out of trouble when we got together. Some of the things we did around ages of 7-10 at grandma and grandpa’s house:
-Finding out how brittle the asphalt shingle siding was on grandparents house we de-shingled one side of their house from the ground to about 4 feet up.
-They had a train track that ran nearby about one house down. We collected as much junk as we could find (mostly sticks and rocks) and built a huge pile on the tracks. Our mothers found us and removed it before any train came by.
-We always heard about older teens egging houses for fun. One of us snuck in the house and took a carton of eggs from grandma’s fridge. We then proceeded to egg her neighbors house in broad daylight.
-One of my cousins claimed he knew his way home from our grandparents house (4 miles in the city of Milwaukee). We decided to hike it to his house without telling anyone where we were going. We made it only to be found by his older brother who immediately called our mothers.
Try alcohol. Some markers are alcohol-soluble.
I think I’ve gained a few more white hairs just reading this thread. Oh, the Hummel-anity!
Now you know why that common stuff on Antiques Roadshow is so valuable.
you can call Crayola (there’s an 800 number on the boxes–I’m sure there’s a website, too) and they should know. Most water based markers have similar make-ups (just don’t tell them it’s not Crayola if it’s not). I had to call when #1 son was about 2 and we had gotten some new kind of Crayola marker–I think you had to shake them or some such. Anyway, he did–without the cap. Marker splashed all over my dining room wall (painted with flat paint). They recommended Soft Scrub in a just barely damp sponge and sure enough–it all came off. I dunno 'bout wood though. Good luck.
Oh. Upon reread, I see it’s permanent. I’d still try Crayola or perhaps Sharpie has a website? I’d do hairspray (but I thought that only worked for pens, not markers), first.
On third thought–you need a solvent. Try some isopropyl alcohol as mentioned.
Hairspray is supposed to work because it has alcohol in it, and in a nice convenient spray form.
When I was a kid, I dropped one of my Dad’s Alan Sherman records, and put a chip in that rendered the first song unplayable. While this was by no means a “prized possession,” he really liked that record, and I always felt bad about it.
Flash forward 30 years or so - through the wonder of technology, all of Alan Sherman’s recordings were re-released on CD in “My Son, the Box.” I bought it for my Dad for his birthday, and I think he really liked it. It was nice to be able to fix what I had broken all those years ago.
My brother and I were having a blast playing on Dad’s drumset. We were really impressed with the loud noise the drumstick made on the snare drum. We decided we wanted a louder noise. So we got a hammer. And, well. . .
I think Mom talked Dad out of selling us.
(Hey, maybe Mom wasn’t too broken up about the snare drum not working anymore. I only just thought of that.)
Destroyed, no. Stolen and hocked for drug money, yes.
The things I don’t know. (I don’t use hairspray). Let’s hope it works. 
That’s way sadder, because it’s a deliberate act, rather than an accident or an oblivous, innocent act.
My friend’s toddler stole several credit cards and her driver’s license out of her wallet, along with various other little things around the house, and shoved them into the return air vent. She found all of it when she changed the filter. If you haven’t checked that, it would be worth a look.
I know it’s too late to do anything about it now, but just because something is deleted doesn’t mean it’s gone from the hard drive. Usually it’s still there, though the file name is delisted. Unless you overwrote the delisted data multiple times, the thesis may have been recoverable.