Entry #1: Week of Jan 24

I'm not sure if I am supposed to comment on a physical item that I created in the past, but I have something (more of a game) I created and used to play when I was younger that was particularly memorable for me...
When I was younger, my brother and I created a game that we played in our living room. I think many kids have imagined and played this game, but it was so much fun for us. We would imagine the floor was all lava and the object of the game was to make it to a "safe spot" (another room or the bathroom or somewhere) without touching the lava or you would "die". In order to do this, couch cushions were placed and used as stepping stones to walk across the lava.
This game that we created was memorable for me because it was something that I sort of taught my brother (I enjoy teaching others different things) and something we needed to do together in order to succeed. This game was somewhat of a bonding experience for my brother and me and it was a lot of fun. We loved playing games together, especially make-believe games that we created ourselves.

Before my four step-brothers came along, I was an only child. I didn't mind having to play all by myself each day because I loved to play with my dolls and stuffed animals, but I especially enjoyed making arts and crafts. Each year around Christmas time I would work on my newest addition to the holiday decor around the house. Till this day I continue to make new ornaments, pictures, wreaths, and other Christmas decorations to be displayed. It is a treat to unpack the cold totes from the attic and reminisce about each craft I made from year to year. My favorite decoration I have made so far is a mistletoe scrapped together with some pipe cleaners and shinny paper. I put it right above the front door each year where there is bound to be a kiss waiting for someone special.

I used to always ask my dad to tell me a story before I went to bed. After a while I always requested the story about a dog named Sandy. The story was always the same: Sandy was the best dog and friend, but one day she would go missing. I would look all around for her and in the end I would always find her. My dad would often tell the story with a little twist, in a certain time of year, or add something new to keep my imagination going even though I knew how the story would end. My dad and I still bring up the story and it's great for both of us to remember when I was little and how much I loved listening to that story.

I remember using large cardboard boxes with my sister and friends to create different settings and play games. One time we turned a cardboard box into a “bank” and would take turns being the bank teller and the customer. We made fake money to play with, and would act however we thought adults acted inside of banks. Another time we turned a cardboard box into a time machine. We concocted a “time potion” that consisted of random ingredients like juice, toothpaste, and soap that we had to taste (yuck) in order to be able to go back in time. Once one of us would “go back in time” while the rest of us communicated with them using little electronic toys that could type and send messages to each other. It was kind of like text messaging, but less sophisticated. According to us, typing and sending messages was the only way to communicate with one another when we were in different times. I get happy when thinking about all of the imaginary games I used to play as a child. I think part of the reason they were so exciting is because you can suspend your disbelief so easily when you are a child. When playing the time machine game, it really felt like I was communicating with my sister who went back into the 1800s. Today, it is fun to have those “Remember when….” stories to talk about with her. I feel lucky to have someone in my life who shares a common past.

When I think about my childhood and a time when I used my imagination to create something that was memorable for me, the first thing I think about was playing “store” in my room with my little sister and my friends. I remember being obsessed with Bath and Body Works and having almost all the body sprays, lotions, shower gels, glitters, etc. We would take all of the bottles and set them up around my room and pretend that we worked in a store and those were what we sold. At the time, I had an electronic cash register with a scanner that we used to scan the barcodes on each of the bottles and it made it seem more real. The whole process of setting up the store, giving it a name, making signs and posters for it, etc. was what made it fun.

I think that when you are young you use your imagination to become someone else. Make believe games allow you to explore roles and what you think being an adult is really like. A lot of children like to pretend that they work in a store and get to handle money, deal with customers, etc. I remember always wanting to use a cash register. Pressing the buttons, scanning items, and handling money was something exciting; it allowed you to use your imagination to do something that you wouldn’t normally get to do. There were no limits.

When I was little, I used to create model houses with my sister from scratch. Our mom would take us to a little store downtown that sold a random assortment of crafts (floor tiles, cardboard tubes, mini bubble gum machines, carpet scraps...think Axe Man for crafts). Each time our houses became more and more elaborate, and we would spend longer amounts of time trying to out-do each other. The purpose of these houses was to have a place for our favorite stuffed animals to live in; I had a little dog (although it closely resembled a rabbit) name Boofus, and she had a small brown bear named Beary. At the time, I liked making these things because of the competition, but looking back, it was meaningful to me because it gave me a chance to spend time with my sister doing something that we both enjoyed.

Thinking back, the most memorable thing I would create was a blanket fort with my younger sister. Growing up, we had a large livingroom, and my sister an I would drag the chairs from the dining room and kitchen tables there to drape my parent's king sized comforter and every other blanket or large cloth that we could find over them. We would create these "mansions" with every necessary room needed, and yes, that included a bathroom (don't worry, we didn't actually relieve ourselves in there). Our blanket forts would usually last a day if we were lucky, but there were so many good memories made in the numerous blanket "mansions." What made this so memorable for me was the closeness I felt with my younger sister. It was such a safe environment for the two of us (unless of course a tornado came through, in which case, our roof would collapse). We would usually forget the fighting and just laugh and play together, living in the moment.

