Even as I type this I still find it hard to believe that Moomin will be a year old at the end of this month.  A whole year old.  How?!  It's cruel how quickly time slips through our fingers, I can still remember going into labour to birth her.

As she's our fourth baby, she already has a toy shop worth of toys that were once her siblings as well as token additions just for her.  Advertisements, shops and catalogues are near exploding with noisy, shiny things that she absolutely needs, apparently.

She can't talk yet, what with her being 11 months old and nor can she write her own birthday list.

What would she want though if she could tell us?  It's not hard to work out, all it takes is an exercise in observation.

So I present to you, the birthday list of what a one year old really wants to play with:

The epic toys your parents bought you

So following on from The Things My Parents Never Bought Me post, as promised, I feel it's only fair that I follow it up with some of the things they did buy me, you know, just to prove they weren't insufferably mean and intolerably ghastly humans.  Well not all the time anyway.....

I present to you some of the life fulfilling toys, if only for a few seconds after opening, that The Parents bought me as a child.

1. My Child

I'm sure if you were a girl child of the 1980s you'll remember these.  I still remember going to Toys R Us to choose mine, being faced with a vast wall of them, all apparently different.  The idea was you chose one that looked just like you.  I chose one with dark golden blonde hair and blue-green eyes.  She was mine, all mine.  My own special, mini-me.  Her skin was a peachy soft felt, her nose button-like...she even had a belly button.  I named her Victoria, yet always called her Vicky.

She was one of the few dolls to survive many of The Mothers cruel toy culls, and upon rescuing her from the loft, Thing Two instantly fell in love with her and adopted her.  So, nearly 28 years after I adopted her from the toy shop, she's still being loved by a new generation, by my true walking talking mini-me.

2. Lights Alive

 One of my favourate toys, ever.  One of the few toys that lived up to the expectations the adverts created.  I got it one Christmas and it was solely responsible for my survival of the lengthy across the country Christmas jaunt to visit The Relatives.  There was just something so magical about the lights.  Unlike my Etch A Sketch which was just an early lesson in how futile, pointless and bloody annoying life can be.  I still remember the day, many moons ago, when I found it in the garage with the battery compartment completely annihilated by a battery leak.  I should have been far too old to care yet I was still traumatised by the sight.

3. My little blue trike

Okay so mine wasn't red and nor did it have a basket but you get the idea.  I had a shiny blue metal trike (none of that plastic crap we get these days).  It was epic, man. My first real wheels (If you don't count the plastic blue ride-on rabbit thing).  My freeeeeedom.  I even remember the Tony The Tiger sticker I had on the front of it.  It was beautiful. I remember as soon as we moved to Essex in 1984, I pounced on the removal trucks and demanded my trike.  I sat proud at the top of our new driveway and wheeeeee.  Splat.  Ouch. Well, the drive was long enough to easily fit about 4 cars length ways and two across and was a hill.

4. My Little Pony Dream Castle

I only ever had about three ponies (and some baby quads, they were twins but I got two sets one Christmas.  They came in a pony pram and everything...) but it didn't matter because I had The Castle so, in your face suckers!.

5. Big yellow Teapot.

Possibly one of my absolute favourate toys. Ever.  I played with this endlessly. I dreamed of my own kids playing with this only to be heartbroken when The Husband rescued it from The Parents loft (along with a dead squirrel, called Rigor) to find that all the pieces were missing.  All of them.  Never would my children experience the joy of the lifty uppy twirly merry go round as you lifted the lid up (it was now jammed)


6. Keypers

These were just one of the things you simply had to have.  It's not even like anybody ever played with them, that much.  All my friends seemed to get the swan, I got Tango (and one of the rubbery baby ones, a penguin) Oh and yes, I still have them and they're in near mint condition.

7. Go For It!

One of my favourate board games ever.  Why?  Simply because The Parents messed up.  It was on The Brothers Christmas list yet they mistakenly bought it for me instead. Ha! 

I could add to this list all day, the more I write...the more I remember.

So, what were your favourate childhood toys?

