53 comments

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  pearl_mattenson

  7 months ago

  Great walk down memory lane. My first "purse"- blue patent leather wtih buckles! A little troll my dad had given me, and a patch I painstakingly sewed on to my jeans that had a moose and said, "Don't eat yellow snow!"
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  ellabobella

  7 months ago

  Light Bright. Troll Dolls. Fun Dip.
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  kerrymac

  7 months ago

  Fun DIp! I bought some for my boys last year and stuck it in their stockings and they were facinated. So much better than all those wierd sour spray sticks and other things they have now in plastic packages.
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  Jess

  7 months ago

  This bear I had that my mom bought to prevent me from hurting my head when I'd fall asleep in the shopping cart haha! His name was Mr. Bearly. He had been washed so many times that his plastic eyes melted a bit, but it kind of made it look like his eyes were sparkling :)
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  Kim

  7 months ago

  The things that make me the happiest are the ones that my grandmother gave to me. She gave me many things over the years; many teacups that I use and treasure. I have 3 small tea cups with roses on them, little girl size. We shared tea on many occasions. After she passed away my mother gave me her good set of dishes and silverware. Everytime I use them I remember her and my childhood.
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  textimage

  7 months ago

  45 records! I love(d) that little, yellow, swastika-esque mechanism you'd pop in the center to make it play on a regular record player. Also the picking out of each song and setting it up, again and again. Every three minutes jumping up and grabbing another. And then the fun my sister and I had dancing to the music of the 70's. I particularly remember making puppets our of brown paper lunch bags and having THEM sing and dance to the song: "You Make Me Feel Like Dancing (Gunna Dance the Night Away)".
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  Kristin_The_Goat

  7 months ago

  I'm totally back in the basement of my childhood house. I didn't make the puppets, but I had the 45's, the adapter, the dancing, the records and the sister lol Thanks for your description. I'll keep that all day :)
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  joannag

  7 months ago

  It's my most treasured photo and instantly takes me back to my happy childhood. My sister, brother, and I are standing on the sidewalk at our old house on a warm winter day. I'm wearing hand-me-down jeans that are literally roled up 6 inches, a dirty blue coat (that I remember fondly), stringy hair, and a ginormous smile. My sister has the perm of all perms. My brother is trying to look cool but is still young enough not to. And my dog Krispie (name after the cereal, naturally) is even there standing at attention. It's totally unplanned, unaffected, and just us being us. Forget those family portraits with the frilly dresses and forced smiles. I'll take my stringy hair any day.
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  Kristin_The_Goat

  7 months ago

  Whenever I hear the music that was on one of my K-Tel compilation records. Philadelphia Freedom, Baby Come Back (which has been temporarily ruined by the swiffer commercial), Get Down Tonight, Chevy Van, Shake your groove thing --- and Many More! I am instantly transported back to our 70's basement with yellow/gold shag carpeting. I used to sing into the end of a jump rope and hold the microphone cord with the other hand and dance and sing.
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  textimage

  7 months ago

  Shake Your Groove Thing! Ahhh! Thank YOU for reminding me about that song. So fun! My sister and I did our version of the Hustle to that one for sure. (And thanks for reminding me that the "mechanism" is called an adaptor.)
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  Kristin_The_Goat

  7 months ago

  This totally inspired a blog post for me. Thanks for starting me thinking about this. I finally found the album I was thinking of - Music Express produced by K-Tel. I'll have the post finished shortly. (that adapter thing -- One of the contestants on this seasons Survivor wears one around her neck. It was fresh on my mind lol)
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  Wazzy

  7 months ago

  My stickers, thanks for reminding me, Danielle! Especially the puffy Cabbage-Patch ones. I also have an old charm bracelet with all plastic charms that makes me smile. My babysitters club books. My Ramona Quimby books.
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  kerrymac

  7 months ago

  When I got my first puffy sticker out of a bubble gum machine I was thrilled! I put it on my banana seat and when I was riding my bike it fell off down a sewer grate. I cried and attempted to retrieve it with chewing gum for hours. It was a unicorn. My Mom was a big meanie for not taking me back to Zellers to score another. I was crushed.
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  Chantal

  7 months ago

  All the paint-by-number paintings that I spent hours working on and the antique set of Le Creuset pots & pans that my grandmother cooked in which I still use everyday.
  I just bought a pair of Candie's wooden clogs that remind me of a pair I used to wear as a kid - does this count?
  My "Hollywood" photo at age 3 - wearing a pink fur coat, knee high socks with black patten leather shoes, huge Jackie O sunglasses and carrying a beach ball. Where was I going and what was I thinking?
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  finola

