Rebirth, part three: On Staff

It was Spring Break, 1995, and I was finally old enough to go the Leadership Training up at camp. I was going to work on staff at Kawkawa that summer, and I could hardly wait.

Leadership itself was a great week - seminars, training, lots of work, and so much information I thought my head was going to pop. Bertski, Professor, and Prem (the director at the time) poured their hearts into us that week. It was intense and loads of fun.

Summer finally arrived, and I had been given three weeks to work - the first two weeks of July and the very last week of August. I was a junior counsellor for one week and taught some activities and helped run a Bible study the next. I was so sad to leave at the end of my first two weeks. At the end of the summer, I came back as a camper for my last year then stayed the weekend before the last week of camp. It was then that Prem asked me if I would like my own cabin for the last week. I was beyond thrilled that he thought I was ready for the challenge of going it alone.

And so I got my very first group of girls: Ellen, Ashleigh, and Kandace. It didn't matter to me that it was only three girls, I was going to be the best counsellor there ever was! It was such a great week, and solidified my desire to work at camp for many more years to come.

And many more years there were. I continued to work at camp for another seven years after that, anywhere from one to nine weeks each summer. If I thought I had grown as a camper, my years there on staff would blow me away.

It was on staff at Kawkawa that I had the honour of praying with someone as they decided to become a Christian for the first time. It was on the back steps of Chalet 401. I will never forget how I felt God niggling at me all day to ask this girl if she wanted to become a Christian. About how scared I was to actually bring it up, and about how eagerly she said yes. I was so excited that I thought I was going to pop. I ran back down to the campfire where the non-counselling staff were still praying and told Bertski about it because I just couldn't contain my joy. She gave me a hug and then told me to go get back to my cabin of girls. Oh yeah! Whoops! (Good thing I was a junior counsellor and there was still someone with them!)

It was on staff where I first saw how much the Bible is a living book. It was the hardest week of camp I had ever experienced. I had a really challenging group of girls, and I was having some conflicts with some other staff, too. I was at the end of my rope. About halfway through the week (um, DUH! Why did it take me so long???), I opened my Bible randomly and had never had something jump out at me in such a vivid, life-giving way. It spoke directly to what I was dealing with and was exactly what I needed to hear. It went so far beyond coincidence. The passage I read encouraged me, chastised me, and gave me comfort and hope. I came to see that God was (and is!) in that book, alive and well, and oh so relevant.

It was on staff that I saw God work in SO many different ways. Big, small, ordinary and extraordinary. It was amazing to get to see him work through me, in me, and often despite me, and in and through so many other people, too. Camp is not the only place I've experienced this, but the thing about camp is that all the rest of life's pressures and messiness just isn't there, so it's much easier to see things more clearly. And seeing God work and answer prayer at camp was training for seeing Him work in the 'real world,' where sometimes it's not so recognizable amidst the stress and business of regular life.

It was on staff that I had one of my most humbling moments - where God began teaching me to back off on my own plan, cause his is so much better. (Oh how I wish it only took that once to learn that lesson! It's gonna be a lifetime before I get that one down!) It was a particularly hot week, and I had wanted to surprise my girls by sleeping down on the dock. I had gotten permission, and waited till they were all ready for bed before I surprised them. They were so excited to get to sleep outside, and I'm sure one of the reasons was that it was about a kajilion degrees in our cabin. We bundled up our sleeping bags and pillows and made our trek down the giant hill to the beach, only to find that some of the junior counsellors were swimming and the dock was soaking wet.

It was definitely not one of my proudest moments when I told off the junior staff leader and made it perfectly clear how annoyed I was that now we couldn't sleep on the dock. I was disappointed for my girls, too, who were really looking forward to this. So, up we trekked back to our cabin - waaay up the hill - and had to go back into our sweltering cabin to sleep after being out in the cool breezy summer air down at the beach. *grumble grumble grumble* At staff meeting the next morning, I made sure that EVERYBODY knew that I'd like my girls to sleep on the dock, so puh-leeeease don't go swimming after campfire.