Thinking back to my childhood that I used my imagination to created thing that was memorable was the time that I played with my toys. As a kid, I used to have a lot of toys to play with. One of the toys I enjoyed the most was the soldier type of toys that had a board under their feet. Those toys were what make my imagination.
I remember when I was about four years old, I used to divide my toys into two groups, one group would be the good guys and of course the other group would be the bad guys. My imagination would create a story for those two groups of toys. There was always a controversy between the two groups. Often time I would put myself into one of the characters that I created. I would lead and decided what happened to each of the characters in the two groups. In the story, the good guys which was the group that I was in always win.
In conclusion, it was a memorable time to play with toys and making up story that went alone with it. It allowed me to be more creative and expressed myself as a kid like any other kids.

Something that I imagined and made in my childhood, was a clay castle. It was horribly made, mind you. But I loved making things like castles, dragons and knights. I always used to imagine myself being in the middle age times with kings and queens and myself as a knight who had to fight dragons. When I was younger, I was always imagining things in my head like this because I thought life was too boring. This was meaningful because it was a way for my to learn, and escape from reality. I was interested in this, because I only saw it in books or video games and I wanted it to be real. The castle I made gave me a sense of something actually being real that wasn't just made up in my head.

As a child, most of my creative play was collaborative with my brothers. There were a lot of different ways we played, but I'll focus on one.

We built 'Lego' civilizations including buildings, ships and weapons. Eventually, bored with our creations, we waged wars which reduced it all back into bricks.

At the time, I think it was meaningful just because I was spending time with my brothers. It's hard to remember any specific attachment to a specific creation, but that may have been a part of it as well.

As an only child, I spent an inordinate amount of time attempting to entertain myself. I had a rather extensive collection of He-Man action figures, which I wouldn't "play" with so much as organize scenarios for, positioning each character in expansive action scenes, which usually became so immersive as to be unmanageable. This all ended, of course, when I got a NES at the age of 8. Skeletor and Hordak were no match for Mario and Luigi. However, one habit from childhood carried through this digital age: reading. Always an avid reader, I was constantly able to construct new worlds based around the author's words, losing myself in the act of imagination. In fact, it took years for me to realize that the reality I created was only one interpretation. I think the movie adaptation of Pet Semetary was the first time I'd seen a movie based on a book I'd already read. The disconnect between the story I'd imagined and that presented on the screen really cemented the fact that I'd been actively creating my own imaginary world.

As I have said other times in class I am not a creative person. I never used much creativity even in childhood. I can remember one thing my friends and I used our imagination for in childhood. I had a couple toy guns in my garage which my friends and I used to create an elaborate war game. The only specific detail I can remember is crabapples that fell from the tree in my yard were grenades. The stem was the pin so once it was pulled the grenade was live. This was one of the few times I did something creative as a child.

When I was a kid I used to play in my sand-box for hours everyday. I would create the usual childhood creations, such as sand castles and digging holes. But I was also obsessed with creating bridges and making road ways in my sand-box for my trucks to drive. It was memorable and meaningful because my dad was a contractor who actually built roads and bridges. I used to think that I was just like him and could create these things too.

When I think back to when I was young I cannot really think of a certain date where I first imagined this, but I do remember that I imagined it many more times. What I imagined was that I was the captain for a spaceship that and i was fighting many evil races of aliens to protect the earth. I remember how the bridge of the ship was set up and I even tried to build what was in my mind out of legos multiple times. This is memorable because what I imagined is something that I wanted to see in the real world and tried to do so through legos. This was the first time that I tried to make something in my head into reality.

In my childhood, I couldn’t have my own room because there weren’t enough rooms in our house for six family members. Since I’m the youngest, I had to yield rooms to my sisters and share the room with my parents, which I really didn’t like. I really wanted to have my own space. That’s why I started to wish sleeping in a tent near the house. For me, tent was just perfect because it guarantees certain size of space for me just like a room. However, it was impossible to do that not only because we didn’t have a tent but because there was no backyard of my house. So I decided to create one – with two chairs, a long rubber band, and Korean traditional wrapping cloth called Bojagi which is a thin and square-shaped fabric used for gift wrapping, wedding decoration, fashion, ritual, and even packing. And the shape of the tent I intended to make was close to the one used by nomadic people in early history which I had seen on TV several times. First of all, I brought two chairs for support. Next, I tied up a rubber band on top of both chairs to make a string between them. Third, I tied two Bojagi to that rubber string as a kind of partitian and hung down them to the ground. That’s it. Even though it was somewhat crude, it looked like a tent anyway! And sometimes I tried to reform my tent by tying lower edges of Bojagi to a leg of both chairs to secure more space inside. It was still memorable for me because I created my own space by using familiar objects such as Bojagi and chairs. (Actually those chairs were ones for our kitchen table so I had to disassemble my tent all the time when the meal time was coming and reassembled them again, which my sisters and parents thought somewhat hilarious.) Sometimes when my uncle and cousins came to my house, moreover, they saw my tent and amazed. Also my tent was really cozy! Even more than my real room which I got after moving to bigger house. Maybe that’s why I still miss my handmade tent and think it is really special for me.

There was a narrow area in between our garage and the neighbor's fence that I used to play in all the time when I was around 8 or 9. I turned it into a sort of club house, and I used stones and sticks and other stuff to build furniture and whatever else I wanted in there. The entrance was hidden behind trees, and I set up a door to get into the area. Only myself and a few of my friends knew the secret password to get in. I would bring stuff from inside the house to my secret place and my friends and I would play roleplaying games like house or detective or something. We created decorations for it and it became one of our favorite places to hang out. I don't remember how long we actively used it because it has stripped bare.