The Five Awesomest Fads of All Time

May 9, 2009     Posted in Cool Stuff, HaHa

tamagotchiI stumbled across some old photos last week from childhood. And while the last thing I want to remember are my awkward looks (Read: a perm [yes - PERM], horrid bangs, and purple braces), the pictures reminded me of all the must-have fads that I had to be a part of.

26

By Jill

Like that photo of me with my shirt bunched on the side by one of those large plastic things. Or the ones of me when Christina Aguilera made bandanas and hoop earrings the size of my arm so cool that I thought it was the perfect look to rock with silver eyeshadow/fairy dust for… Hebrew School.

So here is a look back at some of our most favorite fads that will always hold a special place in our hearts:

1) Butterfly Clips. Let us not forget the years we spent sectioning our hair into mini “corn-rows” – and by corn rows I mean mini braids, or twisted hair pinned down by mini plastic butterfly clips that came in a plethora of colors, including my favorite, glitter.

True Story: I thought it was a good idea to enter a contest to be in a Got Milk ad. I put on a my best fake milk mustache, a cute (I use this term loosely) butterfly skirt, those clunky Steve Madden sandals that clippity clopped like a freakin’ horse everywhere you walked and, of course, what goes best with a butterfly skirt than a head full of… butterfly clips. I then made my poor mother take numerous pictures of me posing thinking “Teen People Here I Come!!” I don’t know how she didn’t laugh in my face. Or give me up for adoption.

I never did win that contest.

2) Beanie Babies. Currently in my parents; basement there is a giant pink chest stuffed with Beanie Babies. And I mean STUFFED. They are all there. The twelve I got from every friend for Hanukkah, the ones I waited in line for an hour for, the ones I got from my grandma after a dance recital, and, obviously, the discontinued ones like that little lamb and that tie-dyed Garcia bear. How cool were you if you owned a discontinued beanie baby?! Cool and better than cool. Confident because those discontinued plush toys were going to make you RICH. Those should totes be worth like 5 grand by now.

Except they aren’t. Not even close.  I remember checking on eBay in 8th grade and Garcia was going for like $600 and I said to myself, “OMG if I wait until I’m like 25, this thing will be worth like 10,000 dollars!”

Current listing price on eBay for Garcia: $9-$50.

3) Hard Tails - These pants were not only the trendiest pants one could own, but the ONLY time it was (and hopefully ever is) acceptable in our lifetimes to wear peach, lilac or any other color pants. They had a drawstring that ended up frayed to the point of tearing from too much wear, dragged on the floor and looked like pajamas, but were the coolest things around. Except for when you sat in them and then stood up to walk by your crush’s locker and you had these weird points in the knees that stuck out and wouldn’t go away until your mom washed them.

4) Tamagotchis - If there was a drug dealer for Tamagotchis it was my mother. This is not a joke. Every friend of mine had one because my mom must have bought stock in the toy and handed it out like it was candy. If we dropped them, broke them or lost them, have no fear, my mom had a backstock in every SUPER COOL color that it came in. I bet she still has some extras stashed away somewhere now. We brought these bad boys every. where. To school, to the movies, to dance practice. It was our virtual baby. And virtual baby means you can turn it off when you would rather chat with your crush on AOL. And it means virtual poops. That looked like Hershey kisses. And it would wake you up in the middle of the night to feed it. And if you didn’t, it died. Good times.

5) Pogs - I still don’t even know what one does with a POG. Did I have an entire master set? Yes. Did I pull them out and look at them? Surem but I never – nor do I now – got the point of Pogs. I just knew they were a must-have accessory in the 4th grade and I was never one to miss out on must-have accessories. Pogs were so bomb. Until devil sticks came along…

Limiting this list to just 5 awesome fads was harder than acquiring the infamous Moses card in the Torah Cards trading game (which was another giant fad at my Jewish day school. No joke.) So, I am going to have to include a few honorable mentions: the bra-strap headband, lip smackers and the Hackey Sack, which you made your mom drive over to loosen up. Oh and, of course, the Shiny Michael Star. The shirt that came in every color and style, but not size. That whole ‘one size fits most’ was great for everyone but me as I was not in that ‘most’ category. Yeah, that was fun.

26 Comments on "The Five Awesomest Fads of All Time"

  1. Kristina says:
    Sat, 9th May 20099:29 am 

    Heck yes on all these (except hard tails, because I'd never heard of them until now. I must have been deprived). I still have a container of pogs somewhere, and all of my Beanie Babies are still in a box in my parent's basement.

