Now that I have flashbacked to the 90s, which really was not that long ago, it’s high time I flashback to the 80’s. I am definitely a child of the 80s since I was born in 1980. So many things remain in my memories that there is no way possible I could include all of them here, but I will do my best. Join me in the fun and tell me what you remember.
Television:
Unlike kids these days, T.V. was not my main source of joy. I loved to play outside in the front yard with my little brother. We were really good at going outside and staying out there for quite a while. My brother and I loved to ride our bikes up and down the block, down to the high school, we played wall ball up against our garage door, and we even played mini-baseball in our front yard into our neighbor’s front yard when no one lived there. I still do not know how we did not break any windows. Anyway, back to T.V. We did watch some T.V. and I did have my favorites. Being a girl who grew up with 2 brothers and zero sisters, I was a little bit of a tomboy (when I look back). I liked to watch Dukes of Hazzard with my cousin, Travis. I was a fan of the blonde brother and did like Daisy quite a bit. My dad used to let me watch Magnum P.I. with him too. I loved the helicopter, getting to see parts of Hawaii and I loved the part where it showed the hula dancers in the opening credits. When are they going to make a movie out that show? One of my all time favs was Silver Spoons. What young girl in the 80s didn’t swoon over Ricky Schroeder?…who by the way is not good looking at all any more. He’s on some T.V. crime/cop show now a days and did not age well. Plus, he had that miniature train that ran through his house that I badly wanted to ride on…the one at the San Diego Zoo had to substitute for my own version.
There were the all time greats like Charles and Charge (I loved that Charles had that cool bed that folded down from the wall), Out of this World (I bought one of those hand chairs a few years ago that I keep in my classroom all b/c of that show), Small Wonder - you know, the one with the dad that built a girl robot b/c they couldn’t have a daughter, she had on a red and white dress in every episode, and who the heck can’t forget Punky Brewster? That girl was my idol. I loved her bedroom that she painted, the wheelbarrow bed, her awesome dog, Cherry her best friend, and the fact that she had the most colorful and odd fashion sense. She was like the equivalent of Pippi Longstocking to me. Alf was pretty freakin’ awesome too, I remember being super excited to get an Alf chef puppet at McDonald’s when I was a kid. I took it to school with me and loved it to death. I tried to buy one on ebay a few years ago but did not feel like battling some of the crazies willing to pay more than $20 for him.
Children’s Shows and Cartoons:
Remembering all those shows makes me realize, maybe I did watch more T.V. than I realized. The difference between T.V. then and now, it was more appropriate for kids to watch shows than it is now. There is so much rubbish and garbage they try to put on for kids these days. Not to mention, putting shows on late now a days does not keep them from watching them. Just ask my students what their favorites are and the age bracket they are watching for will astound you. Geez, back to the topic again…I keep doing that.
Where do I start with my favorite cartoons? Again, let me remind you that I was a sort of a tomboy. I really loved He-Man, which later was joined by She-ra. I had so many of the figurines. Carebears and Strawberry Shortcake had to be my all time favorites though. My room was decorated to the nine in Carebears. In fact my childhood nicknames (and still as an adult) center around those two shows. I was obsessed you could say.
I would have to fall off the face of the planet if I did not include Thundercats (Thundercats Ho!) or Transformers. I truly loved Voltron as well, especially the fact that they had a girl character in that cartoon that was just as tough as the boys, even the short little guy with a squeaky voice.
I can’t believe I almost moved on to the next category without mentioning the coolest chick in cartoon land, Jem! I wanted so badly to have earrings I could press on and turn into a rockstar with a cute boyfriend, slammin’ hair, and makeup. To the Misfits with the green ugly hair, I say boo! In fact, I could actually do a whole separate post on 80’s cartoons that I loved. But I won’t because this is hard enough as it is.
I really loved the Get-along Gang too. In fact, my parents have a picture of me in my Dotty on rollerskates (the dog) outfit some where in our albums back at home. I thoroughly enjoyed all the cartoons that had wacky animals and weird creatures like the Wuzzles…they were these characters that were half of one animal and half of another. Butterbear was my favorite…half bear and half butterfly. From what I can recall, my brother’s favorite was Bumblelion (half bumblebee half lion) or Eleroo (half elephant half kangaroo). The shirt tails was another cartoon that consisted of woodland creatrues. But these guys wore shirts that had these messages that would appear…almost Carebearesque, just on shirts. I still have Kevin’s blanket folded up on the guest bedroom in our house and my Carebear blanket happens to be folded up in one of the closets as well. Not to be forgotten as some of the best cartoons out there that rival those of today are the Smurfs and the Snorks. Again…what was with the weird creatures featured in cartoons? Maybe that’s what made them so awesome?
I was just about to move on to toys when I realized I almost rudely forgot about my all time favorite kids show. The one I would wake up on Saturday mornings, nice and early, to watch. You guessed it (or maybe you didn’t), PeeWee’s Playhouse!!!!! He might be a little strange and got caught for doing bad things at an adult cinema, but that didn’t stop me from loving him as a kid. Just like 90210, some day I want to own all the episodes on DVD.