  7 months ago

  Hot penny loaves heated up in the oven and dripping with butter after getting caught in the tropical rain playing outside with my sisters in the stony 'ravines' near our house that run only when it pours.
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  Linda Borland-Fitzgerald

  7 months ago

  Where was that tropical paradise? And what are hot, penny loaves?
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  Cindy - Creative Classic

  7 months ago

  When I see cartoons that I used to love on the cartoon network - "The Smurfs", "Thundercats", etc... When VH-1 plays the videos from the 70s and 80s.
  When I hear music that makes me think of certain phases of my life.
  When I see old movies that make me think of my childhood.
  I guess you can say that different forms of media take me back more than objects.
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  Krystall

  7 months ago

  Angel Wings - Buscha would bring them in between Christmas and New Years to celebrate, we have this tradition with our children now, only my dh stops at a specialty shop to purchase them.
  
  A deck of cards, my family is was into pinochle and the adults used to play while us kids got to hang out and spend some time together.
  
  my first bike, b/c I remember my dad following me on the bike and helping me learn to ride - I still love riding today...
  
  the scent of homemade bread/baked good, as it reminds me of being at home with my mother....
  
  For me it tends to be all things that have to do with the memory of time spent with my parents/grandparents, doing something and being together.
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  C

  7 months ago

  My childhood was the one you did not want to have. How ever, there was this story book I was given when I was 5, that I loved to read to my little sisters. Forty years later, one of my sisters found a reprint of that book and gave it to me as a Christmas gift. The memories of reading that story warm my heart and put a smile on my face.
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  pearl_mattenson

  7 months ago

  You just reminded me of my prized book: Mike Mulligan and the Steam Engine. I saved it and read it to myown kids (it is barely holding together now) but for some reason it meant so much to me....
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  Linda Borland-Fitzgerald

  7 months ago

  C,
  
  I had one of those childhoods too. The item I wrote about was also a book. It was from the best part of my childhood. It was only one year but it was the one in which I felt safe, loved and magical.. all because of one very, special teacher.
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  Danette

  7 months ago

  My Little Ponies. Pound Puppies. Glow-Worm. I just wanted a pet so bad.
  
  I don't know if this was their real name, but I had a whole set of "Sea Weeds", which were little plastic mermaids that came with their own sponge lily pad they could float in the bathtub with. They came with baby mermaids too. I LOVED mermaids. Still do.
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  Traci

  7 months ago

  Hahahahaha...I had the Sea Weeds, too! I forgot until just now. I remember I'd make a game out of "saving" them from the draining tub. I also had a very cool Care Bears soap dish in the shape of a cloud car that would float. God, I loved bath time!
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  sharon grace

  7 months ago

  i love my little ponies. i saw some in the store the other day and had to resist the temptation. i LOVE ursula on the little mermaid.
  
  "the men up there don't care a lot for chatter, they really think that gossip is a bore" "sing ARIEL, SING!" "sing. for. ME.!!!" BWWWWAHHH HAHAHAHAHA!
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  donna Frazier

  7 months ago

  My China tea service set which my aunt saved for me, ice skates and sleds. Hot chocolate on a witnery day always stirs up fun memories from my childhood.
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  Sara

  7 months ago

  WOW! My mork & mindy jeans w/ rainbow suspenders, strawberry shortcake, carebears & my big yellow plastic skate board :)
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  DanielleLaPorte

  7 months ago

  I really wanted those Mork & Mindy jeans. I had to get the gypsy jeans instead, with rollerskates embroidered on the back pockets. Not quite as cool.
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  kerrymac

  7 months ago

  Gypsy jeans were still darn cool! I also longed for the Jordache jeans with the horse head! We shopped at Biway and I was lucky if I found some look-a-likes. I did score a pair of pinstripped jeans once though with gold piping down the legs.
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  Meredith

  7 months ago

  My glam grandma had the most beautiful taste in jewellery. Even into her 80's she would not be seen without something sparkly. My favourite was a long gold chain with a dingle thingy at the end. I loved it when I was little. When she passed away, I inhereited her jewellery box and all the wonderful treasures inside that I loved so much growing up. They are worth millions to me because they make me smile and they remind me to of her spirit which was unapologetically G-L-A-M!
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  colleenoverman

  7 months ago

  Snoopy Snow Cone Machine! An amazing invention. Also just my huge collection of books. It is such a great memory that my mom used to take me to the bookstore and allow me to buy as many books as I wanted. Hooray for amazing mothers!
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  Celise

