1) All of those things were big when I was a kid except Pogs, I think I missed that by a few years. He-man & She-ra were big, and micro machines, transformers, Popples, Pound Puppies, Kangaroo shoes, Nintendo power pad, Nike warm up suits, Care Bears, Michael Jackson Beat It! t-shirts and gloves, Strawberry Shortcake, and Garbage Pail Kids (I had a whole collection of cards).

2) Reading your comment made me feel like a kid again. I totally had all of those things, except the MJ t-shirt. But I did have Janet Jackson one!

3) Did anyone else have Construx, the little plastic beams and joints? I swear that toy stole at least a year of my life as a child.

4) Niki's list basically sums up my entire childhood! Big props for the Micro Machines reference. Those were teh bombz!!!1!1!

Let's see if I can come up with anything else to add: muscle men, charms (boys liked 'em too, right?), mini-sunglass pins, California Raisins, Ghostbusters anything, Back to the Future skateboards, friendship bracelets...

5) Ahhhh! Niki, my childhood was the same as yours. Don't forget Rainbow Bright and G.I. Joe. And 2 of my favorites:Jem and Voltron! For those of you who remember, Dave had a mint condition Voltron from his parents house that he threw in the trash last year. Oh, yeah, still bitter about that one.

6) I had a huge collection of pogs!!! I also have to admit that my mom has a trunk full of tons and tons of beanie babies...hehe i'm kind of embarassed by that now!

7) I have no idea what Pogs are, but ditto to Niki. We're the same age, so that makes sense. I was never a Garbage Pail Kids fan, myself, though.

Ethan got to snuggle Dave's old Pound Puppy the other day when we found ourselves at Grandma and Grandpa's with no Arf Arf. He loved it.

8) Yup pogs. 5th grade - I had a sweetass Pumba slammer!! I never knew how to play until someone told me in college (no, I didn't still keep up with them) but I have all of them (including about 100 ren and stimpy pogs) in my parents garage in a box.

Polly Pockets and Micro Machines went hand and hand at my house - my sister and I used the grout of the tile as the "roads" in polly pocket town (the little, choke-able Pollys, not the huge ones they have now). It was sweet!

Also...Cabbage Patch, for sure. And Water Babies....any one else have Water Babies?! (I loved those things...I had a water baby and a Baby Water Baby.)

That was fun...thanks K8

9) My hobby when I was a kid was to raise Endangered Wood Ducks for the SCWA South Carolina Waterfowl Association. My dad and I along with several SCWA field biologists collected 75% of the wild Wood Duck egg population from several hundred specialized nesting boxes in upstate South Carolina. I had four large incubators that I hatched the eggs in on a constant rotation every spring. I would raise the Wood Ducks in a special Brooder building that Dad built for me. I would keep them until them until late fall when their flight feathers would come in and then we released them in several different sites in SC. It was the greatest... and it really helped me develop my infatuation with animals.


Oh Yeah... I also loved Micro Machines.. and my sister still has about 9 Millian pogs in a box in storage.

10) Wow, Will, that's impressive. Nice going.

11) OK, so I'm totally older than all of you because my first "cool" toy was Romper Stompers, and I wore them while watching Romper Room. Yep, that was in the 60s! When I was about four-or-five years old, I loved my Spirograph; Santa brought it to my door, so it was uber special. After that, I only remember the usual stuff, like Barbie, Lego and such. I did have a rock tumbler around age 10, along with a Pet Rock and a Care Bear collection, which I still own.

12) I spent most of my childhood outside finding the most dangerous hills in the neighborhood and riding skateboards or bikes down them...and then falling and skinning my knees...or climbing trees or stuffing insects in my pockets. Mom used to have to bribe me to take off my pants to get the insects out of my pockets. THANKS MOM! Most of the dolls that were given to me ended up with a crew cut and no clothes. I remember liking pound puppies and I had a care bear or two. I traded garbage pail kids. I do remember having a sticker album and collecting charms for those charm necklaces....also jelly bracelets and jelly shoes. What was with all the jelly stuff?

13) OK, Angi, I'll make you feel better. I have to claim Howdy Doody!!

14) LEGOS!!!!!!

15) Anything Star Wars or Ghostbusters. I also loved my "Mighty Men and Monster Maker." It was the boy equivalent of "Fashion Plates."

16) Oh, also Pogo balls! I loved those as much as my skateboard.

17) My favorites were the Dr. Drill n Fill play doh thing, my eazy bake oven, that huge barbie head that you could put make up on and dye her hair pink or purple (I think her name was Candie), strawberry shortcake, Baby Alive, inchworm.

I've never heard of pogs. And I never had care bears, my little pony or rainbow brite--I think they were after my time.

18) Skip-it, anyone?!

19) Angi - I am with you on the things you mentioned - what is funny is my 3 year old has Romper Stompers! They still make them !