Things your parents never bought you

Do you remember when you was a child those things that you nagged and begged for yet never got?   You asked at Christmas and Birthdays and everybody else had them, except you.  Do you remember how mad you were at the sheer and utter unfairness of it all?  How completely and absurdly mean your parents were?  The absolute injustice of it all?  Well, here are five of the things that spring to my mind when I think of the things my parents never bought me....

1. Mr Frosty

I wanted one of these badly.  I still to this day haven't been given an actual reason from The Parents as to why they never ever got me one despite me pleading.  Bastards.


2. Cabbage Patch Doll

These were all the rage in the 80's.  Everyone was getting them.  Everyone except me that is.  Why?  The Mother refused to be me one purely because they were, in her opinion, too hideously ugly.  Which is odd seeing as it wasn't for her.

3. Hocky boots

My Google-Fu for an image is failing me here.  I had the mandatory roller boots, hell despite being somewhat terrified of them I even had a roller-disco birthday party one year yet when all the cool kids upgraded their roller boots to chunky Hockey Boots, I wasn't allowed any.  It was so unfair.

4. Scooter

I adored my bike (which I rode until my knees were over the handlebars as The Mother hates bikes and refused to ever let me have another) yet these BMX-style scooters were incredibly popular and very cool.  Did I get one?  Did I heck as like.

5. boy doll

A neighbour had two Zapf baby dolls, I think she called them Susan and Daniel. Not only were they twins but one was a boy! Oh how I  lusted after those dolls, yet I never ever had a boy doll.  The woe, the woe! I tell you.  It was unbearable.

Now don't get me wrong, there were plenty of things I did get, perhaps my next post will highlight some of my favourate childhood toys.  For now though, I'll wallow in the corner and indulge in some true emo-ness over the things I never had.

So, cast your mind back to your childhood.  What toys did you really want yet never got?

Bargain hunting (retail therapy on a budget)

There is sometimes an element of snobbery when it comes to pound shops with a certain stigma attached to them yet what can I say? I'm a commoner, a mere peasant if you like and quite frankly you can't beat the feeling of coming out of a shop with a bag full of goodies having spent less than a tenner. I know, I know I have somewhat exaggerated using bloggers license as I'm sure other things could rather beat that feeling (why hello Mr Northman.....) yet the fact remains, to many of us shopping is a good temporary boost for the blue and surely we all love a bargain.

There are variations in pound shops such as those that lure you in under the assumption everything is a pound when actually they're not then there are the ones where actually, everything is a pound.  The latter can be further split into two groups, do keep up I absolutely understand the sheer marvel you are experiencing whilst learning about the technicalities of pound shops. There are those that are cramped squalid places where it's every bugger for themselves as you navigate around aisle hoggers and general numpties with a death grip on your spawn so as not to lose them in the sea of fuckmuppets all scrabbling at cramped shelves knocking the unsuspecting workfare victims flying as they literally devour the shop from the inside out. These places are usually dimly lit in some unsavoury piss colour lighting adding to the general sense of claustrophobia.  By the time you exit you feel like a suffocated Ninja.  Now don't get me wrong all these places sell their fair share of utter tat and to be frightfully honest absolute junk yet often if you persevere you'll find some gems.  Yet the other group of pound shops realise that just because their stock is cheap, the shop doesn't have to look like the exploded contents of a whores handbag.  These places are brighter lit, slightly airier, easier to navigate and for some unfathomable reason, not as busy.  Bloody marvellous!

I visited one such place last week and as you can see from the picture came out with a 45 piece jigsaw, glider planes, lacing animal cards and a rather retro noisy stick thing for The Toddler, two packs of grow your own cat grass for The Felines, a make your own fairy home and fairies for Thing Two and a (not pictured) giant glider plane for Thing One for the tremendously grand total of eight pounds.  Even better is that the jigsaw is actually rather good, we should know as we do after-all own about eight of these ones and they sell on eBay for nearly a fiver.  Ditto with the lacing cards, lovely, vibrant and quite decent quality.  In fact we also procured our bargain bird houses to paint from here too previously (not to mention oodles of paper, colouring books, a toy telescope, pens, felt tips, cat toys, hair clips and slides etc)

In an unaffordable world, it's sometimes terribly refreshing to get some actual value for our money.

