Barbie I Still Love You!

As I was shopping at Target for a 5 year old girl’s birthday present, I found myself somewhat lost. Come to think of it, I never really put much thought into buying girl toys until we finally had a baby girl. So this turned out to be quite the adventure. As expected, the whole Barbie by Mattel aisle was hard to miss and so I was automatically drawn to the doll section. I said to myself, "this should be easy", I mean really, how hard can it get? I thought that I would just grab any Barbie and get out. But holy cow! I didn’t realize that there were so many different ones! All of the sudden I didn’t know what I wanted anymore. I was getting frustrated and almost about to walk away. And then, I found this! It is called “My House” Barbie. It has 50 pieces of home accessories and furniture you can actually move the house and furniture around to however you want. I saw stars twinkling around the box melodiously calling out my name like how it was called when I was 6 or 7 years old.

My heart melted and brought me back (way back) when I played with my own Barbie Dolls! Shucks…I forgot how much I really loved them. I still remember --- I have 11 Barbie dolls that I played with daily. My little sister and I carried all 11 dolls in a plastic shoe bin and we dressed and redressed them every single day. Everywhere we were, our imaginations were endless. We piled little blocks for Barbie's bed, and always attempted to make a home for Barbie out of boxes. A flood of memories kept pouring in. Really happy memories.

I even actually own that controversial Growing-Up Skipper (picture on the right)! For those of you that didn’t grow up in the 70s, Skipperhappens to be Barbie’s younger sister. Oh wait, maybe Skipper is still around? No? Anyway, the Growing-Up Skipper was a riot. You basically wind the arms backward and the torso gets longer and thinner, and the breast gets bigger too! I guess that it was such a hit that they followed up with Growing-Up Ginger (which I wish I had). Ginger is Skipper’s friend. Oh and who remember Malibu Barbie? The sun-goddess doll that has a tan line if you pull down the straps of her bra!

After that Target trip, I found myself searching online to see if I can still buy these old toys so I can share with my daughter (how’s that for a reason). I am excited to also find the vintage Barbie books from the 60s that I used to love. You gotta love ebay! But the funniest of part of all is that I am now in the lookout to buy another toy I used to play with. This Fonzie doll below complete with the faux leather jacket and motorcycle.


You see in my Barbie household, Mr. Fonzarella was the main squeeze. Infact, there were many timesI was questioned why were Barbie and The Fonz laying around the house without their clothes on. Well, why else? That leather bomber jacket will look hot on Barbie don’t ya think? (*wink) And as the The Fonz cooly say...."eeeeey"

Care to share your favorite childhood toys?

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Crossposted at ChicagoMomsBlog.com

Packing for A Girl is All New To Me!

I used to travel every other week for work, and lived in hotels a lot so traveling and traveling preparations has always been a piece of cake for me. I was always ready to leave on an instant’s notice. I’ve even shopped around that lifestyle. I made sure to always buy clothes that are easy to travel on and with, but still end up looking well put together.

Although life has changed a lot for us, we still travel at least 3-5x a year. Now with 3 kids (one of which is still an infant) and 2 adults, my husband is surprised that I still managed to pack just one good-sized luggage for everything we need on a 2-week trip. He of course credited my so-expertise in packing. And even I thought that was an incredible feat as well. But really ----- packing this time around was quite stressful for me.

You see we’ve just added a little girl into our mix of 2 little boys. Packing wasn’t this crazy with the boys, but packing for a girl? Oh Geez! Suddenly more chaos and confusion attacked my brain (or whatever is left of it). Before packing, I made mental notes of what she needed. Now I must pack the matching bows, and tights, shoes, etc…etc…It all became too much. I can’t even begin to rationalize packing anymore. I came up with 3 pair of shoes, 5 pair of tights, her entire collection of hairclippies (just because you never know), 5 pajamas, 3 dressy dresses (we might decide an impromptu ball?), 12 tops, 12 matching bottoms, and about 5 sweaters or vest to complete her ensemble. I said to myself – this is ridiculous! I decided to downsize, but none of it happened. 50% of our luggage contents actually belonged to my 10-month-old baby girl!

Now this brings me back to the first time I received my ultimate dream job in the Fashion Industry. This was of course way before thoughts of having kids were even in the radar. I was to fly to NY for 3 days, 2 nights and meet up with my new bosses along with the designer herself. I was so excited and couldn’t begin to figure out what to wear or bring to my first meeting. Needless to say, I packed almost my entire closet. Ok, I’m exaggerating. But it sure does look like I did when I mistakenly decided to have the car service drop me off at the office first instead of leaving my gargantuan of a luggage in my hotel. Every single person I met in the office noticed my luggage like it is a big mole on the tip of my nose and one even asked if I was moving in NY. I sure made quite an entrance, because according to a co-worker of mine I was remembered by all - as the big suitcase girl. I still cringe to this day when I think of that past scenario.

Having had experienced an embarrassing moment like that, you would think that I have learned to not overdo things for my daughter. Out of the dozen outfits I brought to NY, I only wore 1/3 of it. And my daughter wore only the 12 tops and matching bottoms, and use only one pair out of the 3 pairs I brought throughout the whole 2 weeks. Having a girl is all so new to me.

Can any experienced traveler mom of girls give out some tips on how to do this? Because really – I’m afraid if I don’t get help now, then she may just cross her “Overzealous Mom” off the list when it comes to planning her wedding one day.

( This posting with the comments were transferred from the Chicago Moms Blog site owned by the SVmoms group. They've decided to close down in business in 2010 and they allowed us to copy out )

Comments

Mary Anne Mohanraj said...

I have no solution for you, but I sympathize. When I went to visit the folks for Christmas, Kavi (at six months) had her own grown-up sized suitcase. Kevin laughed at me, and it's true that she didn't wear *all* the clothes I packed -- but actually, she did wear most of them, because a) there are some spills and spit-ups still, and b) the grandparents and aunties do love dressing her up. She can easily go through three outfits in a day while visiting.

Kevin keeps telling her that she has to learn to talk, so she can say, "Mommy, I am not a dolly." :-)

ReplyJanuary 15, 2008 at 11:13 AM

Sheena said...

I am going to feel your pain when we have a girl. If I were you I'd pack things in the same hue, so that the shoes match everything and so do the clippies. Nothing wrong with bringing the whole collection of clips, when I travel I bring my entire jewelry box!

We went on a cruise in November and I packed entirely too much because I know if I spill something or something goes wrong I'll need the extra clothing! I wore a few cute outfits and then the rest of the cruise I spent in comfy clothes.

ReplyJanuary 20, 2008 at 10:45 PM

Go. There. Now.

Oh the joys of being a mom to a girl!

Check out my newest insanity blurted out in my posting "This Is All New To Me" at the ChicagoMomsBlog.com

It's great to be back HOME!

We're back, but not all completely there just yet. All of us ended up with a bad cold during the holiday vacation and now the baby is a little feverish too. Uurgh. But we are glad to be home, and although we had such a blast at Legoland (near San Diego) - we can all honestly say that we wished that we had stayed home to celebrate Christmas and New Year where the love and spirit was in the air. I'm also happy to say, that this same love and spirit has greeted and welcomed us home along with a beautiful 60 degree January Chicago day? How weird was that?!
Now as we are unpacking and packing Christmas stuff away, I just now realized how much my family truly enjoy receiving Holiday photos from all of our families and friends. I've kept every single one each year that we received them from when we first got married (yeah --- way back - hehe), and it is really a delight to see how the children has grown. So thanks to those that has sent us your Holiday Photos again this year. And know that we will be looking forward to it every year!

Happy New Year everyone!