The first shoebox I remember came to me the day we moved from Rockton to Abitibi Canyon. The moving truck had come and gone and we were getting ready for the 12-hour drive. It felt like we were moving to another country.
Rockton was a very small town – a village really – just a detour off a regional highway with two stores and a gas station. Every Saturday we would get a dime to spend on penny candy at the smallest shop. On the day we left Mrs. Tanner, the owner of the shop, gave my sister and I a shoebox. Not one to share, as often happened, but one each. The shoebox was full of Archie comics and candy to keep us busy on the long trip North. Mrs. Tanner has long since passed away and I wonder if she ever knew how much those boxes meant to my sister and I.
The second shoebox is the one that got me thinking about shoeboxes. One Christmas, my sister and I each received a shoebox full of Barbie clothes. And these weren’t any old clothes. They were handmade, not store-bought. And, we each got a different selection. Each box contained a wedding dress and a variety of other outfits. I suspect there were shoes, but my Barbie never wore them.
The media hype around the Barbie movie has me reflecting on my own Barbie experiences. When we got out Barbies, my blonde sister got a blonde Barbie and I got a brunette. The hair differences were enough to let us tell them apart, but my Barbie’s were always more recognizable for another reason: I chewed off her feet. My Barbie just had nubs where her rubbery feet should have been. It didn’t keep her from enjoying her life in the Barbie camper or the Barbie airplane I got years later, when I knew to be embarrassed about her missing feet.
The third shoebox was one of my own creation. In grades 7 & 8, we boarded a bus once a week to drive to Wilmot Centre where the girls took home economics and the boys did industrial arts.
It was the 70s, so the weirdness of the gender division was the norm. There were other weird things that happened. We had to ear a “sewing machine driver’s license” by following lines on paper, without thread, to show we could control the machine. The hardest one was the spiraling circles, but I got it eventually. In addition to passing the test, we had to make a sewing box. We had to bring in a shoebox to decorate then use to store the supplies we’d need for sewing. It was the only time we were provided materials. I chose aqua tissue paper that I pâpier-machéd on my box, adding string for texture. The string, and my fingertips, took on that same hue.
We were responsible for our own sewing supplies: pins, thread, patterns, fabric. In grade 8 I made an awesome blue pinstriped gaucho jumpsuit. I remember shopping for the fabric with my mom. Decades later, I wonder if buying fabric was ever a burden for any of my classmates.
I made the gauchos on the right. Picture how fantastic that looked in navy blue pinstripes!
booksandbassets 
What a wonderful collection of anecdotes inspired by shoeboxes! You made me think of so many things: the kindness of neighbors (whose age I am now, so surely they’ve moved on); those gnawed nubs that Barbie had to hide behind with her accessories (I was a fervid hair-cutter myself); and sewing with Simplicity, handmade sewing kits and all. (I can definitely remember tissue-paper-dyed fingers, too.) I loved reading this! What a fun slice to travel down memory lane.
Penny candy…we would make a killing with a quarter. Shoeboxes do more than just hold shoes. They hold treasures.
It’s hard to explain penny candy to kids today. It is such a bizarre concept to them.
You really capture the magic of the humble shoebox. I used to tell my elementary students to keep a shoebox under their bed for their rock and nature collection. I was right there with you with the Barbies, even the gift of home-made clothes. I had forgotten about sewing on paper in home EC, and I wanted to tell you about when we made our own first aid kits in metal Sucrets (throat lozenge) boxes in Girl Scouts. In fact, I have to stop myself right here, because your piece sparks so many memory connections with me I would be writing on and on about myself! So it is a good piece- very evocative 🙂
I remember Sucrets! One advantage of being a certain age is that there are lots of memories to draw on.
Ha ha, yes indeed.
As I read I realized this is more than a story of childhood and the utility of shoe boxes. It’s a great story about upcycling. I have thought a lot about my own Barbies and how much trouble I got in when i cut their hair. I was playing beauty shop,
Ha! ha! I’m glad I’m not alone. There seem to be a lot of people who permanently altered their Barbie’s appearance.
I love this slice! The Barbies, the chewing of the feet (hilarious), the clothes, the pattern……so many memories in one small shoebox slice. I loved playing with my Barbies as a kid, and I remember the smell of the newness in the box when we got new accessories. Ahhh……..plastic!
I wanted to include a bit about the smell of the vinyl but it didn’t seem to fit. Vinyl doesn’t smell the same nowadays.