16 Canadian TV Shows That Totally Shaped Your Childhood

Because you really wanted a tickle trunk.

If you grew up in Canada in the late '80s and '90s, you probably watched these TV shows when the street lights came on (or on Saturday morning while eating your French Toast Crunch):

1. Mr. Dressup

CBC

CBC

How much did you want a tickle trunk of your own? It was basically a trunk full of imagination.

2. The Friendly Giant

CBC / Via Facebook: The-Friendly-Giant

Look up! Waaay up!

While us millennials were only treated to reruns of this iconic TV show, Friendly managed to make an impression on our generation. Admit it, you totally wanted to be invited to the castle to sit in one of those little chairs.

3. Polka Dot Door

TVOntario / Via aelynn.tumblr.com

Full grown adults + puppets= basically all of Canada's children's programming in the late '80s.

Is it weird that we weren't freaked out by Polkaroo?

4. The Elephant Show with Sharon, Lois, and Bram

CBC / Via aelynn.tumblr.com

Hands up if you know all the words and the actions to "Skinnamarink".

We'll ignore the fact that this show was based on the premise that 3 adults and 1 elephant lived platonically together and were constantly followed around by a random group of kids.

"Skinnamarinky dinky dink, skinnamarinky do..."

5. Today's Special

TVOntario

TVOntario

OMG I wanted to live in a department store so bad. Did anyone else sneakily try putting hats on mannequins when their mom wasn't looking? No? Just me?

PS. We were all obviously pretty tough preschoolers—that mouse is the stuff of nightmares.

6. The Big Comfy Couch

YTV / Via guycodeblog.mtv.com

We all aspired to do the "Ten Second Tidy".

YTV / Via tumblr.com

And this was the "Molly" we grew up with.

7. Babar

Nelvana / Via listal.com

Anthropomorphic, aristocratic elephants? I feel like there are a lot of issues here.

Whatever...Babar was a BOSS.

8. Under the Umbrella Tree

CBC

CBC

Holly, Iggy, Jacob, and Gloria made it look like having roommates was so much fun: Crafts! Songs! Life lessons gently delivered!

Somehow this did not pan out in real life.

9. Animorphs

YTV/Nickelodeon

imgur.com

As we got older and craved a bit more action, Animorphs had us covered with alien-fighting, animal-morphing teenagers. Totally scarred for life by the maggots being dropped into ears, though.

10. Goosebumps

downrabbitholes.tumblr.com / Via giphy.com

Because kids don't need sleep, right?

YTV / Via blogut.ca

Nah, they don't. Because if they sleep, they might wake up to THIS standing over them.

11. Are You Afraid of the Dark?

YTV / Via shocktillyoudrop.com

I don't know who sat down and thought: "What kinds of TV shows do '90s kids need?" and came up with horror anthologies, but here we are.

Arguably scarier than Goosebumps, Are You Afraid of The Dark? had Canadian kids answering "yes, yes we are".

YTV / Via thehorroronline.wordpress.com

Because OMFG.

12. ReBoot

YTV / Via inwap.com

A computer animated show taking place in a computer. Meta.

It definitely made you wonder what really happened every time you popped in Oregon Trail.

13. Video and Arcade Top 10

YTV

Yes, this was basically watching other kids play video games. But hey, there was no Netflix in the '90s. You took what you could get.

14. The Odyssey

CBC / Via blog.canuxploitation.com

This show was delightfully confusing. Where was Jay really? Who's dead? Who's alive? How are these children, who never grow older than 16, reproducing? So many questions. So many reasons to tune in next time.

15. Uh-Oh

YTV / Via youtube.com

Wink Yahoo was so fantastically eccentric. You wanted to be on this kid's game show and you kind of really wanted the wheel to land on Uh-Oh.

YTV / Via youtube.com

Because getting slimed actually looked like so much fun.

16. And finally... Breaker High

YTV / Via outisthrough.wordpress.com

Guys, these kids went to high school on a cruise ship. Ridiculous? Yes. But we could also dream about going to Language Arts in tankinis and sunglasses.

Oh, and Breaker High brought us a more grown-up Ryan Gosling. So there's that.

YTV / Via eviemae.buzznet.com

We had some great children's programming in Canada in the '80s and '90s. Kids these days don't know what they're missing.

Treehouse TV / Via thechildrensnook.com

(Unfortunately, they're now being subjected to Toopy and Binoo.)