Even if you’re still relatively young, one surefire way to feel old is to look back at the stuff that was cool when you were a kid. Trends aren’t timeless, and the stuff that was trending during your childhood probably feels old and dated now.
The r/AskReddit thread, ” Without saying your age, what was something that was trending during your childhood? ” should be at least a little bit relatable .
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Commodore 64
“I LOVED my Commodore 64!! Spy hunter was my jam. Can’t count the hours I spent on it. And something with ‘artifacts’ where if you got too hurt (or took too long??) you died of radiation poisoning. Oh, and Pit Stop!
Still upset that I never got mine back from my college ex’s dad’s storage unit.”
Mighty Beanz
“My cousin had a set of them. He and I had ‘our’ mighty bean, and we would put these little rubber glow-in-the-dark sleeves over them, pop em in our mouth, and dance around his bedroom like a couple of idiots just asking to choke to death. It’s a hefty memory from my childhood.”
– u/Jinpix
Cabbage Patch Kids
![Image credit: reddit | [deleted]](https://static.diply.com/e6891727-7337-4489-aabe-92d9bfcb87fb.jpg)
“I hated those creepy, nightmare inducing…things. I remember even their powder scent because one of my classmates insisted on having me sniff her dolls. She had around seven or eight of them which was a huge deal because they were extremely hard to find and very expensive at the time.”
Yo-yos
“Why did seemingly every school have a yo-yo guy come for an assembly for a period of time?”
“I had saved up to buy a yo-yo from one of those assemblies and was so excited to get it. Then I got in trouble and my mom took it away almost immediately after I got it. That was one of the worst times in my childhood lol.”
Pokémon cards (and Pokémon in general)
“Carrying a fat stack of Pokémon cards (or if you were real serious, a binder) with you every lunch period, locking eyes with another kid and instantly -without saying a word- knowing it was time to trade.”
Etch A Sketch
“That is the first thing my grandpa always handed to me when I came over to his house. My etch a sketch. For some reason I never wanted to bring it home. I’m in my 20’s now and I think he still has it somewhere.”
Oregon Trail
“I’ll bet you’re not talking about the version I played:
Go into a special ‘computer room’ at school. Sit down at the teletype terminal. Dial the phone. Wait for the mainframe to answer. Put the phone handset in the rubber coupler. Watch ‘Welcome to Oregon Trail’ magically type itself on the giant ream of continuous feed paper. Feel like you are in some futuristic fantasy movie while you wow your friends with your game-playing skills.”
Dial-up internet
“I took the day off from work to wait for the UPS guy to deliver my Sprint DSL modem back in 1999. Went from 56K to ‘blazing fast’ 256K.
I called a buddy after I set it up and told him that I was online and talking on the phone at the same time. Thought I was in heaven.”
Lite Brite
“I had to go to the ER because I shoved one of the bulbs so far up my nose. Then when I got home from the ER I swallowed one and had a panic attack.”
“I bet if you look real good you can still find some of those bulbs in cracks and crevices at my parents’ house.”
Lisa Frank
“When I was little I went to a friend’s 10th birthday party and she received something Lisa Frank themed for every single gift. When she was getting toward the end of the gifts she prepared to open a huuuuge one from one of her family members, and one of the other kids leaned in toward the rest of us and whispered, in the most serious tone, ‘that’s mine. Got her Lisa Frank herself.'”
Littlest Pet Shop
“Littlest Pet Shops!!! I had about a thousand of them when I was a kid. I have this vivid memory of me and my cousins lining up all of my LPS down the stairs of my grandparents’ house and playing LPS Black Friday.”
Tamagotchi
“One of my favourite tiny childhood memories is this small moment I have of my sister, my best friend & I sitting in my basement all playing with our Tamagotchis and my friend just goes “wElCoMe tO tHe LaMe ClUb” and we all died laughing.”
Bell bottoms
“I feel like this could be any time between the 70’s and 90’s, lol.”
“Also called flares! I remember getting my first pair in maybe 1998 and being SO pumped.”
“I was too young to wear them back in the day, I’m so happy they’re coming back. My childhood is complete now.”
Furbys
“Came here for this! Worst was if you had more than 1 and they would talk to each other, it was terrifying. That and the batteries never seemed to die within those things, from the depths of my closet years later furby would randomly start making sounds. Nightmare fuel.”
Pogs
“One time I traded with an older kid and scored some really edgy looking ones with skulls and stuff, my Mom made me trade them away.”
– u/Regnes
“My sleeves were legendary. Only the finest pogs allowed. My favorite slammer was a golden saw blade. Even had the make your pog set up, fierce days.”
Handheld water games
“Those handheld water games, I think they’re called waterfuls? Where you push the button to get the hoops on the sticks in the water. Furbies, lite brights, and sea monkeys.”
“I had one with a jumping frog. I learned how to place all the little rings by pushing the button in a certain way so the water would flow just right to get the frog to jump perfectly. It was like a very low tech handheld video game!”
Polly Pockets
“Still have all of mine. Got to pull them out for my goddaughter a couple of years ago and watch her play with them too. Classic Polly pocket is waaaay better than the new one they tried doing.”
Garbage Pail Kids
“My parents were on board the Satanic Panic train in the 80’s, so I wasn’t allowed Garbage Pail Kids (or even Cabbage Patch, because some crazy person was going around saying kids could hear them talking. I just thought they were ugly.) But I remember being at a friend’s house and they had a bunch. I spent a good hour examining each one, completely grossed out and fascinated.”
Sticker albums
“Ahhh, the eighties. I had one of these myself, loved the color changing gel-filled ones along with the scratch and sniff ones. The pizza scented one was my favorite.
Also had a couple of holographic stickers in my album!”
“Paper doll books oh man. The little cutouts. I’d have completely forgotten about those if not for your sticker albums.”
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
“I dunno, seeing as there have been new iterations of the the TMNT on average every seven years, you could have been a child at any point from the late 80’s until now.”
“I still have a TMNT xmas tree ornament from ’93.”
