Toys We Yearned For.

Tressy

I had Tressy 'her hair grows', it did but was quite hard to style, and getting it back into the doll took ages.

Can’t think of any toys, TBH.
One thing I did most painfully yearn for was a puppy, but I knew that was never going to happen. ?

And in very early teens I dropped loads of hints about a particular 45 record (Telstar) for Christmas. They were only 6/8d but that never happened, either. Can’t remember what I got instead.

One present that has always stood out (birthday when I was 7) was 2 goldfish in a bowl, from my cousins. First pets I ever had.

One year I really wanted a pogo stick which was the craze then, as one of four children, money was tight and I didn’t get one. Then the craze ran its course but my parents must have saved up and got me one the following year even though no one was playing with them any more! I did appreciate the gift though as it was special and I played on it in the garden but not with my friends who had moved on to the next craze.

A Pink Witch bike! Our local cycle shop displayed the pink witch in the window and my sister and I would go and gaze at it yearningly. We never got it, though! It was a bright pink girls bike and very unusual in those days, the 1950s.

Tressy and Sindy never made the cut - DM didn't approve of "teenage" dolls. Nor of the pink plastic "glass" slippers, for health and safety reasons. I'm not sure why I didn't get the dalek costume - probably because it was rubbish and nothing like the exciting lifelike version exterminating people on the TV adverts. Or the shop-bought Beatles bag (for some reason the one I craved was tartan with fringing) - I did get a pretty good home-made version though.

Health and safety seemed to go out of the window the year I got a tin cooking range, which was powered by methylated spirits and lit by matches. I must have been 7. I absolutely loved it, and was so upset when it and all its little pots and pans rusted because I'd left it outside.

I was really really wanting to keep up with my friends who were gliding along the street in white boot skates I must have been 8 to 10 years old I asked mum and dad could I have some skates for Christmas and a few weeks before Christmas I found the hiding place and poked in to have a look I can still remember the huge disappointment as there was a pair of very basic metal skates that went over your shoes and had a key at the bottom so they could be extended When I got them I remember so clearly how my friends were gliding and I was clunking along

A similar thing happened to me BlueBelle.
I wanted some roller skates and the ones I got seemed to have some sort of limiter on the wheels, so that they never went really fast

NotTooOld I too wanted a Pink Witch bicycle (didn’t it have a lipstick stowed away on it somewhere?). I did get a bike eventually but not that one! Come to think of it, I don’t think I ever saw one outside of a cycle shop window, so maybe they didn’t sell very well. When I was a small child I wanted a Mobo horse that moved along when you pressed the “stirrups” down but my father said they were dangerous! . What did he expect it to do, I wondered? Throw me?

A puppy, always a puppy. Santa never came through, parents never came through but Orlin did the first year we were married. She was a yellow Labrador called Honey. She came to Australia with us and home again 14 years later. Is buried here on Anglesey at the nature reserve. Best Christmas EVER.

I had Tressy 'her hair grows', it did but was quite hard to style, and getting it back into the doll took ages.

I think I said on another thread somewhere that I cut my Tressy's hair off. Don't know if I expected it to grow again, or what ?

Okay so a puppy is not a toy.
I did always want a present my little sister didn’t get too. We had twin dolls, matching dolls prams, matching teddy bears, a dolls house between us, we were always dressed the same. When I was 14 and she was 11 I asked for a transistor radio, we got one between us, same with tape recorder and record player in the following years.
My Dad always bought me something different though, usually a toy car or a book. Made me feel more special and acknowledged my being older.

I love the story of your cooking range with little pans Maggiemaybe and your tale about Orlin buying you that puppy was sweet LauraNorder.

I too wanted a bike. We couldn’t afford it - any Christmas. I just stopped wishing.

My friend had Tressy, I was incredibly jealous, my parents didn’t really approve of those sort of dolls, I saved up and eventually bought myself Sindy.

I got a tressy doll loved her, but always wanted a bike but was told too dangerous, think it was more because they couldn’t afford one.

My main presents were always books, which I loved, plus of course, an annual. One year my brother had a Meccano set once, which I yearned for. He really wasn't bothered about it so I built a few models. I remember him playing with what I made though.

I wanted a bike but Mum thought they were dangerous. I was eventually promised one if I passed my eleven plus- I passed but then Mum decided a fountain pen would be a safer reward. It was a Parker and probably quite expensive at the time but I was so disappointed. I never did learn to ride a bike.

Oh I do feel your pain BlueBelle. I too wanted the boot skates though only had those that you describe. Mine were red plastic but just clunked along.
I did get a nice Petite typewriter one year. Thought I was going to be a journalist. Ha.

Calendargirl

Reading another thread about toys, how today’s children have too many, set me off thinking back to the toys we wanted but didn’t receive.

When I was about 6, sixty odd years ago, some shoes were advertised on tv, plastic ones with stiletto type heels, in a clear sort of colour. How I longed for these shoes from Santa! Needless to say, both Santa and my mum were in agreement, that such silly shoes would lead to a sprained ankle or worse.

Still think about them though. ?

I know those little Shoes, glitter plastic. I was lucky to get them for Christmas . Only lasted about half a day, the heel snapped off I was heartbroken. Even tho my Dad tried to fix them with glue, even tried heat from a hot Poker to melt them together he couldn't fix them.

I remember those roller skates Bluebelle. I had a pair also, they were from Woolworths I think, hard black plastic on the top.

Think they cost 19/11., just under £1. Yes, you could ‘extend’ them as your feet grew, but fed up with them by then,

Wonder what happened to my skates?

My best friends was given a beautiful sparkly turquoise bike for her birthday. I pleaded with mum and dad to have one for Christmas, a few months later.
Imagine my disappointment - I was given a bike but it was an ex postman’s bike which my grandad had painted blue ( supposed to be turquoise) . Bless his lovely heart. He’d really tried his best. I rode that bike all over but always behind my friend, yearning for her bike. ?

For some reason I wished for bagatelle. I wanted the real kind, wooden board and cue, silver balls.
Instead I opened a plastic pinball game worked with a spring. It broke before the end of the day.

My sister was given a pink witch bike. It was a bit embarrassing with its mirror and lipstick holder.
I got a sensible raleigh bike - much better.

Pink Witch - that reminds me of Edna O’Brien’s novel - The Country Girls, where the main character is so envious of her friend Baba’s Pink Witch, (‘She was my best friend and I hated her.’ ?).

I think they were made by Raleigh though, Grammaretto! The good old sixties, when much of what we bought was still made in the U.K.

For a few years I longed for a walking doll, kept gazing at them in newspaper adverts. I eventually got one for Christmas when I was 9, but was so disappointed that she couldn`t walk on her own, I had to hold her arm.