Wednesday, October 26, 2011

A Dog Park Discovery

I know I pretty much only use this blog to talk about my dogs and my toys, but don't be deceived by this post's title - this one's about toys, not dogs (although, I will try to get a new post about the dogs up, as I took some adorable pictures of Piper and Munchie the other day).

On Monday, Jason and I took Munchie to play at the dog park. While we were down by the pond, I noticed something floating in the shallow water. Munchie went over and picked it up, so I had him hand it over and discovered this little guy:



Of course, at that point, it was dripping red mud. It's not a dog toy, and if someone brought it to the park as a dog toy, I would be sorely disappointed, because 1) it's tiny and could easily be swallowed by the large dogs at the park (we get a LOT of danes at our park), and 2) it's a beanbag - so the dogs that are too small to choke on it could rip it open and choke on the pellets inside. Not a good toy for a dog at all. Of course, the fact that I pitied the poor, muddy thing might have affected my decision to bring it home. ^.^

Once home, I scrubbed it up with soap and let it dry out. That's when Lizzie found it and claimed it as her own. We're still haven't picked a name yet, but I'm sure I'll find a good one soon. In the meantime, aren't these pictures of it with Lizzie cute?







So who knows how this tiny stuffie ended up at the dog park that day, but it's most certainly welcome in my toy room. Little, lost toys are always welcome in my room.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

McToys! Part Two

What's this? MORE McToy goodness? I think yes!



If you know me well, you know that my favorite movie Of All Time is Toy Story. I LOVE that movie (and its sequels!). This toy, if I remember correctly is a McToy from the original movie, circa 1995. It's actually a decent little pull-back car, really. I remember playing with it way back when it was a new toy. It's getting a pretty distinguished place of honor in my craft/toy room now. ^.^



I don't remember a story behind this toy, but Doug is the original emo kid of the nineties, so in a homage to awesome 90s Nickelodeon cartoons, I couldn't part with it. Big Smiles when I found this one (and a lot of humming the theme song!).



Pretty sure these guys came from McDonald's when I was very little. I didn't even know what they were when I was a kid! Never fear, though, I've grown into a moderately capable nerd-girl. Everybody needs a little Mario in their lives, after all.



I've always been a sucker for miniatures. I'm not sure why, I just love tiny plastic animals! I was a total dino nut when I was younger (and I still kind of am hehe), so the dinosaurs are just awesome. I remember that the pig used to belong to my farming Barbies (lol!). And I used to carry those little frogs around everywhere when I was about ten or eleven. I loved reptiles and amphibians! I don't even recognize the giraffe, but it's a pretty cool giraffe, so I suspect it'll find a place in my stop-motion when I get around to making it!



Oh, man. Where do I even begin with these? My sister and I were NOT car nuts. We didn't collect Hot Wheels obsessively. But we did, over the years, accumulate a few of these die cast cars. And while, yes, we did take them outside and play with them in the mud, we weren't technically playing "cars." No, these cars all had names and personalities, and the big cars were the parents while the tiny ones were the baby cars. Yes, we took perfectly awesome boy toys and turned them into something very girly. But I have very vivid memories of these cars, and still remember exactly which tree we would play under with them. Megan and I had a lot of fun with these, whether it was girly fun or not.



And lastly, the army men. I got these after my sister had stopped playing with toys, and they came to me through various second-hand means. I was never really into playing war or such, but given my love for Toy Story, seeing green army men always makes me smile. ^.^

Never fear, for these aren't nearly all of my McToys - I know I have at least one more box still left in storage to go through. I've culled a selection of them out to get rid of, but I still have these pictures as well as a healthy selection of others in my craft/toy room. I look forward to including them in future stop-motion video adventures, as opening the McToy Box always sends my imagination reeling, just as it did years ago. And I'm not going to lie, I still pick up a Happy Meal from time to time, so there's always the prospects of new characters being added along the way. ^.^

I've only just realized that I completely forgot to feature the McBarbie collection! No worries, though, I'm sure they'll find their way onto the blog soon enough. If there were ever McToys that we played with more than any other, it had to be the McBarbies. And seeing as I am STILL a huge Barbie fan (you never grow out of some things...), I think we all know we'll be seeing them around. ;)

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

McToys! Part One

I probably should have done this before our garage sale last weekend, but I finally sat down with several of the bins of old Happy Meal and other miscellaneous small toys and sorted them into the ones I wanted to keep and the ones I was willing to part with. Some of these toys are as old or older than I am, so it was quite the walk down memory lane! I've held on to these for ages, because (unlike a lot of kids), I actually played with them a fair amount. Lots of good memories were tucked away in those bins.

I've decided to show off a few of my favorite finds. These aren't necessarily the oldest or most valuable of the lot; they're just the ones that brought me the biggest smiles when I rediscovered them. ;)





Anyone remember these? These are actually from three different sets. The robots/dinos are from the late '80s and early '90s (I think), and the little spy cassette-player is from the mid '90s. What I love most about these, though, is that they make great props for my American Girls - LOL! You know me, always on the lookout for miniature items for my doll dioramas.



These got a BIG smile from me when I found them. ^.^ They aren't actually McToys. Back in the early to mid '90s, there were these stuffed animal "mothers" that had a velcro pocket in their bellies with these little beanbag babies inside. You didn't know how many babies you got until you opened the toy. They were quite popular at the time. If I remember correctly, my grandparents bought one each for my sister and I, letting us pick them out. Megan picked a bulldog, and I picked a pink and white cat. I'm actually pretty sure I still have them in storage! I remember that Megan was SO angry, because my cat came with more babies than her bulldog. But man, we had some good times with these little guys!



Disney! I don't know that all of these were McToys. I know that Bambi and Thumper were, but I'm not so sure about the others. These are totally going to decorate my craft room/toy room/office. ^.^ Ursula doesn't want to stick to the window very well, but I think I just need to clean the suction cup a bit.



Once I outgrew Barney as a kid, I was all about the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers. Trini (the yellow ranger) was my favorite, but I don't seem to have had her in McToy version. You can imagine my excitement when they did the run of Rower Rangers toys at McD. Some of these were the "special" toys that you had to buy extra at McDonald's. The larger action figure I think was bought from the toy store. I also have the red ranger action figure, but he's already locked in an epic battle with a Lego dragon in my room, so he couldn't make it to the photoshoot. ;)

Well, I have more pictures, but Blogger keeps trying to freeze Google Chrome. >=( So I guess they'll just have to wait for another day.