  7 months ago

  My copy of "Where the Sidewalk Ends" by Shel Silverstein that my parents gave to me. Also, there's a pic of me that I have hanging up in my office. It's black and white candid shot taken outside somewhere and I don't know remember how old I was, but I look pissed. LOL. I love that pic.
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  L'Tanya

  7 months ago

  When I was a teenager, I got my first stereo system and headphones. You know, the ones with the earpieces so big you could fit 10 iPods in them. I would close my door and it would be just me and Michael Jackson, Stevie Wonder, and Earth, Wind and Fire.
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  Elisabeth

  7 months ago

  The only thing I have from my childhood is a stuffed toy dragon that my favorite uncle gave me when I was 8. The dragon (named Dragophant after a kid's song by Ringo Starr) has lived on my bed ever since, and somehow my husband tolerates him! :D
  
  There is another item that I know from childhood though it wasn't really mine until just recently. I wear my mother's gold wedding band as my own. My mother passed 15 years ago, and my father kept her ring (and his) after he remarried. He passed them on when we married, and I treasure them. For me my mother's ring symbolizes two generations of love, partnership, and family, and warms my heart to see it on my hand.
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  K.

  7 months ago

  Muppet Babies!! I wish they would come out on DVD! I have nieces and nephews I want to share them with! Also: I have a stuffed toy dog that I have had since I was 2 that I still love to pieces. My Madonna Like A Virgin cassette tape. Choose Your Own Adventure books. Solid Gold (I wanted to be a Solid Gold dancer when I was little!) Three's Company, although at that age most of the humor went over my head. Roller skate night in elementary school. And I miss my dad's "streetlight" curfew in the summer: basically, we could play outside with our friends till the streetlight at the corner went on. One night it was broken -- what a dream!
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  Traci

  7 months ago

  Barbies. My sisters and I were so very creative with our Barbies. We would turn the entire basement into a Barbie mansion and our "story lines" would last us weeks and weeks. In the summer, the mansion moved to the deck, where the area under the built-in seats served as separate rooms, and the open floor was the grand ballroom. We were very melodramatic. I remember my Barbie trying to talk my sister's Barbie out of jumping off of her balcony over that jerk Ken. I think we watched too many soap operas!
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  kerrymac

  7 months ago

  I loved going to my friend Tammy's house as she had all the Barbie stuff, so awesome. I loved my Pretty in Pink Barbie. I also had a Darcy doll but she was a bit of an Amazon woman and couldn't fit in any normal clothes. She did have an awesome side ponytail though!
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  Constance

  7 months ago

  The tiny adorable transistor radios that my mom gave to my brother and me. All my saved for and excitedly awaited Nancy Drew books and the little glassed in library bookcase in our attic apartment when I was 12. Two gorgeous fancy dressed ceramic dolls in my grandma's livingroom. All my dolls like Betsy Wetsy and my big soft doll who attached to my feet so we could dance around. I also loved my paper dolls and my two imaginary friends Jean and Betty. Jacks and jumpropes, too.
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  Susie Hutchinson

  7 months ago

  TV, I have been a junkie for as long as I can remember: I'm with Danielle, Little House On The Prairie! Also, Laverne & Shirley, The Partridge Family, Welcome Back Kotter, All in the Family, Maude, Three’s Company, The Jeffersons, The Donny and Marie Show, The Sonny and Cher Show, The Carol Burnett Show, The Muppet Show, The Waltons, The Bionic Woman, and CHiPs.
  
  The ones I loved most were Love Boat and Fantasy Island, because my mum didn't work on Saturday, and she would buy a few boxes of Old Dutch (miss not caring about eating that crap as well), and all us girls would sit around and laugh our heads off together.
  
  My other fav was of course The Tonight Show! I have always been a night owl, and I used to stay up and watch it with my dad. He and I would watch it together, while everyone else was asleep.
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  DanielleLaPorte

  7 months ago

  You can tell you were a true fan of Erik Estrada - you spelled "CHiPs" correctly - small "i" makes you a fanatic.
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  Daniel Gibbons

  7 months ago

  It has to be my Mamod steam engine. A real, live working steam engine, complete with a boiler you had to fill with water and highly flammable / dangerous / exciting-for-a-small-boy tablets that, when ignited, heated the water and powered the engine along with steam.
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  Linda Borland-Fitzgerald

  7 months ago

  I had company all day and couldn't wait to answer this one. I knew immediately what my item is. You know how they say that what you are meant to do is always in your childhood - it's true, and I have one amazing story that illustrates that, but I digress.
  
  The one item from childhood that still makes me smile actually came up in conversation today...
  
