Throughout my life, there has been one secret that I swore I would never reveal. But today, I finally did…and it feels amazing. When I shared this story on Threads today, I was blown away by all the love this story got. So here it is…and a whole lot more!
When I was 19, I flew to New Zealand to visit my boyfriend and celebrate our 1 year anniversary (you can read our long distance love story here!). Before I jumped in the shower, I told him to jump on my laptop to research some places for us to go on our trip to Australia. I told him I saved some places in my bookmarks. So while I was in the shower, he went on my computer.
As I came out, he was staring at me. It suddenly dawned on me that he had discovered my bookmarked websites. All of them.
I froze. This was it. My worst nightmare.
He looked at me and said, “Justine, what is…this?” He turned the laptop.
My face turned bright red as I covered my eyes. No no no. I had no choice but to confess.
“It’s an iWeb website database my sister and I made about the lore and universe of our stuffed animals.”
The way this man tried to contain his laughter. Of course, just when I thought I couldn’t get more embarrassed, he discovered THE MUSIC.
Guys, I had recorded like 2 full length pop albums using garage band in the voices of my stuffed animals.
My face was beat red but he found this secret whimsy of mine simultaneously hilarious and adorable.
Obviously, I married him and what I once found to be an absolutely embarrassing secret, I’m now so darn thankful for. Our kids, especially our 6 year old, is obsessed with all the silly lore my sister and I created. She plays the songs for her stuffies to dance to and every night, we play with them and dive deep into this fantasy world I created once upon a time.
Never be ashamed of your whimsey. It’s there for all the right reasons.
How It All Began
My sister and I played with our stuffed animals since as far back as I can remember. As kids, we had TV shows we filmed with them and Academy Award shows we made our parents sit down and vote on for all the categories. They also had to watch two seasons of “As You Like It”, our stuffed animal version of The Bachelorette which always had a shocking twist of course!
But as we grew up, our game took on a whole other life. These toys developed such stories and personalities that we kept running with it. As teenagers, I recorded multiple albums of music in my stuffed animal voices. They were silly and fun. At a time when I was going through so much (I dropped out of high school at 16 due to health issues), these games kept me feeling playful and able to express myself somewhere.
Eventually, iWeb came into existence. Naturally, we took one look at the opportunity to make a free website and ran with it. An entire database was built full of all the lore.
And oh, there was a lot of lore.
The Photo Tax
After sharing this story on Threads, naturally everyone was requesting I share some photos! This is only a small part of it.
A little map info: Mun Land is where the Puffalumps live. Don’t know why we called them Muns but that is their entire species. Also after too much Grease “Blue Moon”, they became obsessed with their mooners and that’s their entire lore. They moon on Mundays. 😭
Baby Land is for Baby Bunnies. Peter Rabbits specifically, who like eating human aunties (mainly because as the little sister, I got annoyed at my older sister from time to time and let it out by pretending my stuffed bunny was eating her).
And Dyn Land is where the Toto birds live who are actually Grovers. They drink tea and hate muns mooning.
The Music Tax
Last but certainly not least (I can’t believe I’m sharing this)… here are a handful of the nearly 60 songs I recorded back then using Garage Band. I never expected anyone to ever hear these other than my kids but here we are! These songs are silly and ridiculous and obviously not made in a professional studio so please do not judge.
Melly MunMo (Mun Pop)
Melly MunMo was the biggest Mun Pop star in the world making silly upbeat songs about the various days of the week…except for Sunday of course because that’s when the sun comes out and the Toto birds have convinced them it will destroy their mooners.
“I’m a Mun” by Melly MunMo (40 seconds in will not disappoint…this is the song my husband first heard)
“(Munday) Carrot Crunch” by Melly MunMo
“(Sunday) Not a Good Time to Break My Heart” by Melly MunMo
Celine Hummy (Baby Bunny Dance/R&B)
Being a bunny, Celine Hummy was incredibly sex positive…so you can expect that’s what 99% of her music was about. As a bunny though, she was also incredibly temperamental and edgy. It was very weird, alternative and heavy on the vocal effects.
“When I Was Young” by Celine Hummy (the first song I ever did)
“Wise Women Know How to Raunch” by Celine Hummy (throwing shade to the prim and proper Toetoe birds about why bunnies are much better…)
Toe Toe Bird Music
“I’m Just a Toe From Blueberry Springs” by Noe (Country Opera)
This was a weird one from the Totobirds. They were a very proper species but apparently I did a bizarre country opera song!
“Too Prim and Proper for Your Toe” by Totella Noia (Musical Operetta)
The Hummy Hoes
And last but certainly not least, this was the original band that started it all. So naturally, I recorded a stuffed animal version of Jingle Bell Rock. This is sung by a bunch of hungry baby bunnies excited for their auntie barbecues for Christmas…which honestly, I recorded as an American with no idea that I’d one day celebrate the holidays in New Zealand summer! The song also ends with a shoutout to the year 1999, when this band first was created in our games. The song was of course recorded many years later.
“Tail Bell Rock” by The Hummy Hoes
And here’s what I actually sound like…
While I created plenty of pop albums as my stuffed animals, I was also living vicariously through them because I always dreamed of recording my own album. Well, this past year I finally did it and it comes out October 23rd. Some singles are already available to stream.
You can listen to two of my singles below.
“Not Something Adults Should Say” by Justine Thomas (stream links here) is a fun song about realizing that as adults we still will never have all the answers…even if so many of us try to pretend we do!
“Glass Slipper” by Justine Thomas (stream links here) is an upbeat pop love song I wrote for my husband about our long distance relationship
If you’d like to hear more songs written and sung by me, you can head to Spotify, Apple Music, Youtube, or my lyrics page for all the other streaming links and follow me on Instagram.
And there’s so much more…
These stories are just little snippets of the tales we have created. Maybe one day I’ll turn it into a book series or my sister and I will do a fun podcast as we look at our old files and giggle along the way about it.
I’m just so happy to finally share this whimsical side of myself. Thank you for letting me share this with you today.
I’m excited to keep sharing my stories on Threads and would love to keep sharing all of this with you!
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