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| Gummy bracelets rocked in the '80s and are cool even today! |
In my
sleep-away summer camp diary posts, I mentioned having a love of gummy bracelets in the 1980s and one of my readers questioned this. I'm sorry to out her, but I just had to. She's a super cool chick from the UK and goes by the name,
Girl Interrupted. Maybe you've been to her blog,
A World So Small.
Girl Interrupted mentioned having never heard of
gummy bracelets. Now, I'm cutting her some slack for two reasons. One she's seven years younger than me. This means, while I was sporting my armload of
gummy bracelets in seventh grade, she was just a little five-year-old girl in kindergarten or something. Then there's the UK factor. Maybe
gummy bracelets weren't big in the UK, although I'm sure they are -- those Brits are usually way ahead of us!
Gummy bracelets are plastic, stretchy bands which were very popular with girls around 1985/1986. They made a comeback in 2000 and are still cool today. Until recently, I was still wearing a few black gummy bracelets but they broke. I also loved
gummy rings.
Gummy rings were the same concept, only scaled down to fit your fingers. I would stack them and wear one or two.
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| These gummy bracelets are barbed wire, I loved 'em! |
Please note
gummy bracelets are not to be confused with gel bracelets which I'm quite sure are those bands which say LIVESTRONG and are cause-related. They are also not the same as friendship bracelets which were woven bracelets friends made and gave to friends. I'll blog about that another day.
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| Not a fan of the shapes. Even if I was 11, this wouldn't appeal to me. |
Today, rubbery
gummy bracelets have been replaced by silicone bands known as
Silly Bandz which I'm personally not a fan of. I don't like the thinness of the bands nor do I like that they are grouped together in corny genres. Kids love them, don't get me wrong. I just don't dig the idea of dinosaur, sea creatures or pet shaped bracelets. For example, the only
Silly Bandz I like are star-shaped. I would want to own a few of these but only 1 star comes in a 12 pack for $2.99. I would need to stock up on several packages of
Silly Bandz just to get a few star bracelets. Not cool.
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| Today's kid has replaced the gummy bracelet with Silly Bandz. |
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Months ago, my bloggie Facebook buddy
Rainy Day Saver tweeted me asking when I would blog about the
Silly Bandz craze compared to gummy bracelets, so there you go. My opinionated 2 cents.
34 comments:
OH I loved gummy bracelets. they were and still are way better then the stupid bandz..
Honestly, I don't like either, but as I've said before, those silly bandz are like crack to my students. They came in really handy those last two weeks of school.
I don't recall gummy bracelets, but those shaped gel bracelets are all the rage with The Daughter and her friends.
One thing I DO remember is those candy necklaces!
When I was 15/16 it was cool to loop them together and cram as many as you could on! I was part of 2000 redo but I didn't know they were popular in the 80s.
gummy bracelets are way better! I don't get the silly bandz at all...
Gummy bracelets rocked my socks! I especially loved the glitter gummy bracelets. Oh how it takes me back to 4th grade. Have I told you how much I love you, Ally?
Since my girls are a tad young for the silly bandz, i've only recently been noticing them on older kids when I take them to camp. everything is cyclicaly, isn't it?
I'm with Joe…when I was a kid, the candy necklaces were the bomb. Of course, I never stopped to think about the candy rubbing itself on the back of a kid's dirty neck before being eaten...
Gummy bracelets were the best! And the rings were pretty cool too. Silly Bandz... not so much.
Sorry for the double commenting, but I just read through the other comments, and it blows my mind that there are people who either didn't know what they were or didn't know that they were huge in the 80s. Amazing.
Oh how I loved my gummy bracelets. I'd wear them up to my elbows. Bands schmands.
I get that Silly Brandz totally can't hold a candle to Gummy bracelets when it comes to the older crowd. However, the young 10-ish kids (like my cousin) can't get enough of 'em. They are like sold out everywhere. Your only hope is to pay twice the price for 'em on ebay. Take that gummies! Sorry.
My favorite was putting two together to make a connected, like figure eight pattern or something around your wrist. If I had some I could demonstrate since my words are not making it clear. If you know what I mean you should amend your post and add a pic of that. You couldn't do that with these silly bandz, which are clearly, just silly.