    I also still have a tonne of the mini Beanie Babies they gave out at McDonald's. My grandma had a friend who worked at McD's and got me extra ones.

  2. Amilee says:
    Sat, 9th May 200910:24 am 

    Those weeks when they had them in the happy meals, we ate happy meals every day for a new one.

    And I just found my tamagotchi's yesterday. I used to love those things.

  3. Casey says:
    Sat, 9th May 200910:45 am 

    I had never heard of hard tails either, till now. Maybe if I saw a picture of them. But, I am soooo glad my parents refused to buy into the whole beanie baby thing. I had about 10 in all. But I think one of them became discontinued. (it was a horse, or unicorn, no clue) But my old house got hit by lightning like 10 years ago and the only thing that got ruined, my beanie babies.

    I LOVED tamagotchi's! A couple years ago when I was working at Hollister Co. some little girl left her plush leopard print and purple marabou purse on a chair and inside was a tamagotchi! I snagged that sucker! They're still just as much fun today as they were then. But my then boyfriend got mad at me for always playing with it and threw it in our high school dumpster one day after soccer practice.

    I had the sickest POG slammer ever! It was a hard metal spiral, almost like a Chinese fighting star thing, with dulled blades and a purple and blue spiral sticker on it. I never actually played POGs, which I believe is where you and an opponent stack up all of your little POGs and then use your slammer to hit the stack and however many you knock out of the stack you get to keep. That is how you were supposed to get more POGs (although, I think most people, like me, just bought them all) It's almost like marbles. But my sweet slammer would dent all of the POGs so no one wanted to play with me :( lol

  4. Leigh says:
    Sat, 9th May 200911:41 am 

    Those darn Michael Stars shirts. Everyone at my private school had one and most had numerous ones in multiple colors. The sad part was they cost something like $70 bucks (maybe my young mind was exaggerating) and my mother would NOT get me one. The day my best friend got one was a sad day for me.

    Also a big trend at my school in middle school – North Face Jackets! The blue ones and the red ones were the cool colors to own. I saved for months and could only afford a red fleece. I wore the crap out of it.

    I am so glad I don't worry about things like this anymore. Saves me a lot of money.

  5. beverly says:
    Sat, 9th May 200912:25 pm 

    Hard Tails–greatest. pants. ever.

  6. Lauren says:
    Sat, 9th May 20093:28 pm 

    This post is amazing. I've never heard of Hard Tails but besides that you basically just recapped my childhood. My friend gave me Garcia for a birthday present and my mom ripped off the tag because she didn't realize that was part of the value.. I was mad at her for weeks for ruining my future fortune.

  7. Erin says:
    Sat, 9th May 20097:16 pm 

    i remember getting a pair of Hard Tails, everyone in school had them, or something similar. Except me, so we bought some from (gag) Fashion Bug. Being a shot person, who has grown 2 inches since 6th grade when those were awesome, I was so short there were like 3 inches of excess fabric. My mother said "your not wearing those to school, everyone will think your poor and a dirt bag". So She hemmed them, or tried to. 4 inches later the same length and they puckered because of her awful sewing skills. She wouldn't let me wear them after that so I wore them to school when she was out of town one day, I wore them with pride. Thank god those days are over.

  8. kikicallahan says:
    Sat, 9th May 20098:03 pm 

    Was anyone elses school really into RAZORS? or was it just a CA thing?

    the scooters, not the slit-your-wrists thing

  9. wordmoth says:
    Sat, 9th May 20098:12 pm 

    Mmmmm – must be my age . .

    The five awesomest fads of all time? Purely subjective, but since you asked:

    Beatle haircuts!

    The Beatles per se'

    Winklepickers (What????)

    Transitor radios (I kid you not . . )

    Flairs

    And that's just for starters. . .

    You do realise of course that each generation has it's own fads (and aren't they amazing – afterwards!!)

    But thanks for the topic – memories, aaaah what memories. .!

  10. Casey says:
    Sat, 9th May 20099:07 pm 

    kikicallahan, We had Razors in Florida, Mine was Blue. They were HUGE but in middle/high school, not elementary.

