1984-8:PLAYSETS

With an introduction of a whole set of Baby Ponies, it seems logical that they needed somewhere to live! The Lullabye Nursery was the solution - a nursery equipped with bathing, play and bed facilities that were all a baby pony could want. With this playset came a cheeky little baby pony, "Baby Tiddly Winks", who, by dint of her playset release, is one of the more common Baby Ponies from the early years. The above picture is taken from the UK insert, 1985.

In the United Kingdom, the Lullabye Nursery was offered through till 1988-9 and for the whole time the baby pony sold with the set was the original edition baby, with normal style eyes and three white freckles on her nose. In the United States and Canada, sometime around 1986 the release changed to include a Beddy Bye Eyed version of baby Tiddly Winks. She was never sold in the UK, and had open and shut eyes to fit the new style of the time. She had also lost her freckles! Both babies are pictured below. Please note that Beddy Bye Eye Baby Tiddly Winks's hair has faded somewhat and should be the same pink as Original Baby Tiddly Winks's.

BEDDY BYE EYE (1986, N America) and ORIGINAL (1984-1988, Worldwide)
Baby Tiddly Winks

Probably as a result of being released for so many years, there are accessory variations to this playset. Some sets have a blue bath, cabinet, shelf unit and mirror, and others have a pink bath, cabinet, shelf unit and mirror. Both are equally common. There is also a grey area surrounding the playset's stickers - though it seems both flat and puffy sticker options were available :)

LULLABYE NURSERY: UK BOX (1985-9)

UK Hasbro produced their own box for Lullabye Nursery, featuring the Baby Ponies which were available for the kids at this time. This image is the box from my Lullabye Nursery, which I got (I believe!) at Christmas 1987 or 1988 (quite late on). You'll notice that Baby Lemon Drop is featured in the box image. Although on the insert, Lullabye Nursery is NOT included on Hasbro's list for 1985, and the box image including Baby Lemon Drop suggests that it might not have reached the UK until late in 1985, since Baby Lemon Drop was officially part of 1986's line (new ponies usually came out in the UK in the October or November before). Baby Applejack also appears in the upstairs, suggesting links to 1985. The insert image definitely seems to have been drawn from this promotional photograph. My Lullabye Nursery was Made in West Germany - I am unsure whether that is significant, or whether earlier ones were different.

I apologise that the box is a bit battered - it had to survive my childhood ;)

Lullabye Nursery (Argos Catalogue, 1986)
Retail price: £21.95 or thereabouts.

Lullabye Nursery: Index Catalogue, Autumn/Winter 1988-9
Interestingly, despite how late on in the line this promotion was, and how many years the nursery had already been out, the Index catalogue describes Baby Tiddly Winks as "the latest arrival baby". At this point, the nursery was retailing for around £25. The accessories shown inboth the Index and Argos catalogues match the colour of the accessories my nursery have (and the box colours) in spite of the different year releases. There are variations, though; my sister's nursery (which she got second hand in 1990) had reversed accessory colours to this - with pink and blue items swapped around (mirror, bath, swing, bowl, etc). The accessories shown in the above image are exact to the accessories that came with my (Made in West Germany) Nursery, although it also came with multi-lingual stickers (which I happily stuck all over the walls XD)

French "Mon Petit Poney" front stickers, English Tiddley (sic) Winks sticker and French and German Lullabye Nursery stickers
(images from my Nursery)

My set came with Mein Kleines Pony stickers as well as a flat sticker in the style of round, puffy ones in English for Baby Tiddly Winks. I was an idiot child and I stuck the stickers in funny places, hence the internal photo shots xD. (I was six >.>). For that reason the Mein Kleines Pony rainbow stickers (which spent much of their life on the front of my nursery) are not in good enough condition to photograph.