What gifts do you remember (childhood)?

[MrsJonesAndMe]

I have few memories of presents specifically:

• a barbie aged about 6 best thing ever
• a Snoopy handbag from granny, was his little house shaped with him on the top
• a bike at around 10

Yours??

Treble Recorder
One of those keyboard wind instruments
I Vant to Bite Your Finger game
Sindy stuff
Scrabble space invaders game
Acorn Electron

A Sunday caravan, and when you slid the blue roof off you could pretend it was a swimming pool! My DB got stretch Armstrong that year. That was a great year for presents!!! We always had amazing Christmasses but I never got Mr Frosty... As an adult I now understand why!!!

The Smurfs Go Pop tape,
a small toy stove & plastic saucepans,
A post office set,
Chocolate coins every single year
A Disney pram which must have costed my mum loads
A woolworths doll with brown eyes. I loved him

This. A toy hospital. I must have been about 8. I had pressed my nose against the toy shop window for weeks and it appeared at the foot of my bed on Christmas morning. I was ecstatic.

When I was 7, Santa brought my brother and I a wooden playhouse. After years of hand me downs and charity shop gifts (which we loved - didn’t realise until I was older how skint my parents were) my dad got a better job and they went to town. They must have gone to some lengths to build it and hide it until he big reveal on Christmas morning! I can still feel the absolute buzz and hear my families happy laughter as the curtains slowly opened, and there it was nestling magnificently in the corner of the garden. We spent many, many, many happy hours playing all sort of games and hosting friends in it, and when we were in our teens it was converted into and apartment block of sorts for our rabbits. It only went to the knackers yard a few years ago. I am going all misty eyed here... to think LOL dolls houses must cost the rough equivalent of what our playhouse did then - very slim chance of getting 20 years service out of those!

@ijustwantasofa my daughter got that exact Sindy bed last xmas for her barbie house. I bought loads of retro furniture off eBay. It even had he exact same cushions etc lol

My cabbage patch doll. Sounds weird but they always had a certain smell to them and a few years ago when they became popular again for a while I bought my dd one and loved smelling it cos it reminded me of Christmas

I had a Backwards Watch for my 11th Birthday. And I remember going into comp and saying "oh are you the girl with the backwards watch" and I was super chuffed

A blackboard and easel. Oh and a toboggan that my father made for me.

@AlexaAmbidextra You have made my day/week! I had that exact hospital and I absolutely loved it.

Hastingslikethebattle your post has really tugged at my heartstrings. I see loads of toy collections but nothing in the way of cash for older kids but I will look out for one. I hope Christmas is a bit more special for you now

Strangely I don't really remember Christmas mornings. I remember the excitement and lead up to it but my Christmas mornings are very vague.
My favourite toys were a ride on tractor, Lego, and Sindy and horse and caravan.

Dolls house at 3 (can't remember anything else that year and that memory is very faint.. no pictures so definitely not made up)
I remember at 4, waking up in the night and sneaking open a stocking present of a little plastic house, it was white with a pink door... and I felt very guilty so went back to sleep without opening any more.
Beano Annual. Something like a 50 year addition and it was bigger than usual and how I couldn't wait to read it.
A Were bear
A toy parrot that recorded your voice I'd been admiring from the market
Aladdin compact play set
Keyboard
Spice girls CD. Now 35.
Flat Eric
Bike
Baby G watch
Silver platform trainers from Tammy girl

I also remember getting knock off versions of my requests almost every year

Pogo stick

I remember asking for a remote control car wanting a really good one but my mum didn’t think girls should play with them so bought me a crappy pink Mini Cooper and forgot the batteries .
Also remember asking for a Mr Frosty and Mr Stretch for years but never got one because they were ‘rubbish’. Likewise wanted a chopper bike but didn’t get one, sigh.

Presents I did get and loved at the time:
Furby until we realised we couldn’t switch the fucker off so shoved it in a cupboard till it died .
Tamagotchi
A castle toy (I wanted a proper dolls house but that sufficed)
Diva stars doll, my poor dad drove two hours to get me the blonde doll because it was out of stock everywhere. Like Jingle all the way in real life , never would happen now with the internet.

I do remember getting heelys and a pogo stick but not using either because I just couldn’t figure them out .

A bike age 6 and a pair of navy velvet trousers age 11. Literally cannot remember anything else.

It's interesting that some of you say you can't remember anything/only a handful so presents can't be meaningful. I actually remember nearly all my presents, I just mentioned a selection. I remember stocking fillers from watches shaped like a frog, yoyos, what time the little spinning tops played, specific bubble bath, selection boxes and which annuals I got year to year. Maybe you just didn't get things you liked. Interfering to know if your pile was minimal or too big.

Not all in the same year obv, but these are presents I always remember:

A pink radio cassette player with Kylie and Jason's albums on tape to play on it.

Barbie Benetton.

The Sylvanian Families caravan with the badger family in it.

A tiny (maybe 6in?) doll with a soft body and a china face.

A little figurine of a pixie/elf woman that I put on my bedroom shelf.

Sindy Doll House (my parents were up till 3am building it apparently!), a polar bear glove puppet, new slippers every year and a cadbury's chocolate machine - you put 2p in and got a cadbury's minature dairy milk!

The best present was one my late grandparents bought - it was a cardboard box covered in wrapping paper and inside was lots of cookery items and a cook book which I still own - a stork ring binder one.

A mister frosty

I put that at the top of my Christmas list every frigging year for about ten years and never got it

I bought one for DC1 as soon as he was old enough for me to justify it - and it was a bit crap

But the present I remember loving the most was my cuddly womble

When I was little (in the 60s) we never had much money but one Christmas my parents got me a twin coach-style pram - on reflection, this was likely to have been second hand but it scrubbed up well!. My mum bought two identical dolls and made matching outfits for them, crocheted a lovely pram blanket and sewed matching frilly pillows. At the last moment on Christmas Eve my grandma popped a little packet of handkerchiefs into the pram. My parents were devastated the next day when I finally saw the present and shrieked "ooooh, hankies"

Battling tops
Frustration
A talking doll
Etch a sketch
My little pony

When I was about 8 a torch that fitted on your arm like a big watch and a toy machine where you put in 2p and got a small chocky.

When I was a bit older a blue faced sekonda watch with a fake blue suede strap. I felt so grown up! Still wish I had it.