Childhood smells: coughs and sneezes

The school Christmas holidays always seemed to start with diseases for me, pyjamas on the sofa, and in my mother's bathroom cabinet what was 'Vick's vapour rub' has a mentholated smell redolent of the preparations for the festive season.

Smells of childhood 2: My Gran

This is a memory of another soap but I only realised it was the smell of a soap when I moved into my house 10 years ago. Our house had been a C19 general store and in the old stable at the end of the garden we found a crate of Sunlight soap. One whiff and I was transported back to my great grandmother's house. This was my Gran's smell: she washed with it, scrubbed with it and swore it was the best thing for washing underwear.First made in 1884 it was a naturally-derived soap and now only made in Canada, although celebrated at Port Sunlight:

http://www.portsunlightvillage.com/

For me it conjours up one of the beloved figures of my life: her wicked smile, the floral dresses my mother regularly made her - always from the same pattern, the hydrangeas and gladioli she grew in her garden, her budgie, seed cake and the way her hearing-aid whistled when she turned it off.