What was on your box?

Last night on Facebook, Lisa Yee asked what everyone had on their lunch boxes when they were a kid. I'm totally into nostalgic stuff like that, so I jumped on the post right away. Pretty soon, I found myself on eBay, searching vintage lunch boxes. Some brought back memories. I went to grade school in the 1970s and lunch boxes were a big deal. It was even more so because I went to a school that didn't have a cafeteria, so we had no choice other than bringing our lunch from home.

Do kids even use lunch boxes today? It's something I haven't looked for in a long time since my kids are homeschooled. I'm sure if they do, they're a lot different than what I used. I'm sure the bags are all insulated and come with cooling packs. The first lunch box I remember was an old metal type. It wasn't anything fancy. It was a simple red plaid design, very much like the one at the bottom of this post. I'm pretty sure I picked it out, but I bet my mom was a big influence with her love for plaid. (I have pictures of me in plaid dresses and pants to prove that.) It's funny when I think about it because I can almost still smell what the inside of those old metal boxes smelled like. It's hard to explain, but I guess some things stay with you forever. Then I remember getting the box in the picture up top with Snoopy. I loved that lunch box! I never had the metal version because that came out in the 60s. By the time I got mine, they had switched to plastic. I think sometime in between the plaid box and the plastic Snoopy dome box, I also had a metal Peanuts lunch box. I don't remember exactly which one, but I'm thinking it was this ...

Reading the replies on Lisa's post was fun. I remembered some of the boxes people mentioned. Some really showed their age though, like me with the older boxes or others saying they had Spice Girls on theirs. I had to laugh when I looked at vintage lunch boxes on eBay and saw things like New Kids On The Block. I guess that was a long time ago for some, but I go way further back than that. How about you? Did you carry a lunch box when you were a kid? Or did you use paper bags? I eventually went to bags, but I'm not sure when that was. I remember when the "Have A Nice Day!" campaign came out and I was so excited about having happy faces on my lunch bags. It's funny the things we remember sometimes ...