We Have to Go Back: Iconic Toys + Games of My Gen X Youth

Cabbage Patch Kids. Fashion Plates. Monchichis. Garfield. That brown Fisher Price tape recorder. Lite-Brite + so many more.

Hi friends.

How about a lil midweek childhood nostalgia? ‘Tis the damn season, after all.

I’ve been shopping up a storm for my nephews and a few other children in my life and it never fails to get me thinking about the iconic playthings of my ‘80s youth. Was our shit low-key ugly and definitely analog? You bet. But it was also awesome. I wouldn’t trade it for the screens of today. I have enough time on those as a grownup.

I mean, maybe this psychotic Ronald McDonald was more terrifying than anything else and I may have been possessed by it?!? But still, I hold that our toys kept us extremely interesting. (My Underoos are DOPE though.)

Let’s just dive right into some of the memorable toys and games that defined much of a generation.

Cabbage Patch Kids

I’m not sure any toy/gift could be more Gen X than the children of the patch—initially created by Xavier Roberts, whose signature you could find stamped on all of their bum bums.

During the 1983 holiday season, America lost its damn mind over these dolls that you “adopted” from the Cabbage Patch, complete with their papers and uncommon names. Like the other children of our era, my siblings and I were DESPERATE for one. Our parents were literally fighting out in these streets to get their hands on them.

LOL to these kids today thinking they invented drops and lining up for coveted items.

It. Was. Insanity. And all over the news every night.