Today we’re talking something super fun: toys and games! Remember Slinkies and Twister? Battleship and Candy Land? Troll dolls? Or were you more of a Barbie and G. I. Joe kind of kid? Let us know what were your go-to amusements as a child, so we can all take a nostalgic walk down memory lane. (Extra points if you still have the toy or game!)

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Lisa Q. Mathews

As a virtual only child, I was a very busy doll and stuffie mom. Of course one can never choose a favorite child, so trust me that I loved them all (and yes, I still have some of them downstairs, why do you ask?) But the toys I spent the most time with were probably my weird dollhouses. One I think someone made, because the setup was…different. It had 2 floors, with access to outsiders via a liftable slanted roof. It opened to what I guess was a bedroom for everyone under the eaves. No bathroom, no kitchen (I added a plastic toilet and sink to the bedroom. The downstairs was a very formal living room, with a piano and velvet couch. The inhabitants were those little German figures with the adjustable ace bandage arms and legs. My other dollhouse was less formal: It was a plastic and vinyl trollhouse cave, carrycase. The molded furniture was the same garish colors as the rest of the cave: orange, brown, mustard and black. A smiling troll family lived there: a bride and groom and a tiny baby that originally went on a pencil. Oh, and some weird family black sheep, except he was bright red, with blazing orange eyes and a very soft tuft of pure-white hair. Oh yes, rest assured my childhood was perfectly normal. (My kids grew up with a tasteful Playmobil Victorian, complete with a ghost dragging a ball and chain on the roof.)

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 Ellen Byron

I always loved dolls, but one stands out in particular: Little Miss Echo. Not necessarily because she was a favorite, although she was. (I think my Madame Alexander Marmee doll earned top ranking on that score.) Little Miss Echo contained a recorder in her chest. Basically, she parroted back what you recorded into her. The reason she stands out is that one day, a friend and I got stuck in my bedroom closet. We were screaming like banshees to get out. My mother was downstairs with my friend’s mother and thought we were playing with Little Miss Echo and hit the ceiling with a broom to get us to shut up. The two moms finally came up and released us. (Turned out we weren’t stuck; there was just a weird knob in the closet we didn’t know how to use.)

I actually once ordered a Little Miss Echo off of eBay – don’t ask me why – but her recorder box didn’t work anymore, so I returned it. BTW, my Marmee doll had her own misadventure. (For those who didn’t read Little Women, Marmee is what the March sisters called their mother.) One of our dogs pulled off Marmee’s wig, rendering me hysterical. My wonderful parents took me into the city to the late-lamented New York Doll Hospital, where they attached a new wig. But for some reason, I chose one with two long, thick braids, so the doll became more Pocahantas than Marmee.

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Marla Cooper

Ummm, this is going to be one of those posts where I realize I had a weird childhood, isn’t it? I didn’t really play with toys or dolls much. I grew up riding horses and spent most of my time doing horse things. I also loved taking walks with my dogs. I vaguely remember a Fisher-Price farm that had little Fisher-Price people and animals, but I wouldn’t call it a favorite. The only thing that I really remember playing with was a board game that was a hand-me-down from my older siblings. It was called Kreskin ESP and it had different ways you could test your psychic abilities. Spoiler: I have none!

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Cynthia Kuhn

Mostly I was into reading books, but I do remember the Fisher-Price bus, car, and plane with the little people inside; Barbie, Skipper, Ken, Dawn, and friends (we lost all of their shoes immediately, without fail); a bunch of Breyer horses that we would set up all over the family room floor, and the Chrissie doll whose hair grew at the push of a button. Games we played over and over included Life, Masterpiece, Operation, Monopoly, and my favorite: Mystery Date! 

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Leslie Karst

I was obsessed with horses starting at around age four, and by the time I was in junior high school, I was the proud owner of a herd of some fifteen plastic Breyer horses. My best friend Nancy and I would play with them after school (she had her own herd) and make up all sorts of stories about their lives: the lead mare bringing the others out of the storm to the safety of the woods, the stallion saving the herd from a pack of wolves. You get the idea.

In about ninth grade, we even acted out the Shakespeare play we were studying at school–I think it was Julius Caesar–using the horses as the characters.

And yes, I still have every single one of them.

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Jennifer Chow

I had a slew of toys. We went through several rounds of Slinkies, both metal and plastic, but I kept stretching them out too much and breaking them! We also had classic toys like huge bouncing balls and marbles—in fact, I pulled out a set a few years back so my dad could play! With my brother, we often defaulted to green army soldiers and Hot Wheels. My own collector items included Troll dolls and a Barbie (once only; she was taken away from me when she somehow got dismembered). My favorite, though, was a My Little Pony. And as a family, we owned Monopoly. I lost every time, even with house rules, and that’s still the case today.

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Patricia Sargeant

When I was in elementary school, perhaps 6 or 7 years old, my parents bought me the biggest plush Winnie the Pooh I have ever seen in my life. It was almost as tall as I was. It was huge and soft and smelled wonderful. I talked with it, read to it and slept with it. Regarding sleeping with that toy, did I mention it was huge? It took up more space on my bed than I did. Ha! I loved that toy.

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Readers: What was your favorite toy or game as a child?