Thursday, February 18, 2010

Childhood Memories

I find myself thinking about my childhood a lot, especially now that the responsibilities of an adult seem to weigh hard on me at times (as I am sure they do with everyone else). There are hundreds of things I can remember doing as a child that I loved, lots of toys and games and it was hard to narrow it down to just one thing....but Barbies were my favorite (yes I am that atypical girly-girl).

I could play Barbies for hours, days, months - alone or with friends and making up new stories for their lives daily. I remember I only had two Ken dolls so they always had to be shared among the girls. We would make them pregnant by stuffing their clothes full of tissues and my mom, as I recall, once caught me and a friend making our Barbies lay on one another naked. I'm sure that in a way she thought it was funny, but was probably disturbed as well. My Barbies lived exciting lives, they had a 3 story house with an elevator, a car with a working radio in the trunk, really cute clothes, pets and kids. In the summer I would take them all outside with their pool, rafts and surfboard and play - those times seemed to be the most fun. I would act out pretty much any life activity with my Barbies and let my imagination run wild. I know that these days people think that Barbies give girls self esteem issues but I still think they promote a certain level of creativity.

My Barbie house basically looked like this one but the elevator was white. It was filled with furniture (I even made a waterbed for them with a ziplock bag and some duct tape) and always the center of the drama. Not only did I like to play with Barbies, but in middle school I started collecting the special ones as well. For each big holiday my Aunt Kathy would buy me a Barbie and she did so till I was 18. Yeah, I have a lot of collections for those of you who have read about my glass and other various household collections. I don't have my Barbie collection here, its still at my parents house in my old room (I don't think Andrew would want a bunch of dolls in here). Most of them are the Holiday Barbies from various years along with some special anniversary dolls.

I'd say Barbies were probably my favorite thing from childhood, what were yours? I'm participating in Mama Kat's writers workshop this week - so get on over there and do the same!

Mama's Losin' It

11 comments:

Christy said...

I loved Barbies too! I totally had the three story house with the elevator, and the pink convertible caddilac. Now my daughter has some Princess barbies and she likes to make them 'nakey'. Its a bit disturbing, but funny too! thanks for sharing!

-coming from Mama Kat's

Anonymous said...

I loved my Barbies too. I only had 2 but that's more than some girls.
I was big into reading. I read every single Baby Sitter's Club book made. I could sit for hours and hours reading. Nerd!

No Longer 25 said...

I loved Barbies too and Cindys as well. We had a big house like that which my Dad added stuff too, it was great, hours of fun!
Jade

Cajoh said...

Stopping by from Mama Kat's…

I used to flatten the chests of my sister's Barbies does that count???

I used to play with Blocks and Playschool People (they used to be made of wood, but later were made of plastic). Had some mighty elaborate homes built as well.

Jessica said...

Barbies were definitely my thing, too! BUT, baby dolls were more my thing. I even once told my mother that I had a baby sister and we had to take her with us everywhere we went. I'm sure that to this day that's one of my mother's fondest memories of my childhood...NOT!

Jeanette said...

You're speaking my language girl. I L-O-V-E-D Barbies! Loved them! And my Ken dolls were quite the scoundrels too. They'd hop from bed to bed all night long while their poor wifies were sleeping (where do kids come up with stuff like that?) I never wanted to give Barbies up. I guess that's why my girls have WAY TOO MANY of them now. Love it!

Unknown said...

Ohh I loved Barbie, I had the wardrobe thing, the house , the car the whole 9 yards. I think we all have done the naked barbie thing lol. Came by from MamaKat's

Summer said...

I LOVED my barbies....too much I think. =) I would spend hours dressing them, doing their hair....so much fun.

Ahhhh, those were the days.

Anonymous said...

omigosh! My sisters and I had that exact Barbie house!! Wow, the memories of Barbie filled afternoons just came flooding back. Thanks so much!

Windthicket Fables said...

LOL- My cousins and i would always play with naked barbies and kens. They went skinny dippin' a lot. LOL.

I'm now following you- found you through mama kat.

♥ Kathy said...

Barbie was my FAVORITE!