Take two. It wasn't a surprise, but the girls were still looking forward to sleeping out. After we all got settled on the dock, we began looking up at the stars. "Hey! There's a shooting star!" "And another one!" "Look! I just saw one, too!" It turns out that that night, and not the night before, was the night of the huge August meteor shower. We lay awake for hours watching falling stars and talking about God's creation, reading Psalms and praising God for his creativity and beauty. Ok, God, I get it. You've got a better plan! :P

And it was on staff that I made one of the biggest discoveries about myself I've made so far. For a year or so, I had been plagued with the question of "What's my passion?" I saw people with a passion for scuba diving, or a passion for missions, or a passion for sports and on and on... But what was mine? Sure, I liked a lot of different things, but I couldn't call any of them "my passion." I guess in some ways it was a quest for purpose: what is my purpose, my calling - where that place where my great love and the world's great need intersected?

Well, it was the last night of the second to last week of camp in 2001. I had had the most incredible week - I had the best cabin I've ever had, and witnessed some extremely meaningful changes in the lives of every single girl in my cabin. It was a particularly impacting week for many, many campers, not to mention staff. We were at campfire on the last night, and I found myself looking around. The kids - many who had never once set foot in a church in their lives - were singing with all their hearts, arms raised to heaven, knowing what it felt like to experience the love of God. They were deciding to trust him, choosing to accept the gift he offers.

It was at that moment that I knew. What's my passion? It's here. It's this. It's helping kids come to a greater understanding of who God is and what he's done for them. It's seeing lives changed. I've struggled since then to understand how that translates to the 'real world,' as sadly, camp is not a year round event. But it's trying to see how that works into my daily life - in whatever role I'm in - that will be the lifelong lesson. It was on staff at Kawkawa where I realized that nothing gets to my heart quicker than a child in love with God. And to have God allow me to help that happen? That's my passion.

Rebirth, part one

When I was eight years old, my nana and papa gave me a birthday present. I still remember where I was when I got it: the atrium section of the old White Spot in West Vancouver. The gift wasn't much to look at, but it would be one that would change my life. It was a card telling me that they had registered me for summer camp. I would be heading off to Camp Kawkawa for one week once school was out.

The time finally came (it's a long wait for a little kid from the beginning of February till summer!) and my parents drove me out to Surrey to catch the camp bus bound for Hope, the little town where the camp was located. Fearless little monkey that I was, I hopped on a bus full of kids I'd never met before in my life, and waved goodbye to my parents, who were definitely having a harder time saying goodbye than I was. I was off for an adventure!

Little did I know then what an adventure I'd be in for.

I don't remember much of that first week of camp, except vague pictures in my mind of my counsellors - Sudsy and Coke - and one of the crafts we did: leather bookmarks that we decorated with leather stamps... They were so cool!

The next year, of course, I wanted to go back. And the next, and the next. I didn't miss a summer - from kids camps to junior then senior teens. I loved the counsellors there - Bunta, Dewey, Squeak, Bertski, Prem, Link, Chunk, Gump, Squab, Lucy, Derby, Crocket, Festus... the list could go on and on. So many of them made such lasting impacts on my life.

And I met lots of great friends there, too. Every summer my address book would be full of new addresses - people I'd write to every now and then, maybe call on the phone once in a while (back in the days when it was a big deal to call long distance to the next suburb. Definitely no email or facebook to keep in touch back then!). They were all people I couldn't wait to see again the following summer.

The location was beautiful, the water was warm, the food was great (oh Georgy Porgy, you were the best cook!), the skits were hilarious, the activities were always fun. It was there I learned how to have a camera war, how to paddle -and tip! - a canoe, how to shoot a bow and arrow, how to watch the counsellor at the table like a hawk so I wasn't the last one to put my thumb up and be stuck scraping the dishes with "Mr. Scrapey." I learned goofy songs and ridiculous wide games, and I learned that sleeping out on the beach was an amazing experience - unless of course the counsellors woke you up early and told you that you were all going to play a trick on the director and sneak over to the provincial park across the lake via canoe. Let me tell you, 80 kids trying to hide behind two outhouse buildings just doesn't work. Grizzly was M-A-D when he got in the camp boat and came looking for us. Kids were in tears, the lifeguard threw down his whistle and quit, stomping off into the forest. Counsellors were mad, we were terrified of our punishment, and it all blew up... until Grizzly finally told us all that it was all a big joke, he'd planned it all, and YAY! We were going to have a pancake breakfast in the park.

Man, that all sounds so awful written out. It was pretty funny at the time, and I have only warm memories of the famous "Sneak." Maybe that's also because that was also the day I found out that my very first cousin was born (he's in grade 12 now!).

