Category Archives: Vintage Childhood

Did you ever drink out of a jelly juice glass?

Things We Like, Vintage Childhood,

When I was a little girl, I remember going over to my Grandma’s house and fighting with my cousins over the little glass that had an image of a Tom & Jerry on it.  It was only later that I realized that it was a jelly juice jar once I read the words Welch’s Jelly on the bottom.

I think everyone has a memory of a jelly glass.  And it is great because you can still find them in thrift stores for a few dollars. Although of course some are a bit more expensive.

Jars specifically used for jelly have been around since the 1600s, but when jellies and jams were sold in grocery stores, the jars were the perfect size for little hands and were often reused for glasses.

Sometimes they just had designs and interesting shapes.

And some of the jars the images on them that were pretty cool too, like this cactus jelly jar.

Then in the fifties, companies started to put pretty yet neutral designs on their juice jars knowing they were being used again in households. Who wouldn’t want to buy a few extra jars of jelly to round out their collection?

And for your hobo style kitchen decor…

But it was Welch’s jelly company that really rocked it out, starting in 1953 with jelly jars featuring some of the most popular cartoon characters around.  Every few years they would launch another collection.  Like these below…

Could we talk about the awesomeness of Miss Piggy here…

Images: 1 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7

So, did you ever have one of these jars as a kiddo? Or as an adult? Do you collect them? What is or was your favorite?

Vintage Blowmold Holiday Decorations

Vintage Childhood, Vintage Toys + Fun Stuff

vintage blow mold snowman

According to Dotson family history, when I was a little girl, I begged my parents to buy a set of blow mold holiday candles that were taller than me.  After hours of begging, they finally gave in and I worshiped those blow mold beauties for years until I became too cool for them as a teenager.

FIE! Because I would kill to have those old blow mold candles back now for the Peach. Sigh!

Blow mold holiday decorations—those large plastic figurines that light up— have been around since the 1930s. They became super popular in the 1950s through 1970s until they were overtaken by other more popular, lighter options like the blow up decor that has become very popular over the past decade or so.

Personally, it is the old vintage blow molds that make me stop and smile when I see one as part of a holiday decorations around a house.

blow mold vintage santa
Image via: Vintage Roadside


Image via: Sosorosey

They actually came in all different sizes including some as small as six inches or so, which is perfect for the mantle.

Clearly, I’m not alone because they are now highly collectible and can garner hundreds of dollars per item.  And the best part is they still look awesome (albeit a bit sun faded at times) but will still make any kiddo around smile ear from ear!

Also, I want to go to there…

Oh, and would you look at this?

Even in the snow, I think blow mold decorations still look wonderful. And thank heavens for the invincibility of plastic that could handle the cold weather.

Image

Personally, I’ve always wanted one of these Christmas lanterns.  I could totally see it hanging from my lamp post! So charming!

What kiddo wouldn’t love to have this outside his or her door?


Image via: Niftic Vintage

I did buy some candy canes for our front yard from Target and hope to have them around for the next thirty Decembers. She gets so excited when we put them up! I hope she is still excited years from now.

Did you grow up with any blow mold holiday decor?  Do you use it today?

Today is TUESDAY! Tuesday Taylor

Vintage Childhood,

I can only imagine how tough all other toy companies had it when Mattel launched Barbie.  Well, Ideal Toy Company  had an idea.  And it was to make a Barbie-ish doll. But far far groovier for the seventies. Tuesday Taylor.

With a name like Tuesday Taylor, you had to kick ass. And she did.  This versatile lady entered the disco dolly scene in the mid seventies before burning in 1978. But for those few years, Tuesday owned the world.

Tuesday was a girl of  many styles. Being just a brunette wasn’t enough for Tuesday. No, no. Flip her scalp and BAM, Tuesday is a blonde.  Tuesday had blue eyes with rooted eyelashes for extra glamour which would allowed her to sashay right into Studio 54 in a hot second. But Ideal saw room for improvement introduced the world to Suntan Tuesday Taylor doll, who came with a sheet of suntan doodle stickers that when the doll was placed in the sun would give her a tattooed look. BECAUSE THE DOLL WOULD TAN IN THE SUN(!)

And it goes without saying that Tuesday had a KILLER wardrobe too! Gold lame and prairie skirts? But, of course!

All of that awesomeness needed a place to call her own.  Tuesday needed a place as versatile as her own scalp.

Behold, the beach cottage/ski chalet!

RIGHT?

And yes, Tuesday did have a pied a terre in the city, too. All the easier to hang out with Halston and Liza.

But of course she invited her fab friends over to her pad. Her boy Eric and gal pal Taylor Jones (who had her own two toned hair situation).

Oh, Tuesday, you are just like the seventies–always changing. According to Jewels Doll Castle, Ideal truly experimented with Tuesday   She noted:

“There was also a Beauty Queen Tuesday Taylor doll who is a great doll that has only blonde hair that does not change to brunette. She is a straight leg doll that comes dressed in an orange and yellow ribbon bathing suit with orange platform shoes. The platform shoes have magnets on the soles to attach to her round stand. The stand is just a circular metal disk that says Tuesday Taylor on it. Then the last edition of Tuesday Taylor was the Super Model with her Fashion Stepper. The Fashion Stepper allowed Tuesday to walk like the Walk Lively Barbie & Steffie dolls of the 70’s. She had blonde hair that is usually styled in a curlier hair style and, like the Beauty Queen doll, she does not have rooted eyelashes. The Super Model Tuesday also came in a black version but she was not named Taylor Jones as the previous black dolls had been.”

But, man, what a great ride it must have been for Tuesday and Ideal!

