I was reflecting during the holidays and thought that a lot of my favorite toys (books too) really had a profound influence on me or at least foretold a lot about what I'd come to adore as an adult.
#1 front and center. The sunshine family. I had just the family. I dreamt of one day owning the house with the attached craft studio. LOL. Oh and the farmer's mkt truck. I still look for them on ebay but always get out bid.
#2 not really a toy, but well into my teens, I'd watch sesame street hoping to catch a run of the tweedlebugs. The little bugs that lived in the window box. I thought they were the coolest.
#3 The Gnome Book. It was a big book, with the front and back images of a red capped gnome in a blue jacket. It was a bit dicey but I loved the diagram pictures and used to spend too much time pouring through the pages.
#4 The Boxcar Children book. Secretly still, I think I'd live in a boxcar if I could hook up plumbing.
#5 A dollhouse complete with little dishes and a chandelier. My grandpa made most of the furniture in his woodshop.
huuummm I was a tomboy at heart so my favorite toy was the outdoors. I loved to walk the trails in the woods behind our house, was a master tree climber and could spend all day playing in the creek (catching tadpools was a favorite pasttime)
I do remember loving the Mary Poppin's books in our school library. I would read them over and over.
My mother was very artistic and always encouraged me to be creative. I can remember her mixing up her homemade glue (flour and water lol) weekly. I would sit at the kitchen table with a bowl of it, construction paper, old magazines, a pair of scissors and crayons. That made me very happy.
Every December my grandmother gave me a Sears catalog and told me I could pick out any one thing that I wanted for Christmas. I always wanted a new doll and I remember having pages so worn and dog-earred because I had such a hard time making up my mind (still suffer from this disease lol). I remember, one year, wanting a doll named Kelly that held a tiny stuffed elephant named Ellie. I had to have been 5 or 6. I changed my mind at the last minute and asked for the Miss Piggy doll that was also a puppet lol
My best friend down the road had the HUGE 3 Barbie dream house that, I swear, must have been like 18 stories high lol. It had the elevator on the side with the string that manuevered it up and down. That was cool though I didn't care too much for the barbies...except for the one barbie that had blond hair on one side and black on the other and you just turned the top of her head around to change the color. Or was it a different face with different hair color on each side and you turned the entire head around? lol Can't remember but I thought that was pretty cool. Now I think that doll would freak me out lol
90% of my best "fun" childhood memories are just me being outside... running barefoot and stopping every so often to pull the stickers out. I hated those darn things.
My friend across the street had a real outdoor play house that her parents built for her. It was the COOLEST! It was just like a miniature house... a pitched roof, real wood siding, furniture, and a window on 2 sides that swung open and closed. We would make mudpies and pretend that we were McDonalds and sell them thru our drive-thru windows..
Wow I'm getting some funny flash backs from this walk down memory lane...haven't thought of this stuff in years.
Gosh I loved climbing trees. We had the BEST trees in our yard and created a pully system between them so that we could communicate with each other (my sister and other friends) by sending a bucket on the rope from tree to tree...
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~ Sherrie ~
Loving my 5 sons
Me, 2nd from left, at my 20 year high school reunion and my daredevil son, Keaton, getting stitches in the E.R.....AGAIN!
Some people are like slinkies. Not really good for anything but they bring a smile to your face when pushed down the stairs.
Books, definitely books. I had the entire Nancy Drew collection. And Bobbsey Twins. I read so many books that have been made into movies...Harriet the Spy, James and the Giant Peach, The Chronicles of Narnia, Mathilda, Charlotte's Web, The Borrowers.
And all my arts and craft supplies. And my bike. And my rollerskates.
I have that Gnome book, Katie. And I was always partial to the Tweedlebugs too.
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~Dannielle
Momma to Isabelle (8/95) and Mason (1/01)
I've always collected crafting supplies. Who would have guessed?
My best things though were nature toys. We played on the beach, collected stuff from under the wharf. I had a tiny punt and hauled my own traps from the time I was 4. We were the only girls on the wharf growing up so we got some special things that the boys didn't. The guy in the fish house next to my Dad's made us a hammer with a pink handle. Anything that floated into the cove was like treasure. Giant styrofoam peices quickly became pirate ships that we would paddle with laths.
One summer I saved my money and got a remote control coastguard cutter. I'd launch it from the beach and run like mad to the next wharf to pick up the signal again. Unfortunately it didn't last long in salt water.
And, I did have a Barbie townhouse with everything that went with it - bathroom that worked, kitchen, furniture, pool. I am the oldest grandchild so at that point there weren't a lot of kids to spend money on and I come from a fair sized family of aunts and uncles.
