Did your parents ever give you a toy that scared you?

[MonkeyFunk]

I got a stuffed donkey when I was 4 that had crazy googly eyes. I always got the sense that he hated me. he slept at the foot of my bed.

I would've put him under the bed, but that's where the monsters slept, and I didn't want Googly to get eaten - I just wanted him to stop looking at me.

[Fran Kubelik]

1. This was hanging in my room.

It scared me sometimes.

[The Velveteen Ocelot]

2. A jack in the box with a clown doll inside.

Always creeped me out a little. I hate clowns.

[spiderpig]

10. I'll second the clowns

One of my early toys - a molded "classic" clown head with orange hair atop a stuffed body clad in red-and-white polka dots.

I'm amazed I don't hate polka dots by association. (Actually I like them - must have focused on the pattern rather than the hideous face.)

[bigwillq]

3. None that I can think of (nt)

[greatauntoftriplets]

4. There was a toy soldier decal at the foot of my crib....

that scared the bejesus out of me. If I didn't go to sleep immediately, I'd screw my eyes up to avoid having to see it. Is that why I am antiwar?

No one ever believed that I remembered that.

Later when I was in a big bed, I had this thing that there was a fried octopus under my bed. And I had never heard of calimari at the time. Needless to say, I never eat the stuff...even if it is squid.

:shrug:

[derby378]

5. I had favorite toys and not-so-favorite toys, but none that scared me

At least, not that I remember...

[ganeshji]

6. Yes. I hated Teddy Ruxpin!

[Blue-Jay]

7. Stretch Armstrong was my only friend when I was growing up.

Imagine my surprise when I stabbed him with an icepick and some amber-colored goo started leaking out.

[Poiuyt]

8. A Jerry Mahoney ventriloquist's dummy

It was fine until we saw that Twilight Zone episode where the dummy comes to life.

[spiderpig]

11. Did you ever see "Devil Doll"?

A really low-budget British film from the early 60's. Creeped my sister and me out and we never forgot it. The dummy's name was "Hugo", and we'd ominously intone the name whenever we saw a ventriloquist.

Came out on DVD a couple of years ago, so naturally I bought two and sent one to my sister so she could traumatize her 5-year-old.

:evilgrin:

[Poiuyt]

13. I haven't seen that one but there were two others that used the same theme

Dead of Night (1945) with Michael Redgrave and Magic (1978) with Anthony Hopkins.

However, it's nice to see you keeping up the family tradition of traumatizing young children.

[realisticphish]

15. It was a MST3K episode, actually

A so-so episode, but still funny

[grace0418]

9. YES! AND IT CAME BACK TO HAUNT ME LATER IN LIFE!

My mom gave me a baby doll when I was really little. It was supposed to be very lifelike, and it was. Creepily so. The thing is that I never liked dolls. Stuff animals were fine, but dolls held no interest for me (hmmm, that's interesting now that I think of it because I have pets but no children). Anyway, my mom was a really scary person, prone to freaking out at the drop of a hat. So I pretended to like the doll because *she* was so into it. But I hated that doll, it was just... just... CREEPY. I can't think of another way to describe it. There was something very "horror movie" about it.

Anyway, I moved away from home and my parents sold our house to travel when I was in college. I have very few mementoes from childhood because of this. Sure enough, though, a few years ago my mom presented me (on my 35th birthday no less) with that damn doll. She'd spent a bunch of time making a new little outfit for it, but it was still that same damn creepy doll. *shudder*

I appreciate the time she took to make a new dress for it, but it was just so indicative of how little she knows me. Just about any other toy from my childhood would've garnered a very different response. But she chose to save the one toy I really couldn't stand.

It's currently stuffed into the back of my closet, but I could totally see it coming out at night and murdering people.

[susanna]

12. Yes. Its name was Iggy and I can't really describe it...

...without requiring medication. ;-)

[Broken_Hero]

14. No, not that I recall...

My dad did have this crazy chef looking guy, who if you pulled his bowtie, he spit on your face and laughed, and that thing creeped me out.

[BlueStorm]

16. Ummm not that I recall n/t

[Nicole]

17. Only my sister.

Imagine my disgust when I learned she couldn't be returned. :P

[GenDem]

18. It was a 'Jack in the Box'

and it played 'Pop goes the Weasel' and this clown jumped up and scared the life out of me. :scared:

[Madspirit]

19. Jack in the box with clown n/t