General Chat

lets try and capture all the things that were real tasks years ago compared to to-day. I'll start by........... Having to boil water for a weekly bath in the tin tub. Lynn

I can think of loads..... sweeping the carpets then taking them outside to beat them, washday..took all day, going to the 'steamie' with the heavy wash items, my Mum sewing all the pleats into my school skirts every Sunday night before pressing them, my Granny making her own pickles and pressed tongue (why didn't she just buy them?) Could go on for ever! Christine

Watching my mam gutting a chicken! They didn't come all nice and clean and in plastic bags then. You picked one from the butchers window if you could afford it! Then when you got it home you had to put your hand up its bum and pull its insides out!! God help my kids if it was like that now ,none of them would know what chicken tasted like!!!

Undoing the pillows and taking all the feathers out, washing the covers then restuffing them and sewing up the cover, hated it until i discovered that my younger brother was terrified of feathers, then i had my revenge 'cos he used to poke my doll's eyes out with a knitting needle, and he never got told off 'cos he was only 5 and a boy. revenge is sweet and such a good laugh, until you get caught, can still feel my sore bum

Anne Marie, that reminded me of pillow fights with my brother and sister! When we burst the pillow we got a good hiding and then had to clean all the feathers up!!

Oh Lynn I have already concluded that if I lived years ago I would definitely be the local slut in the true sense of the word - scrubbing the front steps! beating the carpets! polishing the lino! I have a major moan when I get the steam iron and D...son vacuum out! Mind you forget all the cleaning rigmarole - I remember when we didn't have a hairdryer - Dad used to towel dry our hair then comb the knots out - OUCH!! Absolute torture! Emma x

Hi Maureen, I had to clean up by myself, but I used to pull the feathers out one by one and put them in his pillow, he'd have hysterics and no one could blame me 'cos he must have had a leaky pillow. Revenge is sweeter when you don't get caught. By the way I remember the chickens and my kids wouldn't know what chicken tasted like either, I tried it once and threw up all over the chicken, another sore bum and had to buy a new chicken out of my pocket money, my mum never understood me boo hoo

Also remember that when my mam was pulling the chickens innards out she sometimes found an egg, she thought it was her birthday!! Thank God for supermarkets!!

What about baking your own bread? My grandad also used to make his own pasta-took all day but the end result was 100 times better than the dried stuff in the shops. He would also mince beef in a mincing machine, and smoke fish and bacon in a special hut he constructed in the garden. This was all in the 1970's- so not that long ago!!!!

Taking old clothes to the Rag and Bone Man in exchange for a balloon! Lynne

My mum & granny darning socks, using a mushroom. Also, my sister and I had quite a lot of hand-me-downs from older cousins, my mum was quite a good seamstress in this way, and used to alter them to fit us. Once, when I had been passed a double breasted suit, which was then out of fashion (try wearing one of THOSE at boarding school!), she cut it down into a single breasted one, and it passed muster very well indeed! Philip

chopping sticks lighting the fire every morning , carrying water , taking an accumerlater to charge for the wireless filling oil lamps for the night time and many more jean

You girls/boys can only envisage what it was like to do these things. I for one, actually had to do many of these things. I had to take a dustpan and collect horses manure when the milkmans horse had left some in our road. I had to go into the park and gather wood after a storm for the open fire. I also had to tear up newspaper for the toilet. I used to have to clean the brass number and letter box on our front door. I also had the job of sweeping our front footpath. In the summer there would be hundreds of blackcurrants to pick and in the winter clearing the snow away. I had to walk to school, which was about 20 minutes away, 4 times a day. I wouldn't change my youth though. No, that's not true. I wouldn't want to live in London in a war again. Sylvia

We used to have to pump our own water when I was a kid. Dad's little 'pump shed' was attached to the side of the kitchen and he used to stand in there in all weathers pumping away until the water dripped onto the back porch roof from the overflow above the door. One of my earliest memories is of the sound of my mum's wedding ring clinking against the water pipe in the kitchen as she tapped her hand against it. That was her signal to dad in the pump shed that the tank was full! If we wanted to get into dad's good books we would go and pump 'a couple of hundred'. A hundred pumps filled about an inch of the tank. I think he was a bit lost for something to do once we had mains water laid on ! Magsx

Washing days in winter when all the house was full of steam and there was damp washing everywhere Taking dinners that were in a basin and tied up in a hankie to the factory Being asked to run errands by this old lady who lived near school I used to feel very sorry for her because I thought she was poor and lonely When I grew up I found out that she owned one of the most well patronised drapers shops in the nearby town Donkey stoning the steps and swilling the windows Heating the flat irons up to do the ironing Toasting bread over the coal fire it would carry a health warning today Dressing up and dancing round the streets with our maypole on the !st of May Bren

Lighting the morning coal fire,using kindling wood, and newspaper,after cleaning out the ashes left from the night before. Going out early in the morning,and collecting mushrooms.Following the rag and bone man,to collect the horse droppings for dads garden. Following the coalman,hoping he would drop some coal from his bags. Helping mum put the washing through the wringer. I could go on and on. And yes, I did do all those things,and remember them well.

Polishing the brass's on a tuesday, putting red cardinal on the window sills and donkey stoneing the front and back steps. Maggie

I remember my grandmother making rag rugs when I was a child. any old clothes of servicable colourful material was cut into strips and threased with a bodkin onto backing. I would love to make one now. Toast made in front of a roaring fire. There were no fridges so food was kept on a slate in the larder, Jams and preserves were covered with a crochet cover. Sterilized Milk...Yuk. Using a mangle to get the water out of the weekly wash, Oh and remember the man coming round each night to light the street lamp. Lynn

I remember white-stoning the front doorstep. I don't know if that is the right word for it, but it was an awful job.Also whitening canvas plimsoles. Sylvia in Perth WA

Alan, Yes, I'd almost forgotten being sent to get the accumulator charged. We had somebody nearby who put them on charge in his garage. Also remember Cardinal polish. Brimstone and treacle. lovely or not???????????