Some idiot has relabelled them 'shag bands' here in the UK and started a mass panic. The idea is if someone snaps a certain colour than you're obliged to perform a particular sex act with them. Are there really girls so stupid as to go along with this - JUST SAY NO! duh.
I remember them best as black bands that Madonna piled up her arms so I did the same.
I love gummy bracelets! I remember looping them togeather, and wearing about 20 of them at a time.
Way better than silly bandz!
Oh Gummy Bracelets, how I loved thee! The sparkle ones were my favorite! I never saw those barbed wire ones...dang it! I would have LOVED those!
Oh, Lawdy! Granddaughters are so taken with the Silly Bandz and have SO many they have resorted to carrying them on separated, latched rings hooks. After all, an arm can only wear about 500 at at time!
I think they still sell these!
Now, in my defence, I DID actually own some of said Gummy Bracelets when younger, I just never realised that's what they were called!
I rather like the barbed wire ones, they appeal to my placid inner rebel ... I don't remember us having those here, but the Spazzy Bandz, or whatever they're called, get a big thumbs down. Whoever thought of the whole 'bracelets in the shape of animals' concept is probably of a most unnatural persuasion and, frankly, I don't trust them.
Thanks for the fun post and thanks for the lovely mention :)
Hmm... I'd rather have a candy bracelet.
I'm too old to remember these things...evidently...LOL. I don't have young kids, so I've skipped the whole silly bandz craze, too.
We called them jelly bracelets (like the shoes)...did you ever have people wear them in patterns up their arms? We were so tacky!
I remember the gummy bracelets being big around a few years ago. I was still in HS actually so 2003 till 05. I still rock them, I like them a lot, theyre just hard to find in 99 cent stores these days. They used to be everywhere now theyre scarce. The problem with these were and still kinda are the assumption that theyre sex related. Kids didnt even really know about the sex relations until people blew it up. I remember selling them in school along with the meanings cause people didnt want them snapped and owe a favor. SMH! I was 14-16 around this time so now I look back like damn, the media misplaces too much for us. Mainly it was the college kids playing the snap game then came down for HSers.Oh well I guess. The era has passed... I think
I tried wearing those Silly Bandz, but they were cutting off my circulation. I guess a 39 year old, like myself, is a bit too old for 'em. LOL
yeah, the silly bandz arent as cool as the gummy bracelets
I only had a couple black ones but wish that I had more.
I wore lots of gummy bracelets in high school, but for some reason, they were referred to as sex bracelets there. Kind of strange what happens in Catholic school.
I thought they would be edible with a name like 'gummy'
Gummy must be a regional term...in my school we called them jelly bracelets beause they remind you of jelly shoes! We would tie them together and jump rope with them. During my biker chick wanna be phase, i used to wear black ones. There used to be ones that looked like a telephone cord.
Do a blog on charm necklaces!!! The plastic chains with those awesome charms you could buy at woolworth greens etc.
I miss the gummy bracelets. My kids have been begging me for those stupid silly bandz and I finally broke down the other day and bought some at Walgreen's. They were just sitting there in the checkout line calling my name. So I bought them, but I threatened them with their lives telling them that if they gave anyone their silly bandz that I wouldn't buy any more. So far it has worked!
Hahah! I saw the Silly Bandz in Bog lots and thought that they were rubber bands. They were about $5 a package and there were only maybe 5 in the package....I thought crap those are some expensive rubber bands! I think they are still too pricey, even as bracelets. You can still buy the gummy bracelets at the 99 cents store out here in CA. I am guilty of having bought some black ones a while back. Remember the "Slap" bracelets, the kind that start out as a flat metal band covered in fabric and then you slap it over your wrist and it turns into a bracelet, coiled around your wrist? Man, they should bring those back!
I remember my Madonna bracelets...not sure which ones those were. But I just bought my 30 year old sister the Princess pack of Silly Bandz! LOL! She loves them! :)
i had tons of them... all the different colors...
remember when you twisted them together to have 2 colors in the same bracelet?
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