I learned all kinds of things at Camp Kawkawa, but the biggest impact that camp made on me was on my faith. It was there where I felt that my faith really grew the most - where I learned the most about God and about what it meant to be a Christian. It was all around me at home, too, but it somehow seemed that there, between the mountains and at the edge of the lake, away from "normal life" and school and parents and pressures, I could really experience God in ways I never had before.

Every year I left camp on a high. I felt like a new person every time I got home. The thrill would subside, but the lessons remained. It was at camp that I remember Gump sitting with me on the back bench of the campfire, ignoring what was going on around us and stopping to pray for my friend April, who was at camp with me and had just gotten called away to take a phone call about her mom who was very sick. I learned that I can pray any time, anywhere, for anything, regardless of what's going on around me.

I remember Bunta telling me straight up that I had a bad attitude when I kept complaining about the girls in my cabin practicing their cheerleading routines every night. I remember telling her, "You know what? You're right," and being so grateful she called me out on it. Those girls stopped annoying me from that moment on, cause I realized it was really me being the twit. (And funnily enough, one of those girls now is a fairly regular sub at my school!)

I remember Matilda's Bible study sessions one week when I was fourteen. She challenged us to make ourselves available for God. I did, and recommitted my life to Jesus that week. I would say that that was the week when my faith really became my own and I became a Christian because I knew it was what I wanted to do, not becuase my parents told me so.

I remember the campfires - the songs, the stories, the testimonies kids told on the last night of camp about how God had impacted their lives that week at camp. I can see their faces lit with an orange glow as they stood by the fire and told their story - of their life back at home - good, bad, or otherwise, of their struggle with friends, of new commitments they wanted to make, of what God was teaching them. I remember how they impacted me. I shared my stories, too, at the edge of that campfire. Of how God had challenged me, of who I was, who I wanted to be. Of renewed commitments and a refreshed soul.

I remember knowing that I wanted to keep going to camp as long as I could, and when I was too old to be a camper, that I wanted to work there. So when I was sixteen, I applied to work as a Leader In Training...

Oh the goodness of it all

I was in grade 5 when the scandal broke. I was devestated. Gotta blame it on somethin'...



And multiculoured vests with no shirt? Oh the hotness!!!
(hahahahaha!!!)

Oh, and how 'bout this, while I'm at it? It's old skool musical goodness. The special effects blow my MIND.



This song will forever be related in my mind to driving along the winding highway through the rockies on a greyhound bus - one in a convoy of five - full of high school students on their way home from a youth conference in Regina. We played bus bowling, had crazy relays, racing back and forth along the length of the bus, diving over and under the seats (safe, eh?), and played the dating game over the bus's radios. I was bachelorette #2, and I got picked! I'm positive that it was because, when asked what kind of kitchen appliance I'd be, I said I'd be a pepper grinder cause I'm spic-ay! That was most definitely THE coolest answer ever. Heh.

The youth leaders set up a 'date' at the McDonalds in Moose Jaw, complete with a boquet of flowers made from multiple straws in a Mickey-D's cup and shredded napkins for petals. It was lovely, and especially romantic when my date posed for our photo together with chewed up cheeseburger in his opened-wide mouth. Wonder why that relationship never worked out???

But the song. Oh, the song. We were obsessed with it for some reason the whole way home. I doubt we listened to it less than 100 times. We had the best bus driver EVER, cause every time the "BAUM! BAUM!" came on, he'd blast that ol' bus horn in sync with the music. Booyeah.

Tuesday's Tale of Christmas

Every year everyone in my family clears an evening in their schedule and we all go to mom and dad's house to decorate teh family Christmas tree. Ours is NOT a "Martha Stewart" tree. It's a real live, sap-oozing, needle-dropping, scent-giving showcase of our family history. Every ornament on our tree has a story behind it: this one was made by Great-Grandma Friesen. She knitted one for each of us when she was nearly blind... that one was given to you by that little old lady who always sat behind us at church. She loved you kids so much! ... this one came from our language student in Korea... do you remeber making this one? We had all the neighbourhood kids over and I baked dough ornaments for hours! ... These baubles were a weding present: they've been on our tree for thirty-two years... and on and on the story goes. Decorating the tree is a little time warp into our family's past. It's also a noisy, hilarious, crowded (there's always friends or language students or boyfriends/girlfriends, or some combination of those added to the mix), treat-filled evening. Did I mention it was noisy?

