Avane 2015 Shopping Guide: 10 gifts for lovers of the 80s

Being old enough to fondly remember our 80's childhoods means that we stock a decent amount of 80s collectibles. We have stuff from Care Bears,  Masters of the Universe, Strawberry Shortcake, My Little Pony, Cabbage Patch Kids and at least a little something from just about every corner of 80s pop culture.

Here's our 2015 list of top gift picks for those of us who still fondly remember the 80s.

Vintage Pac Man Wind-Up Toy:

Vintage Pac-Man toy doe sale.

Pac-Man was everywhere in the early 80s pretty much everyone succumbed to Pac-man fever at one point or another. This cute little piece of nostalgia would make a great cubicle mate for your favorite Pac-Man lover.


Jem Animation Sketch Signed by Samantha Newark:

Jem and the Holograms animation sketch for sale

Jem was one of the most iconic and memorable cartoons from the 80s. It got a pretty terrible movie adaptation this year, but we shouldn't hold that against the original source material which is classic. This is an original animation sketch of Jerrica, Jem's normal personality. This sketch signed by Samantha Newark who was the speaking voice of both Jem & Jerrica. This is a unique piece and would be an amazing gift for any Jem fan.

1989 Mario Brothers Cookie Cutter:

Vintage Mario Cookie Cutter for sale.

Back in 1989 Wilton made a small set of these cookie cutters shaped like Mario characters. This one is a Spiny. In spite of it's age it's in great shape and we know form using our own set that they still work after all these years This cute little cutter is sure to make Holiday cookies a little more fun.



Masters of The Universe He-Man & Skeletor Laundry Bag:

Vintage He-Man Collectible for sale

Anyone who knows someone who collects Masters of the Universe toys and collectibles knows that there's a ton of merchandise available but most of it is fairly similar. However, this item is rare, we've only seen a handful of them for sale, so most collectors don't even knew it exists! So if you're looking for something unique for a collector who has just about everything else, this He-Man Laundry bag is a great choice.

Vintage Care Bears Funshine Bear Plush:

80s Care Bears Funshine Bear for sale.

The Care Bears has gotten several reboots over the years, but most of us know the original 80s version was by far the best. This is one of the original 80s Care Bears plush stuffed bears, Funshine. Not perfect but still in good shape after all these years, a huggable piece of nostalgia for any 80s kid.

Transformers Record and Storybook:

Vintage 80s Transformers Book and Record for sale

 I remember loads of these book and record combos from my 80s childhood. (records played on Fisher Price record players naturally) This Transformers book is in good shape for it's age and the accompanying record is in even better shape.  A really fun piece of nostalgia any Transformers fan would love to get as a gift. Double fun if you give it to someone with kids and watch them attempt to explain how the big black things can play music and sounds.

Vintage 80s G1 My Little Pony Show Stable Commercial  Cel:

My Little Pony Show Stable Commercial Cel for sale.

My Little Pony has rather successfully been rebooted as Friendship is Magic, but many of us still love the cute chubby pastel ponies from the early days. This is a great  Hand Painted Animation cel of Cotton Candy from the animated portion of the My Little Pony Show Stable Commercial. This is a unique one of a kind MLP item, perfect for the Pony fan in your life.

Rainbow Brite Plush Sprite Romeo:

Vintage Rainbow Brite Sprite Romeo

Rainbow Brite was a childhood favorite of mine, a distinction I know I share with many other ladies who were little girls in the 80s. I know I'd be thrilled to get this cute little plush sprite. This one is Romeo and he is 30 years old now, so he's got some wear, but still looks adorable. A wonderful gift choice for any Rainbow Brite Lover.

The Land Before Time Littlefoot Stuffed Dinosaur Plush:

Vintage The Land Befrore Time Littlefoot for sale.

The Land Before Time is a long running movie series with a newest installment slated to come out next year. However, the first and pretty universally agreed to be best film in the series, came out back in the 80s, This is a large (16 inch) plush of Littlefoot the adorable main character of the film. This plush is dated the same year as the first movie, 1988, but is still looking great for his age and is just as soft and huggable as ever.

Cabbage Patch Kids Porcelain Figure:

80s Cabbage Kid figurine for sale.

Cabbage Patch Kids dolls were ubiquitous in the 80s, they were pretty much everywhere and many of us fondly remember dragging or chubby little adoptees with us everywhere. As an adult it's slightly harder to work a baby doll into your decor so this cute little porcelain figure is a perfect choice for some adult nostalgia. She's happy to hang out on a bookshelf or desk being a cute little reminder of those first forays into parenthood.

We have so many great 80s toys that it was hard to limit this list to just 10! So if you don't see something in this list we probably still have something great on our site just waiting to be discovered. If you're looking for a unique vintage collectible, we've got you covered. If you've got friends or family with a flair for the geeky we've probably got the perfect something in stock at www.avaneshop.com right now!

~Stephanie

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Collection Oddities: Vintage Mario Halloween Mask

 One of our most infamous posts was our Legend of Zelda Link Halloween Mask. It's October again, so we thought it high time we horrify with some more Nintendo Insanity from 1989.  In addition to making our little green hatted hero of Hyrule, they also made everyone's favorite mustachioed plumber for children of the 80's to horrify their friends and loved ones on Halloween or any other occasion.