Last, but not least, we had dolls with clothes that matched ours. My Nana worked for Health Tex and she and her friends would make clothes for our dolls from the same fabric as the Health Tex clothes. They even had little tags. 25 years later those clothes are still around at my cousin's house!
ETA: I adored both the Tweedlebugs and the Doozers. What I would have given to have those for pets...
Books of any sort ... I read cobsessively as a kid. I remember having a birthday party when I was turning 8 (my birthday is in July) and my parents got me a whole stack of those Choose Your Own Adventure books. I opened them and was so happy, and I will never forget at least 2 of my friends saying incredulously (and agast) "You read during the summer?!?!?" In college I was sitting in the student lounge reading The Witching Hour by Anne Rice and another firend came over and was asking me what class I was reading ot for. I said it wasn't for a class. She also could not believe that I would be reading for myself.
Mostly, if I wasn't reading and I was inside I was creating something ... I loved ceramics (still do), cooking (still do), and crafting of any sort (duh,lol!).
I was most o fthe time outside and played a lot of sports. I was a big tom boy too. I was always climbing a tree or playing baseball.
I also collected Cabbage Patch Kids, and have a bag full of at least 2 dozen of them in the basement now.
I also collected natural things like sea shells on our yearly trips to Maine and Florida and also rocks. Both of which I still collect
I guess I haven't changed much, lol.
I ha dthat Barbie Condo too. My cousin and I used to make the Barbies take flying leaps off the roof, rofl!
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Bonnie
WAHomeschooling Mama to McKenna Elizabeth (8.00) and Holden (2.04)
Omgosh, the barbie dream house. LOL. My friend at the top of the street had one in her garage but she never wanted to play with it. I loved the elevator and could have run that thing all day. She was bossy tho and wouldn't let me. never did play with her much.
I remembered about Sweet April after I'd posted last night. I remember that doll turned me into a firm Santa Believer. I wanted one but never told anyone....Santa showed up, at the front door no less, and handed me a SWEET APRIL DOLL when I was about 6 years old.
well, I loved Barbies, My Little Pony, Care Bears, Cabbage Patch Kids...of course my sisters and I ony had the basics so we had to be creative with our "accessories"
__________________ ~Selena~
Mama to Daniel (5/00), Anna (5/02) & Chloe (11/05) All natural soaps, essential oils, lotions, butters, perfumes, salves and more at Motherhues!
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I was big on legos and tinkertoys. I didn't have real legos but my good friend down the road had some and I thought they were the coolest - I asked for some and my dad gave me some 'building bricks' that just weren't the same. So I made all sorts of cool creations with the tinkertoys.
I loved my record player. I would play records endlessly and sing and dance - pretending I was in musicals and doing performances.
I was never big on dolls, but if I had had bendy dolls as a kid, I would have been very into that - I've always had a huge fondness for fairies and loved to pretend about them. Like Sherrie, I spent most of my time outside and I would imagine little elves and things in the moss. Playing outside was my favorite.
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Melinda
with 4 great kiddos!
Josh (6/96), Nathan (9/97), Corrie (6/99) & Rylee (9/02)
I just remembered another favorite toy. I didn't have it but my neighbor did. It was a school bus and a school house with those weeble-wobble people!! Those weebles were the coolest!
I just remembered another favorite toy. I didn't have it but my neighbor did. It was a school bus and a school house with those weeble-wobble people!! Those weebles were the coolest!
Mys sister had the bus and we still talk about it. The new Weebles just aren't that cool.
My parents made most of my toys when I was growing up.
I had a soft sculptured baby doll with the most extensive wardrobe ever since my mother loves sewing doll clothes. My dad made her a cradle and she had quilts made by my mom as well. They just made Lorelei a cradle and quilt this Christmas from the same pattern.
My father made me a toy cupboard and I loved it until my idiot cousin tried to get into the bottom and destroyed it. I was 13 and I still cried.
I really liked my Raggedy Ann and Andy that my mom made when I was about 3. I had a matching dress and my sister had a set that she matched too. Lorelei found them about 2 months ago and has been carryig them around ever since.
I had a Holly Hobbie doll my mother made that I adored too. Not sure what ever happened to her.
My Great-grandfather made my sister and I a table and he made everyone of his kids, grandkids, etc a little red chair for their first birthday (they're about 15 inches high) so we had ours and my mom's to go with it.
Dad also made us a HUGE dollhouse on wheels that my 2 sisters and I shared. It wasn't a Barbie condo, but we sure liked it lol.
I loved all things Barbie, Books, I loved the Trixie Belden books, Nancy Drew, Little house, The Borrower's, The House with A Clock in It's Walls. I just loved and still love books.
never did play with her much.
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