Dad always gets the tree set up before dinner. Because our Christmas tree stand is now ROUNDED on the bottom (DAD! Just get a new one!!!), the tree has to be secured to the wall/window ledges with string. I'm pretty sure the string is the only thing holding it up this year. "Is it straight?" Nope, a little to the left. "Umf! Is it straight?" Not quite. "Now?" Well now it's off center. "Yeah, but is it straight?" ...




This continues for who knows how long, then it's time for the lights. They get strewn all the way down the hallway and dad cirlces them aroud the tree while one of us feeds them to him. Sometimes things get a little tangled up...




Our family has a two set-in-stone traditions when it comes to our Christmas tree. The first one is the "squint test." Nobody wants a Christmas tree with big dark spots on it... the lights have to be evenly distributed. When dad's about halfweay through the lights, it's time to the "squint test." One (or more!) of us stand in the hallway and scrunch up our eyes to blur the lights. It's much easier to spot light-deficient places on the tree that way! Of course, if someone happens to be standing there with a camera, you end up with a picture of yourself that looks like this.

The second started back in 1994. My brother was 11 when he wrote this note, and every year when we put away the decorations, it gets tucked carefully back into the box. I'm going to let the note tell the story for me on this one. (Click on the picture if you need a larger view.)



After all the decorating was done, it was my turn (according to the note!) to put the angel on the tree. It really doesn't matter to us now, but mom still insists we follow the order. It's fun!



And of course, some typical sibling goofiness, just for fun!

Tuesday's tale of Christmas Past

I love warm fuzzy Christmas memories. I was at an event last night where the "icebreaker" activity was sharing your memories of a Christmas 'high' and a Christmas 'low.' I had lots of highs, but couldn't really think of many lows. I'm sure I had a few, but if they weren't coming to mind, I figured, why try to dig them up? I decided to post every Tuesday about a Christmas tradition or a Christmas memory that I have. I'd love to hear your stories, too! Either leave them in the comments, or write your own Tuesday Tale of Christmasses Past and notify me, and I'll link to you! Maybe we can get a lil' trend going!

~*( )*~*( )*~*( )*~*( )*~*( )*~*( )*~*( )*~*( )*~*( )*~

Santa is always messy when he comes to my parent's house. The grate in the fireplace gets knocked over, the decorative logs on the hearth are all spilled. Apparently the snack we leave for him isn't enough, so Santa has to meander over into the kitchen to have his fill. He invariably knock over dining room chairs and leaves a trail of paper towels, crumbs, etc as he goes. Mandarin orange wrappers are everywhere. This hasn't changed as my brother and sister and I have gotten older and moved out. Santa still comes. Santa still leaves a mess.

One year, when I was maybe eight or nine, Santa was particularly messy. So messy, in fact, that he got a few gifts stuck in the chimney.

Stockings were opened, all the gifts were unwrapped, and we were enjoying mom's candy cane loaf (bread stuffed with nuts and dried fruit that was shaped like a candy cane) for breakfast. All of a sudden, Dad's ears perked up: "Did you hear that? What was that sound? ... I think it was coming from the chimney!" He went to check it out, and came back amazed. "Santa got something stuck in the chimney. I'm going to go downstairs and get some tools to try to get it out. You stay here."

We were so excited! We stayed in the kitchen, which was - conveniently - around the corner from the living room, while dad went downstairs and got his tools. When he returned, the banging and clanging of a man trying to dislodge another one of Santa's treasures made us so excited we could hardly breathe. After what seemed like forever, we were allowed to round the corner and see what had been stuck. There in the middle of the living room was a brand new tricycle for my brother, who was maybe three at the time. We stood in amazement (all except my brother, who was already riding the trike around the living room.

"Now hang on a second, while I was getting this out, I think I saw something else up there, too. You go finish your breakfast, I'm going to go down and get some more tools." We tried to sneak a peek up the chimney before mom shooed us back into the kitchen, but alas! It was far too dark to see anything. More clanging, more banging, and when we got called back, there was another bike, this time for my sister!

Once more, dad saw something ELSE up the chimney. Once more he went to get just a few more tools. I of course knew what was up there this time around, but that didn't stop me from practically jumping up and down in the kitchen the entire time dad was trying to extract the gift.