20) Oh man, I jumped on my Pogo ball until it went flat. That thing was awesome. A couple years ago I was a counsellor at camp and we had an ostacle course race. One of the things you had to do was bounce on a pogo ball down a bumpy dirt path. I was the only one who made it the whole way. Score!

I spent most of my childhood on the monkey bars, even in winter. Otherwise i had a care bear, cabbage patch and a couple of barbies, but I liked GI Joe better.

21) Skip it! haha! Awesome!

Did anyone else have a Glow Worm?

22) I didn't have one myself, but every once in awhile I get the song form the commercial for "My Buddy" and "Kid Sister" dolls stuck in my head.
-Betsy, I think everyone had a glow worm?

23) Paper dolls!! I loved cutting out the outfits. Did anyone else read Trixie Beldon mystery books? OMG....I lived for when the next one would come out, usually once a month.

24) I loved Trixie Belden. I don't know whether they were new or used, but I was probably reading them late 70s or early 80s.

25) Will that was an awesome project-my hats off to your Dad for getting you involved.
Spike, I held my breath when I read your response-oh now what is she going to reveal next??My favorite bug incident was when you were just a little over 2-you had these darling pink jeans on that had been your big sisters. Getting you in pink was a feat in itself. You came in the kitchen and announced ,"I have a Catawba in my pocket (caterpillar)t-I watched wth dred as you patted your catch and the pocket of your jeans turned a greenish brown.I tried to make you kids afraid of snakes because I am so phobic I was afraid you, yeah, especially you, would bring one in the house. I remember walking into your bunk room at camp Hanes-who was sleeping with a black snake in a an aquaarium at the head of their bed? My Sarah Beth of course!!
My toys-well most of you never heard of them-my favorite was Betsey McCall, McCall's magazine ran paper dolls every month and I haved all of them. One Christmas I got the real doll-which I still have. My Mom was always very stylish and she would give me her hand me downs. I loved her polka dot pop beads to play dressup. So thisisn't much longer I think I will blog about my favorite Christmas memory as a child.

26) Oh, I loved Christopher Pike books and RL Stine too. I also loved to play games on my Tandy computer from Radio Shack when I was in middle school.

27) I liked Choose Your own Adventure books and Nancy Drew or Hardy Boys.

I am laughing and crying at the caterpillar story! Laughing because it's funny and crying because it will be me. Natalie already tried to keep pet worms in her room. I found them petrified some months later.

28) So many memories! I loved all that stuff. Except the choose your own adventure books. I couldn't help but read the other pages to see if they were better than the path I chose. Ended up taking all the fun out of it. But pogo balls definitely rocked!

29) Dannie,
I thought Betsy McCall was great--I'm old enough to know what you are talking about. I remember carefully cutting her and the clothes with the tabs out of the magazine. I had a Tammy doll--a Barbie wannabe but with better (and more realistic!) measurements. She had a great sports car and suitcase/apartment with a cardboard bed (or maybe it was a closet). I inherited my sister's (Gigi) Barbie after I destroyed her perm by brushing it out. I always wanted a Lionel train set but never got one. One of my favorite toys was a parking garage/gas station (all metal with lovely sharp corners) with an elevator to get to the parking level. I think I wore it out. Mostly I remember games like Chutes and Ladders and Monopoly and Concentration. Oh, and Clue (Col. Mustard in the library with the rope!). Mostly we played with our imaginations. :)

30) Omigosh, Linda, you made me think of my Toni doll!! I'm quite sure we could give the dolls a real perm. How did that work?? I remember how much I loved to fix her hair and dress her up. I kept her in a little round red suitcase. And I truly remember the metal parking garage with the elevator!!! That goes way back!! I loved playing with that. I also remember playing with little blocks that were made of real stone. Very neat. And hours and hours of Monopoly and Clue (I still have my original game!) on the side porch. And getting soakers in the creek every day!

31) I was just reading some things and remember Candyland (yeah, still around) and Chatty Cathy (never had one but I had friends with one). My sister had a Betsy Wetsy. Was Toni the one with the hair that could be pulled out and put back to give her shorter or longer hair? I just looked up Tammy in eBay and saw 3 outfits I used to have as well as the vinyl case and car. I loved that car. Got a great clock toy once that allowed you to take it all apart and put it back together. Had one defect. When both hands would hit 12, the clock would explode and all the pieces would scatter (I'm surprised I never got injured!) to the wind. I think that's how I finally lost it--lost too many pieces. :)

32) No, Linda, Toni's hair couldn't be pulled out and put back. She had beautiful long dark hair and she came with curlers and we could actually give her a perm. (Hence the name Toni after the popular perm of the day.)

33) Just looked at one on eBay. Guess we never got into Toni at my house but she looks beautiful. :) Saw another site--remember spirograph?

34) Ahhh...I forgot about Betsy McCall. She had the coolest clothes

35) Colorforms too--loved those. I see they made a comeback.

36) Scratch 'N' Sniff stickers rocked.