One early memory is my 4th birthday. We'd just moved from France to California. I got a new baby doll, with a new hand-tufted mattress and quilt in a new baby carriage. I was in heaven. I was over 30 when my mother told me that all of my Christmas presents had been stolen in a re-fueling layover in the Azores, and I had no toys at all when we arrived in California. Then she told me she bought all that "new" stuff at thrift shops, and cleaned (the doll), stripped a real baby carriage down and refinished it, and made the quilt set herself from discounted fabric.
Knowing this just made the entire birthday even more precious. We were living in temporary housing, with most of our belongings in storage or en route from overseas. All we had was what could fit in a couple of suitcases. So I think of my mother working over that set. No one could beat this with "shiny and new".