Miraculously, dad had managed to dislodge three bicycles from our chimney that year. I loved that bike so much, partly because it was a beautiful pink Strawberry Shortcake bike with a banana seat, but partly because it was the gift we almost didn't get because Santa just didn't take the time to be neat and tidy!

I only have a fuzzy memory of that bike today, but I sure am grateful for a daddy who knew so much about getting bicycles out of chimneys!

Something about the ocean...

Vancouver, of course, is a city surrounded by ocean. It's protected water, though, sheltered from the open ocean by Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands. It's not the Oregon Coast kind of ocean. Instead, it's a much calmer beast, seemingly surrounded on all sides by mountains.

I can not imagine myself living away from the water. There's something about spending time on the beach that renews me. It's at the ocean that I often feel much closer to God than I do anywhere else.

I grew up no more than a 10 minute walk (usually much less) to four different beaches. First, there was the main beach at Deep Cove. We'd often go there in the summer to swim and year round to just goof around. Even as a child I was struck by the beauty there. I did a painting or a drawing one time in grade 5 or grade 6 of the view from Deep Cove. I loved it. My teacher loved it, too, and asked me if she could keep it. I wish I still had it.

About a five minute walk away from my house was my favourite place to go swimming. It didn't really have a name, I don't think. We called it the secret beach. There was a little path between the back yard of one house and the side yard of another that would take you to a rickety set of wooden stairs. It looked like you were walking through someone's yard to get there. The beach was small - maybe only thirty feet of sand and broken shells worn smooth by the waves - and it was nestled in between the rock retaining walls surrounding the waterfront homes on either side. The best times to go swimming there was when the tide was either way in or way out. That way, we didn't have to step all over the barnacle-covered rocks as we eased our bodies into the cold water. There seemed to be a strip of those nasty barnacles right at the mid-tide level. We'd often come home with tiny cuts all over our feet, but it didn't matter. There was great swimming at the secret beach.

Down at the end of my street, there was a little public dock. Right in front of the dock there was (is!) a small island with a house on it. Sometimes we'd swim to the island when the tide was low. That dock was my haven as a teenager. If ever I was upset and needed to get away, I'd go down there. The early morning or dusk were my favourite times: a mist hung over the water and the light was still grey around me. It was quiet and calm, and every now and then, if you were lucky, you might see a seal pop his head up off in the distance. I would often go there to meet with God.

Over the years, there have been countless encounters between me and the ocean. Snuggling up on the beach on New Year's Day with an old boyfriend... watching the summer sun slip behind the horizon at Birch Bay and remembering how my grandma loved to do the same when she was still alive... watching pods of killer whales swim alongside the boat up in Port McNeil... gathering with hundreds of thousands of people to watch the offshore fireworks competitions in Vancouver every summer... silently paddling from bay to bay in a kayak, watching the shore glide past... going for longs walks with worship music playing on my discman, feeling God's presence with me as I walk... looking out at the forever horizon down on the Oregon Coast or at Long Beach, with the waves crashing in and feeling so small... crouching at the shore to listen to the sound of tiny pebbles rolling over each other as the water eased in and out, in and out...

Most of all, the ocean reminds me of God and his faithfulness. It's steady and unchanging. It's where I often get a better perspective on my life. It's where I can block other things out and just focus on Him. I definitely need to spend more time at the water's edge.

Popples, and other warm fuzzy memories

Do you still have some of the toys you had as a kid? In my blog reading, I was reminded of Popples, those furry creatures that could roll themselves into their very own built in pouch. I still have mine. I loved his bright orange "fur" and green hair. I never could fit him fully into his pouch. There was always ears anda green tuft poking up out of the pouch. *GRIN*

I still have my Cabbage Patch Kid, too. Her name is Nadia, or at least that's what her birth certificate said. I remember when they were sooo popular that mommies would elbow eachotehr and knock eachother down in the stores just to get one. I don't think MY mommy did any elbowing, but I got one anyway! When my grandparents went travelling (to Thailand?) they brought back the dress that she's wearing. And those red smudes on her feet? Those were from when I was playing with some play make-up (or maybe mom's real makeup?) and for some reason decided to leave lip prints on her feet. The red line on her mouth was a felt pen serving as lipstick. I don't know why I didn't just use mom's lipstick there, too!

