Finally, something that makes me feel comparatively young : Crayola Crayons turning 110 years old! This classic name in creativity goes waaaay back to my childhood when crayons were just about all we had for fun. Sounds primitive, but true. Call me simple, but there was nothing like a fresh box of crayons - all perfectly pointed and pristinely presented. They even sort of smelled good, in a weird way.
To celebrate the big
1-1-0 birthday, Crayola invited Facebook fans to come up with new nicknames for
eight of its classic colors. No plain
Jane names for these new hues.
Here are the new
nicknames with plain Jane names in parenthesis:
Sunny Side (yellow);Peace, Love &
Purple (purple);Freshly Squeezed
(orange);BeYOUtiful Blue(blue);Freckle (brown);Ladybug (red);Night Owl (black);Jalapeño (green)
Pretty cool,
creative names, huh? I think so. You can temporarily purchase these eight new
fancy colors in a specially designed limited-edition box only while supplies last through Crayola's Facebook page.
Don't think I didn't
have a colorful childhood. Life wasn't just all plain Jane crayon names. Some
of my friends were lucky enough to own (and share) deluxe crayon sets from
Crayola with 64 colors! I remember the
deluxe box having some cool color names back then, a couple of which have
always stuck in my mind such as Burnt Sienna and Raw Umber. It was heaven to be
able to use so many fantastic colors of crayons with exotic names.
And speaking of
things stuck in my head: crayons and plain Jane brings me to another memory. It
was one of my first days in Kindergarten. Our table of four was given a box of
fresh crayons - big, jumbo beauties. The rule was that you could only take out one crayon
at a time and use it. No sooner did I accidentally take two crayons out
when this girl named Jane (I am not kidding)
ratted me out to the teacher! I
remember being scared out of my mind at that moment. Luckily the teacher
ignored her. I was too quiet and shy to tell Jane to zip it. I just minded my
p's and q's after that and never trusted that little snitch again. Obviously,
I'm still not over it.
It is funny how
random memories and associations of things stick with us. I certainly have fond and warm
memories of Crayola crayons. And I hope kids still get as excited as I did when
they get new boxes of crayons. Unfortunately, I always associate Jane with crayons. But luckily, her squealing on me didn't hamper my artistic
abilities in the least. Maybe she even did my favor. I went on to be quite creative and often took all the
crayons out of the box at one time. The way I see it
now, that's what life should be about - boldly taking all the crayons out of
the box and creating something beautiful and colorful with them. As the owner of Fundamentally Toys, I get to encourage every kid who comes into the store to do just that.
