I got losts of memories of this sort of stuff, but I'll start with the BIGGEST haul (and more importantly the most unexpected) of my younger days:

It was Christmas 1985 and my Aunt & Uncle had gotten me 3-4 shirt-box sized packages (we all know as kids that shirt-boxes, mean clothes, which translates into....dissapointing (usually) Christmas or Birthday gifts). So, I opened the first one with little hope of a cool toy, and sure enough - there was a shirt or sweater or something, but then when I held it up for the "show us what you got" obligatory photo-op...... a Joe fell out!!!! My Aunt had put a carded Joe in the folds of the shirt, so there WAS a toy INSIDE the shirt - like a reverse Trojan Horse! That was so awesome and uinexpected to find Alpine, Shipwreck, and Bazooka inside of 3 shirtboxes.

I also scored Tele-Viper, Snow Serpent, Eel, Barbecue, and the first 3 'Noks wrapped the traditional way. My "big gift" that year was the TTBP and I also got Frostbite & the Snowcat either that Christmas or 2 months later for my 9th Birthday. So, after the gifts were all unwrapped and the adults went into the kitchen to prepare Christmas dinner I remember having a grand ol' time unboxing everything on the orange high-pile living room rug and having some Christmas show or special on the old dial-tuner TV on the metal-legged TV stand that got 3 channels back then. I was allowed to keep my new Joe-palooza set up in the Living Room over by the cement/brick fireplace hearth for another week or so until after New Years was over and it was time to head back to the 3rd grade....

So that's my "shirt-tale". Quite a lucky, fun, memorable Christmas that one was!