Does Pink Stink?

Just curious really but what do people think about the 'Pink Stinks' campaign?

"Parents are being urged to boycott shops selling pink toys and gifts by a campaign group.
Pinkstinks says the "pinkification" of little girls causes them to choose less challenging careers and pass up opportunities as they grow up." - http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/8402628.stm

Personally I'm not exactly pro it.  I believe there's a place for pink.  Thing Two adores pink, but she also like yellow, lilac, blue etc.  She lives in a pink room, pink walls, pink carpet, pink bedding, pink blind.  Her favourite colours are Orange and pink.  I often let her choose her own things and sometimes she loves pink and other times she doesn't.  For instance she recently chose two dresses one being super pink with brown dots and the other being turquoise, brown, red and white....so quite a bit different...she could have chosen two pink ones she could have chosen two none pink ones...the choice was hers.  I think that is important.... 'choice'.  Many mums who have a lil girl like pink clothes and pink bedding and to an extent sometimes pink buggies, as my first was Thing One when I had Thing Two I loved being able to buy pink because even though there's nothing stopping you, pink isn't generally a colour you buy for boys or one boys would often choose.   Yet girls can happily wear pale blues and pinks.

Many girls naturally gravitate towards pink fluffy girly things and in all honesty, what is the harm, as in really?  Pink is a fun, happy and often innocent colour.  Is there an issue with girls being girly?  Does it make them into doormats? Does it encourage them to fulfil a pretty and submissive gender role?  No.  Thing Two loves pink....and cars...and heavy metal (& dead things). She's diverse.

To a child a colour is just that, a colour.  Any symbolism and connotations attached to it are purely manufactured by adult minds and then impressed upon children.

Saying that as a kid i hated pink, red was my fave colour.

The thing that irks me however is unnecessary pinking of things.  If you look in say the Argos catalogue now you will see a baby gym...then a pink one.  A push-along walker...........and a pink one.  A bouncy chair............and a pink one.  THIS in my opinion is unnecessary.  I mean seriously the usual ones are bright, cheerful, unisex and great.  I think it's unnecessary to foist pink on things that don't need it but there's nothing wrong with having specific pink stuff. There isn't however a blue walker for instance, so it would seem the manufacturers deem the child friendly (unisex) one for boys?  There isn't a need to replicate it in pink with the only purpose of it being to market it towards girls who quite frankly are far too young to care.

 So what if a little girl adores fairies and princesses...... it's childhood. Why shouldn't she?  Why should we dictate what our children can and can't and even should and shouldn't like when it comes to something like colour? What's wrong with just letting them decide?  So what if a little girl likes pink and dolls and fairy wings...and likewise so what if she prefers a firemen costume and bob the builder toys.

On the other extreme you get people like The Grandad who is appalled by the notion of boys and pink.  He has some unfathomable issue with Thing One hugging or kissing him as he's apparently too old for that.  Thing One is seven, The Grandad has been trying to get Thing One to shake his hand instead for several years.  He also had issues with The Toddler having a penchant for dressing up in Thing Two's high heeled play shoes, tutu's and pink roller skates.  However, it's interesting to note that he's never had an issue with Thing Two liking cars.

I think sometimes parents try too hard to conform to stereotypes and likewise some try too hard to navigate their children away from them.  Is either right?  Aren't both..technically a form of dictatorship and the parent pressing their beliefs on their child?  Where's the room for child choice and organic growth?  Is the sexism in the pink or actually within the anti-pink?

Labels, stereotypes and connotations are adult concepts.  An item, object or colour only has as much meaning as you invest into it.  A cross to a christian is symbolic, a cross to an atheist might just be another shape.  Pink is just that...a colour....a child knows not about any significance it has in later life and shaping a person, it is the adults around the child that has these ideas and imprints them upon children.   Is there anything that wrong with a girl wanting to be girly?  Should we encourage them all to wear dungers and wellies and spit through their teeth just to uncomform to archetypal femininity?