Pictures from Oh My Dolls, Jewels Doll Castle and Flickriver.com

Did you have this doll? Were you a Barbi fan?

 

 

MK Flashback:: Vintage Station Wagons

Vintage Childhood


Image via: Lennoxnehar

Before there was the mini-van, there was the station wagon. And all was right in the world.

For many people, summer brings back memories of family vacations, which for most people in America usually involved some time spent in a car and that car was usually a station wagon.

I remember trips to Cape Cod in the family station wagon.  Towing a fishing boat no less. All of the boys crammed into the middle seat and me all the way in the back seat with the cat and the cooler and my Raggedy Anne. I mean, really. If you looked at your family photo albums, I bet you probably have a photo somewhere in there that looks like this:


Images via: Station Wagon Forums and Lah Rah.

But before the station wagon became the family car that millions of teenagers learned to drive in and make out in the back of, it was more of a transportation vehicle for people traveling on trains in the thirties.  The modified back ends that made them “depot hacks” were necessary to carry large amounts of luggage – everyone traveled by train then, remember, and you needed a car that could comfortably carry people and large amounts of luggage from the train station to home–as opposed to a truck.


Image via: Traveling mamas.


Image via: Flickr user gem66

One of the most popular early station wagons pre-WW II was the Woodie. They were made with real wood–hence the name and harkened back to when people used wooden coaches to transport large groups of people. And they are gorgeous aren’t they?


Image: Akeem’s blog.


Image: Curbside Classic.


Image: Nihat’s blog.

But the real golden age of the station wagon was during the 1950s, when baby boomers’ parents needed something to travel on all those new highways in style! I love the ads the most! Every family had one! And the wood was replaced with steel although of course faux wood paneling was still popular for many years.


Image: 55 Classic Chevy


Image: Adclassix


Image: Forum.love-fords.org


Image via: Paulmanon

 

The sixties, we started to see more European versions, like this sweet Volvo.


Image via: Fontaine Maury.


Image via Flickr.

But the “wood paneling” stayed .. And the station wagons started to get smaller (think Pinto) but still were loved.


Image via: carsdirect.com

But the 80s were tough on the iconic gas guzzling station wagon and the mini-van pretty much signaled the death knell for these gorgeous cars, but that doesn’t mean we can’t still love them.  Vintage station wagons are still available and you can’t help but smile when you see one on the road and perhaps think back to your own childhood.


Image via: Striderv

But before I go, I must admit, I’m not just a fan of vintage station wagons, I’m a co-owner too!

We bought this sweet car the first year of our marriage with dreams of fixing it up and filling it with our kiddos for our own road trips.  And it is pink. How can you not love that? Right now it is getting more of a work out as the Peach’s playhouse, but we have dreams of future cross country trips in that beauty.

Here’s to future road trips!

 

 

Chairman of the Board :: Vintage CLUE

Best of Alix, Best of Modern Kiddo, Vintage Childhood, Vintage Toys + Fun Stuff


Meet my favorite board game. Clue. This charming lil “murder mystery” detective game is really one the whole family can get into. The premise? Someone has killed Mr. Boddy and you must deduce WHO DONE IT! Players get to choose from 6 different “characters” (aka suspects) and you travel around Mr. Boddy’s mansion, collecting clues. The ultimate goal is to figure out who was the murderer, in what room he (or she!) killed Mr. Boddy and with which weapon. Sounds grisly but I promise ya, it’s not at all! The feels a bit like an Agatha Christie Miss Marple mystery—and because it’s not scary, its great fun for kids. Over the years they’ve released several different versions of the Clue board game, with the graphics updating to reflect the design of the time.  We love it so00 much we have four different sets! You might recall we also took it camping with us.


image

Clue first got its start in 1944 in Birmingham, England when solicitor’s clerk Anthony E. Pratt filed a patent for a game called “Murder!”   It was eventually licensed to Waddingtons (in the UK ) and to Parker Brothers (in North America, where it was renamed it simply “Clue”). Pratt’s original game was slightly different from the version finally released in 1949. Originally he had ten characters who would become suspects and eleven mansion rooms as possibilities for the scene of the crime—including a gun room and cellar.  Most intriguingly he had nine murderous weapons, including such gems as the axe,  a syringe, poison and the mysterious shillelagh. (!!!!)

Let’s take a look at one is one of my favorite versions, the 1963 edition. Just look at the cute illustrations!

Cuuuuuuuuuuute, yes?? I bet Mr. Green did it. With the shillelagh. Hee.

But as cute as this is, I have to confess my REAL favorite is the one I grew up with. That’s THIS 1972 version. And oh ho ho, is it different. You don’t get the same charmingly sweet drawings, but this version has the added layer of mystery and drama by showcasing actual actors as the characters. And oooh the drama!

I mean, look at that mysterious spray of broken pearls!  The cream colored princess phone that’s off the hook (literally and figuratively).  Amazing! I love the design of this edition so much…

I was always Miss Scarlet….and I was verrrrry transfixed by The Lounge. And The Ballroom. And ze candlestick. We played this game alot growing up. I still can hear my favorite aunt, Tante Maria counting out her prediction in her cute German accent, “It vas Mista Green, in de conservatory….mit de leadpipe!” My Uncle Max was always sneaky and would try and spy on us to see which portion of the notepad we were marking off when we got our clues (top portion meant person, middle was weapons, bottom was rooms!).

I love to see how they have updated the game over the years. The latest versions I’m not too keen on, but just look at these two. SO MUCH FUN!

OK friends. Do you love Clue?? And did you know there was a CLUE movie? I haven’t seen it in years but I remember loving it. I wonder if it has stood the test of time….hmmm. Perhaps I will cozy up in the Lounge with my candlestick and a copy of it this weekend!