  When I was 8 years old I had this incredible teacher. It was 1954 and Miss Mortimer taught us in a one room, rural schoolhouse. She's the reason I finally am writing. She inspired and encouraged me. The reading of my stories were always left for last and you could actually feel the anticipation as I made my way to the front of the class to read for them.
  
  But it was my entry for 'A Letter To Santa' that won me first prize. It was a shiny copy of "The Bobbsey Twins In The Country," addressed on the inside cover as follows: "Presented to Linda Borland as a prize for her letter to Santa." The book was lost along the way and I now scour flea markets, antique shops and second hand book stores, searching for that particular copy. Who knows, maybe the person reading this has tucked it away on a shelf somewhere? Now wouldn't that be ironic - and wonderful?
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  alligator_kate

  7 months ago

  In the Spring when I'm at my mother's house where I spent much of my childhood, if I go for a walk in the woods, when I pass by a certain pond I will get this poem in my head "four ducks on a pond, a grass bank beyond, a blue sky of spring, white clouds on the wing. What a little thing to remember for years, to remember with tears."
  I remember getting that poem by Joyce Kilmer (set to music by a boy I had a crush on, and Joyce Kilmer was the father of the founder of my elementary school) in my head whenever I passed that pond in the spring as a girl. I was a sap back then, and still am.
  No object does it to me.
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  sharon grace

  7 months ago

  there is no item but i had a husky that i adored. the best photo opp of my life was taken with that dog when i was six years old. i'm 52 now.
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  Jane Winkler

  7 months ago

  Wow, Danielle! That list is just about perfect. I would only add Avon Perfume Pins....
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  laurie_matthews

  7 months ago

  legos - v.c. andrews books - gingerbread houses - popsicles - free to be you and me.
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  Shea Fields

  7 months ago

  As a child I too grew up in the 70s, touching on the 80s. The things I remember with fondness include my roller skates (With 4 wheels), my Cougar boots, and Addidas runners. I also remember lots of play time with my Fisher Price castle, and people. Of course Holly Hobbie, and Barbie. I loved the Batman & Robin show, Pok A Dot Door, and Looney Tunes on Saturday mornings. I also remember Love's Baby Soft, but I loved the perfume. Growing up then seemed simple, less complicated, less stuff, therefore more to remember, maybe less is just easier to remember. It all brings warm, fuzzy memories.
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  Dazzle1969

  7 months ago

  My Partridge Family and Shaun Cassidy records, Avon collectible lipgloss (I had the hamburger, ice cream cone and big red lips), A Keane-esque print on my wall, and my litebrite and Duncan yo-yo's.
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  ChaseLisbeth

  7 months ago

  A copy of A Wrinkle in Time given to me by my sister - my first "big kid" book ever. The cover has fallen off, the pages are loose, and it's still one of my prized possessions.
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  fabuleuxparis

  7 months ago

  Barbie dolls and the handmade clothing from my Grandmother. Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys books.
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  Colleen Green

  7 months ago

  Nancy Drew was my favorite but I had to wait until my 3 older sisters read them first. I fondly remember my Susie Bakee oven, spirograph, white gloves and shiney shoes on Easter, Candyland, lincoln logs and my pogo stick. It's amazing to me how many of those toys are still popular-timeless.
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  Terry Fitzgerald

  7 months ago

  It's a little sad that I had to think so hard then ultimately my wife reminded me of some stuff. I used to get Mechano sets at Christmas every year when I was a pre teen. Actually as a sort of joke I still get a little set at Christmas.I liked building the different devices.
  I also got a chemistry set although I must admit I have no real interest in chemistry but there was something about all those little bottles and beakers and other nifty little tools that I loved. I did a few of the experiments.
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  writework

  7 months ago

  I don't have them anymore, but Ginny dolls from the 1950's. My best friend and I had a long-running game where they were fairy dolls, as in Rumer Godden's book The Fairy Doll. I do still have a copy of that book.
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  Cobby

  7 months ago

  I have the wooden spoon that my Baba used to cook with. It is now in my utensil crock in my kitchen, but the rule is that no one is allowed to use it. It's burnt crackled surface reminds me of the time I tried to make lemon meringue pie and burned the living daylights out of the filling. It reminds me of her cooking and the warmth of her kitchen. It reminds me of standing next to her, all underfoot, wanting to help and her being patient about finding ways to safely include me. It reminds me of the abandoned bunny rabbit we found and tried to keep alive by feeding it milk from an eye dropper and putting it in a little box in the oven on its lowest temperature to keep it warm. Despite having been a farm kid, she promised me that we'd take it to the vet in the morning if it made it through the night. It didn't make it, but the spoon reminds me of all her good intentions for me and of the person she was when she was with me. I hope I can be like her someday.
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