It'sa YOU! MARIO!

Like Link this is an official product tagged Nintendo of America 1989, has large souless holes for eyes and is a made of the same breathable plastic. It's a little better than Link though as it actually resembles 80's era Mario rather than a demented Leprechaun, and looks a little less horrifying on a human being.

Link still edges out Mario as being our favorite creepy plastic mask, but Mario is still a pretty fun and still creeps out our friends. However given the brittleness of the vintage plastic and the general uncomfortableness of an 80's plastic mask it's probably better left as decorative item than an actual usable mask.

We display our proudly next to our Link mask and someday we hope to add any more of these monstrosities Nintendo may have made. (we know in addition to Mario and Link ,there's Yoshi, but who knows what else might be out there)


~Stephanie

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Collection Oddities: 1989 Mario Cheez Whiz Jar

It's been awhile since we've had time to do a collection oddities post, but this special item joined our collection a few weeks back and it's just too fantastically odd not to share. So I bring you The Official Mario Cheez Whiz Jar:

It looks upsetting but it's just water and food coloring

It was empty when  got it so we filled it with colored water to help show the details. In retrospect yellow water may not have been the best choice, but ambiguously yellow water is markedly less horrifying than the 1 kg (2.2 lbs) of processed cheese that originally filled the jar, especially when you consider it would be 22 years old now. *shudder*


 In spite of having this misfortune of being a promotion for what is quite possibly one of the least edible "foods" to ever be commercially available, this is actually a pretty cool item. Unlike most promotional food items that just have an image screen printed on them, the entire jar is fully molded into a portly princess saving plumber.

Without the yellow water he seems sort of cross eyed

Even the lid is interesting and features Mario and the Super Mario Brothers logo.

In English and French in case you need to know how to translate "Process cheese spread"

 In spite of our opinion that it's great, there's no denying that it's weird. I mean the concept of an entire 1kg jar of Cheez Whiz is pretty odd in itself, who could possibly eat that much gooey plastic?  Then, it's shaped like Mario for some sort of unclear promotion, "It's Mario, It's yellowish orange plastic, together at last! Buy it!" Does Mario love Cheez Whiz? Are the circuit boards in Mario 2 made of Cheez whiz? What?

Regardless of the mind boggling reasons such a thing exists, it does and it fabulous and no cracktastic Mario collection should be without one.

 ~Stephanie

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Collection Oddities: Super Mario Brothers TV Tray

For my first Oddity of the new year I've decided to highlight something that could have been a completely normal and legitimate item, but didn't quite come out that way, The Super Mario Brothers TV Tray.

At it's core it's a normal light metal TV or lap Tray. When the legs are extended it's roughly 4" tall and measures probably 16" across*. At the time a TV tray was a perfectly reasonable piece of merchandise and something most homes had in the 80's so it was normal thing for Nintendo to market. What wasn't normal is to find an a drug addled artist to put an even more incoherent spin on the already clearly drug influenced world of the mushroom kingdom.


There's a lot of especially crazy stuff going on. That's not even taking into account the things you just accept about the mushroom kingdom, like mushrooms reading in the living room and stars making phone calls. There's honestly so much, I'm not sure I can't properly even mock it all, but that won't stop me from trying:

Crazy proportions everywhere, the crooked man in the crooked house had nothing on this place.

Television screen seemingly made of paper, and while looking at that note that one of Bowser's claws in backwards.

• Luigi coming from Doorway quite possibly designed by a drunk MC Escher.
• Barber Pole in what should be a plumbing shop
• Phonebooth inside house (or whatever sort of dwelling this can be called)
• Lamp screaming (this is unfortunately very hard to see in my picture, but I assure you it's happening)
• Toad, just look at toad. He's um...phallic.
  
• And that thing on the wall that looks sort of like a muffin or a hair comb? That's half of a woman's face with fringe on the bottom. Seriously.
• 
  

And that's just the most obvious stuff, not even the things you have to think about like for example, Mario. I can accept that Mario has somehow managed to procure a giant NES advantage pad (it's a bit inaccurate, but you can tell what it is) and is using like a Power Pad. What I can't understand is why he's attempting to use it facing away from the television. I also can't understand why he's suddenly deaf to the cries of bascially everyone else, including the inanimate objects (IE the screaming lamp), and continues to pose happily with his giant prototype.

In spite of all the awful there are some things about I consider good:

Old, bald, mentally disturbed and much scarier Bowser character design. This sort of Bowser pretty much disappeared by the time Mario 3 came out, so I'm always thrilled to find anything old with him.

• Old, Italian Stereotype Mario and Luigi. I know it's insensitive, but I love how ridiculous and inappropriate their old designs are.
• The NES Advantage, sure it's drawn inaccurately, but how often do you see something other than your standard NES control in merchandise?
• The goomba. Look at him over there with his hands he shouldn't have peering in the window, adorable.

On the whole, there's a lot more crack than good. But, honestly we bought it for the crack just as much as we bought it for the "good". Sometimes I'm sad items of this caliber are no longer being created (officially at least, bootlegs are a totally different story), then I realize that it probably much better for everyone else this way.

~Stephanie

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