  11. Debbie says:
    Sun, 10th May 20098:08 am 

    Your list was incredible… however you forgot about Furbys. They were the coolest thing after Tamagotchis. It spoke and was furry, and during that time they would even say over the loudspeaker on an airplane: Please turn off all furbys haha. You also forgot the black choker necklace that everyone wore that was that weird swirly plastic as well as the silver slinky bracelets everyone wore and the color beaded bracelets. Maybe those were just a NY thing.. but they were everywhere! Lastly, collecting milk and absolute ads was HUGE where i lived in the 5th grade… but then they were banned from my school because the principle didn't feel it was appropriate for 5th graders to be collecting and trading alcoholic ads. :(

    But I did buy into all of those fads you listed too…. I think I was the queen of following fads haha. And yes… to those of you confused… I DID play pogs with my pogs. The way you play is to stack up as many pogs as u want, throw ur slammer at them and whichever fell and were no longer touching other ones, those you got to keep. Then you would use your flipper which was like a slammer but a lot thinner/lighter to try and flip the other ones so they were no longer touching and they became yours too. In the end, whoever had the most from the original pile won. Stupid, I know.. but so much fun!

  12. Debbie says:
    Sun, 10th May 20098:13 am 

    Ahh and I also forgot to mention jacks. That game was like…the biggest fad ever at my school and camp. I was so good, I used to beat people in only one turn! haha, oh man. Arite, I'm done.

  13. Jill says:
    Sun, 10th May 20091:44 pm 

    I should of added to my list- the platform gym shoes like vagabonds and rebels. So stylin.

    and of course slap bracelets, and friendship string that you would put in your hair. like over one piece- and it would be multicolored and SO ugly but back then was SO cool?

    the list could go on. and on. like kipling backpack purses and hard candy nail polish with the ring that came with it.

    ah the joys of childhood fads.

  14. Jessica says:
    Mon, 11th May 20098:47 am 

    TAMOGOTCHIS!!!! oh man… I used to be OBSESSED. I kinda miss those little things.

  15. Shea says:
    Mon, 11th May 20092:52 pm 

    Yesss i lovee this list.
    im glad someone mentioned furbys & scooter.
    but i gotta add spice girl shoes.
    everyone at my school owned a pair. the white sneaks with a huge rubber platform.
    it’s a wonder i didn’t get hurt more haha.!

  16. GS says:
    Mon, 11th May 20095:20 pm 

    Wow!! you almost made me cry with the butterfly hair clips… I used to use that a lot!

  17. Jennifer says:
    Mon, 11th May 20096:53 pm 

    this post is awesome, i just relived my childhood. i was crazy about butterfly clips and POGs. at my elementary school everyone was really into wearing old navy tech vests and those plastic choker neclaces that were meant to look like henna.

  18. asobov5 says:
    Tue, 12th May 200910:59 am 

    aww butterfly clips ! past fads come up in conversation with my friends all the time but butterfly clips have never been mentioned ! I couldn't tell you how many pictures i made my mom take of me with my "corn rows ."

    also to the list : pokemon cards and magic cards !! … or was that just my weird, anti-social brother ?!

  19. Erin says:
    Tue, 19th May 20097:08 pm 

    Anyone remember Cross Colours? Man, those were so popular along with Starter Jackets. I thought I was the bomb for having a starter jacket!

  20. Colleen Bee says:
    Mon, 8th Jun 20096:04 am 

    anyone remember go-go's?

  21. moi says:
    Thu, 25th Jun 20091:11 pm 

    YES!! except the hard tails…i have no idea what those were, but i do remember the towel cloth jog suit all us girls wanted to wear. they came in all these insane colors like hot pink, lime, or pastels. ALSO the glitter craze. glitter was a must have, you wore it on your cheeks or on your eyes, along with a cute gem sticker at the corner of your eyes or on your cheek. put all that together with butterfly clips…yeahhh…

  22. Michelle says:
    Mon, 21st Sep 20094:07 pm 

    I loved this list!!! I also have a big bin of beanie babies that live in the attic that my mom wouldn't let me sell when I was collecting them.

    Were you girls obsessed with collecting key chains and feather pens in Middle school? I remember going to claires to get like 283472934 key chains to put on my backpack..and I'm pretty sure I only had like 1 key lol. We also loved SCRUNCHIESSS!

  23. Brian says:
    Mon, 12th Oct 200912:41 pm 

    You stack pogs then throw the plasitc/metal ones at the stack and if they flip then you get to keep them….if you are playing for keepsies.

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