The third long lost toy in the series is Lamby. My aunt gave him (her?) to me when I was a baby. When you wound it up, it's head would move in circles and it played "Mary Had A Little Lamb." You can tell by the state of it's fur and thread coming off his nose that he was well loved.

Fourth and finally, I used to have a Glowworm. That one's long gone, though, you'll have to just settle for this Google'd picture. It's face lit up when you hugged it. I liked to fall asleep each night hugging the glowworm, the warm light of it's face scaring away all the monsters under the bed.





Some days I'd just like to go back to being a kid. Favourite toys and snuggling under clean laundry fresh from the dryer... that was the life!

Six years ago today

It was a Saturday, and I was working at the Capilano Suspension Bridge. I had to work Sundays, and so hadn't been gonig to church too often, and I was really missing it. The church I was going to at that time had a Saturday service, so I decided to go. By the time I got off work, changed, and took the bus there, I was a little bit late. I had changed, but I felt all icky form a long day of gardening and cleaning. I snuck in and sat off to the side near the back. Maybe 15 or 30 minutes into the service, I felt a tap on my shoulder. I think I was in the middle of singing or something, cause it startled me. I turned around and it was my dad! I thought maybe he had come to go to church with me, but then he motionned for me to come with him into the hall. Maybe he had something to tell me. As soon as we got into the hallway, my dad started crying. He blurted out, "Papa just died." I would find out later that he had had a huge stroke earlier that day. I don't really know what my thoughts were at that point. I was more concerened about my dad. He and Papa were so close. My dad was a mess. He told me later that he hadn't wanted to tell me that way, but when he opened his mouth, that was all that came out. I'm glad he told me that way. It was such a human moment.

As we prepared for his memorial service, every member of our family wrote something, and then the idea was to combine them into one tribute. But when my mom went to compile them all together, she realized that they were all too personal to just be edited into one. So we read them all. Nana and I had both written letters. I remember my mom saying how she read only the first word of Nana's letter and she was in tears.

Nana's letter began, "Dear." That's what she always called Papa. I imagine throughout their marriage it took on many different tones ranging from exhasperated to loving, but to her, he was "Dear." Her letter was full of memories, many from before they were even married. I cried as I saw Nana in a different light - as a teenager falling in love, then getting married. After over 50 years together, two children, three grandchildren, now her husband and best friend was gone.

It was, thankfully, not an entirely sad ceremony. Papa loved Jesus with all his heart. We knew that he was finally home and that we'll get to see him again. In the meanitme, though, there are days like today when I think about him, and miss him so much. He was such a loving, tender man. He was goofy, and always had a story or a joke to tell. It didn't matter that he told the same jokes over and over and over again. We loved the them not for their punchlines, but for the joy Papa got in telling them. He loved photography and nature, things which I, too, love. Two things in paricular remind me of Papa. I have always loved looking at how the mountains fade off into the horizon. Range upon range gets hazier and hazier as they get farther away. I mentionned that to my parents one time shortly after Papa died, and my dad told me that Papa always said the same thing. The other thing that reminds me of him are old barns. He loved to take pictures of old, dilapitated barns - where the roof sags, or they look like they're about to fall over. It sounds strange, I suppose, but he saw the beauty in them. Once sturdy, now left as a memory of days gone by. He has photo upon photo of these old barns that Nana put together in an album for my dad. I love those photos. Whenever I see an old barn or farmhouse, I'm reminded of Papa. (For examples, click here and here - these aren't his photos, but it gives you the idea).

More important than jokes and mountains and farmhouses, though, is the person Papa was and the legacy that he left. My dad grew up watching him an learning from him. The way Papa played, worked, worshipped, spoke, treated my Nana, treated my dad and my aunt, treated others: all this shaped who my dad is today. While I wish that Papa was still around and that now, as an adult, I could continue to get to know him, I can see so much of who he was in my dad, and for that I am so grateful.

On May 22, 1999, Papa finally

got to see his saviour face to face.

"Leapfrog," eat your heart out!

Ok, I must say, I miss my speak and spell! I loved that thing! Even after the raised buttons kinda broke and I had to push the button really hard and kinda wiggle my finger around for it to register. I distinctly remember learning how to spell "neighbour" on my speak and spell. How weird is that?

I ask you, where are the quality toys like that these days?

What was your favourite toy of the Eighties?