Ten Birthday Gifts I Loved

I’m grateful for every good day and I’m grateful for good memories.

This month has me contemplating back over the last forty years. ‘Cause truth be told, forty sounds like a loooooonnnnggg time, when you think about it. It really makes me giggle, because inside I don’t feel all that old, or grown up or nearly as wise and discerning as I’d like to be. AND I remember my parents turning forty. They turned seventy last year and it hit me rather hard. I love watching my kiddos grow up, but I don’t like my parents aging. I want what I want how I want it, thank-you very much. 😉 That isn’t how life works and I know God’s got it, and yes, I very much believe there’s so much beyond this life and the horizons we see wrapped around us. Praise God!

I’ve been caught up in a swirl of happy remembrances and I thought if I would post Ten on Tuesday posts four times in July it would give me forty memories or thoughts, which is, of course, just right for celebrating forty!

 

Here’s to my first list of ten!!

 

Ten Birthday Gifts that popped quickly into my memory from days of yore….. {because days of yore sounds funny and long ago and aged and wise} Ha!

 

1.  When I was eleven or twelve or thirteen….{my aged memory doesn’t work so well} I received a black Huffy ten-speed bike with pink handlebar covers and a pink seat and pink pedals. I’d long dreamed of having this bike and I L.O.V.E.D. it. SOMUCH. It had curved handlebars and you could lean over and clasp the curved edge or you could sit up tall and hang onto the handlebars from the top. We are talking OPTIONS. I adored it. My dad assembled the bike and I spent hours riding along our back country road or up and down our lane and around our property. Sometimes we’d bike around the block and occasionally my cousin and I would ride and meet in the middle and continue on to one of our houses to spend a few hours together.

2.  On my fifth birthday, my parents invited cousins and aunts and uncles and grandparents and they laid out a scavenger hunt for a couple of my birthday gifts. Now while I don’t honestly remember it in vivid detail, I DO remember the scavenger hunt and a whole passel of kids running from clue to clue. There was one in the mailbox. I remember that. And one in my parent’s closet. And in the old bathroom in the garage. And joyous of all, we discovered a pink trike just my size and a yellow and green little Tikes type wagon. I fell instantly in love with both. I plopped into the wagon and one of my older cousins pulled me around for the rest of the scavenger hunt. It was glorious! I loved the pink trike as much as I would later love my Huffy ten-speed. Apparently, I am all about pink when it comes to pedaling human-powered transport conveyances! 🙂

 

3. A car seat booster. Yes. One year I wanted a car seat booster to sit in when riding in the car. {I’m guessing I was five or six, but I could’ve been seven or eight} {I’m serious} This was in the days before all the seatbelt laws and requirements and car seat regulations. {remember….aged….turning forty….} {also, note, I am a bit on the nerdy, bookish side….awkward introvert…} {thus further explaining my choice as a child} 😉 I was always on the short side and the booster was wonderful! I could sit up and see out!!! AND it had this BEYOOTIFUL shiny, brown vinyl cover. It felt amazing to run your hands over it. Yes, at that age and time I really found it beautiful and amazing! Perspective is certainly a gift.

 

4. Sigmund Shane. If you’re of my era, I’m pretty sure you’ve guessed it. YES!!!! An all-the-craze Cabbage Patch Kid. He was adorable and I totally adopted him and loved him with all my heart. His curly, looped cinnamon brown hair. The little elephant applique on his trouser shorts. His cute smile. His adoption papers and big, rubbery shoes. What wasn’t to love?! I had several more Cabbage Patch dolls over the years, but Sigmund was my favorite. I eventually parted with the others, but Sigmund still resides in the dark corners of one of the closets in my house. My dad nicknamed him Gunther, whereupon a chain of reactions and eliciting of loud exclamations could be heard from Sigmund’s mother because she wasn’t fond of this nickname in the least! 🙂

5. This isn’t birthday specific, but every year my Grandma would give us a gift OR she would give us $40 cash if we didn’t have a gift item chosen. She always spent around $40 on us and it was a hefty amount to me. The years she gave me cash, I felt so rich with two crisp twenty-dollar bills to spend or save in my bank account!

6. Another gift adding absolute delight to my life was a bright, orange tubey float! I loved it. With every ounce of my being.  I loved the orange. I loved floating in it and jumping from the rung of our pool ladder and landing in the center of my delicious orange tubey. The bliss! It must have been delicious, because as fate and little brothers will have it, my poor tubey was destined for an end. One July afternoon, my little bro was captaining my orange inner tube. {I’m sure out of the goodness of my unselfish, big sister heart. 😉 A little sarcasm going on there.} Somehow the smoothness of the tubey and the lure of the orange compelled him to bite my poor tubey. And with serious enough effort to cause ultimate damage. Teeth marks!!! Holes!!! Air leaking!!! The demise of my gorgeous orange tubey! Oh, the bitterness and anguish of soul. I was not a happy, big sister. {No younger brothers were hurt in the making of this story.} {The same cannot be said for lovely, orange tubies.} {I did forgive him, but I was very sad.} {And I never had a tubey I loved as much as that one.} {I may be nerdy, but I AM committed.}

 

7. Honoria Diane. Yes. Another Cabbage Patch Kid. She stand out for two reasons. #1 She was a Cornsilk Kid with hair you could comb, versus yarn hair. Her hair was silky and auburn red and I loved running a brush through it. #2 We were in Kansas visiting my aunt and uncle over my birthday. {yes, close to where I now live} {who knew then???} {life is funny} We went shopping and I could choose my gift. I was elated! I deliberated long and hard between Miss Honoria Diane and a Cabbage Patch playpen for the baby dolls I was already mother too. The red hair and velvety purple dress won out. Plus, the brush packaged in the box beside her. And while I loved her fiercely, I didn’t love the name Honoria and opted to call her by her middle name. So, Diane she was! 

 

8. On my sixteenth birthday, I received a Fuji camera. I’d had an older camera of my Grandpa’s and I liked snapping pictures. I was thrilled to receive a nice camera of my very own. I’d load the film, take pictures, carefully package up the finished film, fill out my name and address on the envelope and slip it in the slot, sending it away for developing. Eagerly, I’d await pickup day and drive to town for my printed pictures. I’d walk up to the counter and politely ask for my prints, pay what I owed and then, enthusiastically tear open the seal to see my pictures! Oh, the anticipation! I love pictures still.

 

9. Another favorite of mine was a knitted purse with a little doll in it. It had a drawstring at the top, but the really cool thing was what you could do with it. You could turn the top down around the bottom and it became a cradle for the baby. I thought it was so cool! The baby had a knitted dress that matched the bag. Everything for a little girl to love!

10.  Books. I loved to read and imagine and my wishlists almost always had books on them. I read about Claudia and Stacey and Kristi and Dawn in the Baby-sitter Club books. I solved mysteries with Mandie. I trysted with Anne and met the Jimmy-Johns along with Jane in Jane of Lantern Hill. I loved Betsy-Tacey and Tib. Baby Island was read and re-read and re-read again. I read Spunky’s Diary and A Cote of Many Colors. I collected Family Circus books and loved them dearly. The Bobbsey Twins and the Happy Hollisters both were eagerly read. I read Star of Light and The Little House in the Big Woods. Summer days are good reading days!

 

I’d love to hear about any birthday gifts you especially treasured and remember! 

 

Copyright secured by Digiprove © 2018