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The Question
Gift giving doesn’t just happen at Christmas, but it is a rather key part of the whole Christmas celebration. Whether it was for Christmas, a birthday, or some other holiday or reason, my question for you this week is…
What gift that you received as a child still sticks out in your mind today? What made it so memorable?
There were a couple of things I wanted as a child but never got. They were a typewriter (my sister got one and hardly used it, but of course I was never allowed to touch it), a train set and Meccano.
Hubby bought me a train set last year, and as you can see it is up under the tree this year.
I wanted Meccano so that I could make those wonderful ferris wheels that worked, but ho hum, I was a girl, so they were all certain it was Lego I wanted, and thus what I got for the next 5 years or so for my birthday and Christmas. I made money boxes, so guess it was an introduction to my working life in banking.
I always wanted a Bride Doll. All my friends seemed to have one buried at the bottom of their toy boxes, but I wanted one that I could look at and admire, not necessarily play with.
Bro and his first wife bought me one, and she was beautiful. I sat her on my pink dressing table (hand painted by my Grandfather) and she was Queen of my bedroom. I carefully made sure she didn’t get dirty or damaged and would occasionally move her arms and legs into a different position.
I don’t know what happened to her. We moved in 1972 and things got packed away, many of which I never saw again, but I always remember the year I got my wish. Thanks Bro!
Photo: Bro and me fishing in NZ in 2010.
Not exactly a Bride Doll here, but this snapper sure did taste good, and I caught it!!
pensitivity101 
Aww, a doll makes the best present for a girl or a boy! Depends on who wants it.
The only ‘dolls’ the boys wanted were the He Man good guys and bad guys. I got together with their Mum and between the families, they both got the lot, including the castles!!
I remember those. I think my brother had that.
We were having dolly punch ups for months.
Oh wow
better than real black eyes……………
Yup!
I would have been mortified to have received a doll. How times change. I remember some younger boys in our road playing with the then novel “Action Man” and buying extra outfits – it was still dressing up a doll! 😝
Ken and Barbie have a lot to answer for! Mind you, I never had a Barbie or a Sindi, and actually never wanted one.
It was the Christmas when I was in 2nd grade (7 yrs old) and got a new bicycle. It was royal blue and was 26″ I was so small that I could barely reach the handle bars (I weighed 33 pounds or 2.3 stone). It took me nearly all the rest of the winter to master that monster but by summer I could hop on and go anywhere I wanted! It was freedom!
The year I received my bike I had a letter from Santa saying my gift was in the roof! I did a post on it, but it was the Bride Doll that came to my mind first this morning.
The year that I was getting married I happened to go to a friends house to babysit her son. On a shelf was a Barbie and she was wearing my wedding dress! It was almost identical! I made a comment and she told me to keep it. I still have it. I’m sure someday when I am gone it will end up in a pile of junk that no one wants. By then I guess I won’t care too much.
How lovely, and what a beautiful gift.
What lovely memories (although tinged with a bit of regret) Di! It’s rare that girls of our generation got ‘boy’ type toys, like building sets or tools (I always wanted some tools, and finally now I have my own set). The parents seemed to think we always wanted ‘girly’ gifts. I didn’t care for dolls much (past age 6) and preferred playing with my brothers’ Matchbox cars and tearing around on my bike. But inevitably at Christmas there’d be some perfume or scent or some piece of clothing that I didn’t care for and never wore. You’d think they’d have gotten the idea…. Hm. That Bride Doll must have been so precious! Too bad she disappeared… Do you still have the hand painted dressing table? That would have been valuable (in sentiment if nothing else) too!
No, the dressing table disappeared in the move too, as did the writing table my grandfather made for me when I started grammar school so that I had somewhere to do my homework. Happy memories though. Maybe if I’d had the typewriter I would have started the writing bug early!!
I live this post, especially the photos 💜
Thanks Willow
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