When Toys Were Magical Without Being Pricey
Do you remember the first time you got the 64-pack of Crayolas? You'd gotten a box of two dozen crayons before. But this one had cornflower, goldenrod and sienna! There were five shades of yellow, and what's that in the back? A sharpener!I believe the 64 pack of Crayola crayons was usually on my list for Santa to bring me. Nothing made me happier than the smell of new crayons or drawing with the sharpened point of a new crayon. A few years before my grandmother died, she gave me her anniversary tin of Crayola crayons. Sometimes I like to open the tin and smell the crayons and a wonderful memories of my childhood envelopes me.
The article brought back fond memories of Christmas when my brothers, sisters and I were growing up. My dad would always go all out if he liked something. One Christmas he discovered the fun of building with Legos. That Christmas, the five of us regardless of whether we had listed Legos on our Christmas list or not, or whether we were teens or younger or whether we were girls or boys, we all received boxes and boxes of Legos.
I recall during that memorable Christmas my family and I had a great time building and creating with the simple little Lego blocks.
An earlier Christmas memory I have was of my Dad, ever a child at heart, created a magical Christmas scene for us with the old Lionel trains. He had a huge layout, or so it seemed to me as a little girl. I remember it having trees, people, villages and of course the locomotive train with the steam and the "toot-too".
Gosh, I wish children could experience the kind of Christmas we experienced as children not too long ago.
This year when our son had difficulty composing his wish list my husband and I turned to the old standbys...Monopoly and Scrabble. Okay, there was a tad of a selfish reason for me choosing these two particular games but I am sure he will have a grand time playing these classic board games as much as I will.
These old toys are what one reporter on Fox News referred to as "The comfort food of toys".
What is your favorite toy or memory of Christmas when you were a child?
2 comments:
Christmas memory:
My mother, as we got a little older, decided that less was more. Or rather, paying less meant we could have more. We just NEVER knew what "more" was going to be!
Mom stopped buying gifts before the week of Christmas because prices went down as stores tried to get the toys out before Christmas.
Then she stopped buying gifts until Christmas Eve. She'd go to Sears and Penneys, and get whatever she could find that had its price hacked into bits to get it out of the store THAT NIGHT. She'd even get managers and 'make offers' of impossibly lower prices and sometimes even got them. The downside was that usually the strangest things were left as all the popular toys and gift items were gone.
Some years the gifts were a little too odd - clocks with eyes, ball-shaped radios or very oddly shaped earring sets. But the best year was the year we got the half-sized pinball machine with all the bells & whistles and a light that really buzzed and lit up when the table was tilted! THAT was a great gift she bargained down to next-to-nothing price. She played it as much as my siblings and I did (and all our friends) did!
Mom hated Christmas shopping, but she loved getting bargains.
Shana, what a great memory! That must have been fun just waiting to see what Santa would bring you. Wow, I wish I had thought of that for Joey ;-) Thanks so much for sharing that Christmas memory.
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