Welcome to the E-Mail Archive, the storage place for older messages. As messages lose their relevance to the present time, they will be placed here, where hopefully they will still have some historical interest. Correspondents will be sorted alphabetically by surname.

JANINE ANGOVE (HORNSBY HEIGHTS, NSW, AUSTRALIA)

In July 1999, Janine declared herself to be "heartily sick of the Pyramiao". At one stage, she got seven in a row! I must agree with Janine, the Pyramiao were really rather more common than they ought to have been. Hand-painted figurines are supposed to be a little harder to get than regular "K" series toys, but in this case, one felt more fortunate to get a K99 toy than a hand-painted Pyramiao for a while there! The Four Seasons Gnomes have been somewhat harder to find, though these are reasonably common nowadays.

In mid-October of that same year, Janine reported that she had found some eggs with K00 toys! These were dated 2/9/00, and were in a single Coles supermarket. However, she later said that no more had turned up and that the K00 finds had been the result of a mistaken shipment. New Zealand has now gone past that date, and we are still in K99 toys.

USHA AMARANATHAN (PALMERSTON NORTH, NZ)

Usha provided the first official sighting of the K99 series in NZ, writing to me at the beginning of April 1999. This was appearing in six-packs at K-Mart. The K99 series is now readily available in Wellington, in use-by dates of 10 October 1999 onwards.

NANCY BRADFORD (CANADA)

Around the middle of 2000, Nancy opined to me that Kinder Surprise toys "are really cute and fun to put together. The chocolate is good too." She is also a fan of the puzzles. Nancy got into Kinder toys by putting one each in her two sons' Christmas stockings. Though these two boys are now 25 and 27, "they still enjoy getting them and it is still a tradition after many years". She adds, "I get one for each of them on many other occasions also". Finally, Nancy says her first ever Kinder Surprise toy was a dump truck given her by one of her sons for her birthday. Apparently, the dumper would only work when the truck rolled backwards, and not forwards. Sounds like an interesting sort of toy. It's interesting to discover what Kinder Surprise toys mean to people, so my thanks to Nancy for sharing that.

PAULA BROUGH (AUCKLAND, NZ)

In August 2000, Paula shared the following tip for storing jigsaws:

"I am a cigarette smoker and smoke rollies. I save the cellophane wrapers [sic] and use these, however bought cellophane or gladwrap (not the best for viewing) will also work - cut out cardboard to fit jigsaw puzzle. Assemble jigsaw puzzle on cardboard. Wrap in clear plastic (cellophane, gladwrap, what-have-you) and cellotape [sic] at the back. This protects the jigsaw puzzles, keeps all the pieces in one place, makes displaying easy, and does not in any way damage or cause permenent [sic] effect to the puzzles (keeping them mint for trading purposes). When you get another jigsaw in the set you simply do the same proceedure [sic[, then cellotape [sic] both (or all 3 or 4) together."

Please be advised that cigarette smoking is hazardous to the health and is not endorsed by the author of this Web site. Nonetheless, Paula's tip is worth noting.

C, M, J & K (SOMEWHERE IN BRITISH COLUMBIA)

While shy about revealing their identities, this foursome were not backwards in expressing their opinion about something called the "Calico Cats" (sounds like yet another name for the Pyramiao) in February 2000. "3 out of 4 eggs contained these un-innovative [sic] little plastic critters". Sorry to hear that, guys.

HEATHER KNOWLES (OTANE, HAWKE'S BAY, NZ)

In early September, Heather got a Chinese Beaver hand-painted figurine in a Kinder egg she bought at a supermarket! This was Castorcin Zonzo Ling, and is from the series called "Castor in China". These figurines are about 1 in 1,000, because they weren't supposed to be issued Down Under, but a few got slipped in by mistake. So Heather was very fortunate. Unfortunately, she couldn't remember the use-by date of the egg, but nonetheless, she should be congratulated on her find.

BARBARA MANN (MISSISSAUGA, ONTARIO, CANADA)

In June 1999, Barbara shared what she liked and didn't like about Kinder Surprise. Her favourite Kinder toys were those "which have movable parts or do something". A particular favourite was the "little glass duck from 1998 because it is pretty". And she liked the Smurfs - this is a lady with good taste! However, Barbara was not so fond of the wooden toys, because you can't assemble those. "I actually feel a little ripped off when there isn't anything to assemble or stick on," she wrote. Duplicates were her pet hate, though. "What to do when they are overflowing my closet?" Another gripe she had is that it is hard to complete sets, because Canada doesn't get all the toys in a series. This has been the case with the K98 series. Canada got all except the Looney Tunes stick figures and jigsaw puzzles. Did any country get those? Finally, Barbara was not overly fond of Kinder chocolate. This seems to be an acquired taste for some, though I must say it's one I acquired easily enough!