Toys:
I am curious to know how many people remember the Popples (I still have my childhood Popples sleeping bag) and the Hugga Bunch were perfect because they even came with a tiny baby that almost served as their sidekicks in the cartoon and movie. Someone has to remember them out there some where. Plus, let’s not forget My Little Pony. I can’t believe they are coming back out with the toys. Cabbage Patch Kids were a neccessity for all little girls. The fact that they came with a birth certificate and that fun little tattoo on their butt was enough to make them the coolest toys out there. I liked it when they began coming out with preemies that had the little tiny teeth sticking out of the mouth. Pound Puppies and Kittens were amongst my favorites as well. I remember having a white cat that would come along every where with me. Carebears were beyond my favorite and I had many of them (I would still have them if it wasn’t for my mom giving them away…yes, mom I know you are going to read this and I always have to say this when I talk about my long lost furry friends). For some reason, they too had a tattoo on their butts, but theirs was on a red plastic heart. Another oddity of the 80s, toys with things on their butts.
I had eye surgery two separate times as a child and for one of those times, I was given one of my all time favorite toys aside from my Carebears and Rainbow Brite dolls. He was called Heart-to-Heart Bear. He was a regular teddy bear that wore a striped flannel nightgown and sleeping cap. But inside he had this beating heart. When you would squeeze him, his heart would beat. I still have it, but the heart doesn’t work as well. Was anyone lucky enough to have a Teddy Ruxpin? You know, the bear that you would put a tape in of one of his books and he would read it to you…his mouth even moved. I think my little brother had one. A friend at daycare had one and I remember we were playing with it and decided to feed him Cheezits as his mouth moved. Well…needless to say we broke it. Oops.
Movies:
We did not go to the movies a lot as a family. I think because it was expensive and probably because it was a pain in the toosh to take us kids to the movies and have to make us sit quietly next to each other long enough. But we did rent movies a lot and watch them. The first movie my mom says she took me to see was E.T. She says I cried at the end, but that she cannot figure out if it was because I was sad the movie was over or if it was that E.T. had died. I am also told that I had a severe crush on E.T. and wanted to marry him. That is what my older brother says…and he sometimes elaborates on real life, so we don’t know if that was true or not. I also remember my mom taking me to see the Pippi Longstocking movie in theatres. There was a news crew there and I remember getting a frisbee at the door. It was sooooo stinkin’ awesome b/c I just loved the T.V. show to death.
Before I even discovered Tori Spelling in 90210, I was a fan of Troop Beverly Hills. I still watch that movie these days and love it (even though it is definitely cheesier now that it was then). I loved Disney movies and one of my favorites was Chitty Chitty Bang Bang. The music was so fun to sing along to and for some odd reason I had a weird obsession with wanting a tiny little house like their grandpa had. Hmmmm, strange. As a typical child, I definitely liked to sit and watch the Disney cartoon movies as well. Lady and the Tramp seemed to be my favorite to watch over and over while my little brother always rented Robin Hood when we went to The Warehouse, every time. But I am also told that I liked Cinderella a lot and could not say it, but instead would say Cinadarella. Any time any of the above mentioned cartoons came out as movies I was alllll over them! Recently, I bought the DVD of Return to Oz as well because that was a favorite of mine. It scared the daylights out of me, but I still liked it. Weird little Fairuza Balk played Dorothy.
Clothes:
Since I was only a little kid during the 80’s, I did not know much about fashion. My mom dressed me, but I do remember liking many of the things I was forced to, I mean wore. There were the flourescent colored leggings and matching striped shirts that had ice cream and soda pictures on them. I had a flourescent greenish-yellow outfit like the one described. Since sleep overs were a huge thing as a kid I loved the Esleep pajamas that came in a little bag. They were seriously the most fashionable pajamas out there and well, nothing has ever topped them I don’t think. L.A. Gear shoes with the multi colored laces were popular too and they always had the glittery set that went with them. Who the heck needed that many laces?! Why did girls like to make their feet sweat and hurt by wearing 2-3 sets of socks that matched their outfit perfectly? It hurts to think back to the hard-as-rock-tall-as-a-skyscraper-bangs too. A girl at our school had to have been the champion of this. She used to get those things at least 8 inches in the air. God it looked so stupid. The girl wore them like that every day too. I for one was a huge fan of my charm necklace too. You know, the plastic chain that you could buy plastic charms for. I remember that I had a charm that was a toilet. The lid even opened on it. There was a whistle on mine too. I think a baby bottle charm was present as well. Thankfully, my parents have a picture of me in our albums of me wearing it at a birthday party after I received several more charms for it. I say this because I lost that necklace at a jewelry store in the Mira Mesa Mall. Jelly Shoes were one of my favorites! I think I had at least 2 pairs (which is a lot for a kid). I specifically remember losing one on the tall slide at Del Mar Fair. I watched it go down the slide and it was the funniest thing ever. I was able to buy 2 pairs in high school (green and clear) when they were back in style for a while…they looked more like mary jane sandals though. What was with the need to want to make feet sweat in the 80’s? Now designers like Isaac Mizrahi make them and are seriously selling them for a couple hundred dollars. Don’t believe me, look up jelly shoes on Zappos!
I think that is the conclusion to this flashback. Like my flashback to the 90s, let’s hear from you about your memories of any thing and every thing 80s. I was not a music fan then and so did not realize how great some of the music of the 80s was until maybe the late 90s when it was cool to listen to 80s music. So, you might have to help me out there. My idea of great were the Beach Boys and Michael Jackson.
What do you remember loving or even hating?
). Our elementary school is a fine arts school and we have brought authors out before. My old AP told me that it might be possible if we can figure out a way to have another school pay to have her come out so that it will not be as expensive and have her stay for two days or so. Cross your fingers that I can figure something out! I will crap my own pants if I can meet this amazing woman, teacher, and author!!!!