Let them wear pink i say (or blue, or yellow or purple or orange) A child is a sum of many parts, a colour alone will not make them (or break them)

I can't personally discriminate on colour alone.  I didn't let Thing Two have kiddie makeup sets until last christmas when she was 5 and asked for some.  We have rules as in she can only wear it once every so often and she can only wear it inside. I didn't let my son have a toy gun because I don't agree with what it is and what it's primary use is and we needed him to understand this, now he's seven he has a spud gun and a water gun.  Myself and my brothers played with them as children and we're not psycopaths or should I say i'm not, I can't vouch for them.  Surely depriving them of the above is inadvertantly infusing them with more negativity and issues. However, I cannot and will not deny a colour because of what it 'may' represent to 'some' people.

Unnecessary pinking.  We have the v-tech walker that we've had since Thing One and i find it ludicrous that you can buy the original...and a pink one.  Why? The first one wasn't all blue or anything!?  Thing One had a chunky elc garage and then Thing Two loved it and now The Toddler loves it.  They love it because it's a garage, it's green and red and orange.....i can't see how it being pink will improve it in any way other then stating 'this' is for girls, it's more about anti-boys then pro-girls which is absurd.

I didn't 'like' pink until my late teens and then it was only to confuse people because i was a goth and even whilst rebelling from convention i had to rebel within my none conformity,  or something.

Whilst Thing Two gravitates towards pinks and lilacs Thing One and The Toddler also naturally gravitate towards cars and dinosaurs.  All three of them have had access to cars, garages, kitchens, dolls, buggies, tools.  We encourage them to independently choose what they wish to play with.  Gender identity isn't always a negative thing.  An equal amount of caution should be applied to degenderising children.  Why shouldn't a boy be a boy and what exactly is wrong with a female being feminine, if they so choose?

Why is being a 'girl' so insulting?!" Exactly, I mean after all shouldn't we celebrate our femininity if we so choose?  Has it really come to a time were it's politically incorrect to be a girl?

Girls naturally like to emanate woman, and boys men.  Isn't this natural?  I'm sure there's been experiments with children in the past where they put them in rooms with boy/girl toys and despite liking them all girls do gravitate to girl toys and boys to boys, why is this wrong? is it really that it's just not 'preferable' for the parent?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JDjquwVArMg

Child of our Time experiment showing how all the girls preferred the taste of 'princess pop' even though it was exactly the same as 'rocket pop'

I especially hate it when we get people who try and take this to another level and make a political and social statement of their child and their parenting like dressing boys specifically in pinks and purples etc and buying them 'girls' toys not because the boy might actually ask for them but to prove a point and to exercise their rabid feminism when infact isn't this stripping the little boys of their gender identity too?  Shouldn't we let children gravitate naturally towards their chosen colours and toys? Why does it suddenly have to be a statement and about a wider issue?  Thing One hates pink but loves dolls prams (granted he 'drives' them lol) Thing Two loves pink and also adores cars / monster trucks / trains.....as well as dolls and ponies. 
Live and let live.  Childhood is far too short as it is, why not just enjoy it with them.


There really are much more pressing and potentially damaging issues then colour.

Children make no association with colour and their place in society, so maybe the problem is grown, cultivated and spread by adults making an issue where actually...there probably isn't one.
Let them make their own minds up and just let them 'be'.

Children learn by replication.  Some claim toy kitchens etc are sexist and encouraging children from an early age to conform to gender stereotyping.  Are they really though?  Or is it merely enabling a child to fulfil their need to replicate what they see in every day life and to identify with their parents? The Toddler simply adores his toy Dyson and as soon as The Husband gets the real one out, The Toddler rushes to get his and hoovers with him. 

I think there's a fine balance between over thinking our children's childhood and under thinking it both of which are guilty of the disintegration of childhood itself and the magic and innocence associated with it.