Old Style Shopping list

ikati5

WeegieWumman wrote: »

Sanitary towels had loops on them which hooked onto sanitary belts.
When the 'stick-on' sanitary towels were first sold, I gave one to an acquaintance. By mistale, she didn't stick it to her undies and needed to use scissors to cut the towel off.

Lol :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

WeegieWumman

Apple jelly, mixed fruit jam and Indian Rose tea, all from the Co-op. Plain loaf (known as a 'batch' loaf to some) unsliced and unwrapped. I loved it when I had a thick end slice with plenty of syrup on it.
Men who came round the doors offering to sharpen your knives and scissors. Rag-and-bone men. 'Back singers' were men who would tour the back courts of the tenements and sing. Everyone of them knew the words of 'Ave Maria' and would sing sad songs. Housewives would occasionally give the kids a penny to throw out the window to these entertainers. Even after rationing had ended. If your mother brought home chocolate as a treat, it was ONE bar between the whole family.

WeegieWumman

When you bought a television, it was delivered with two men carrying it. They plugged it in, secured the cable to the skirting board, plugged in the aerial, adjusted the picture to perfection and showed you 'how to work it'.

Seraph123

Was born in mid fifties just after rationing ended but life was very frugal and my Mum made every penny count. Hair was washed in the bath (tin one in front of the fire) every week and my sister and I got bathed in same water and then sometimes my gran would use it too .Water was boiled up in a big copper in the kitchen. Remember my Gran telling me I would make myself ill and wash all the godness out of my hair when, as a teenager, I took to washing it every 2 days. Veg was bought a 'the old lady's' a little shop that only seemed to sell potatoes, carrots and onions and my Mum used to send me round with a brown shopping bag and the spuds got weighed and tipped straight in. We shopped at Lennons supermarket on a Friday which I thought was some huge superstore but in reality it had about 6 aisles and if you sneezed you missed it.

My Mum and Gran were both good cooks and could make a meal out of nothing, or so it seemed but we never went hungry and my sister and I learned the value of things and how to look after what you had. Mum made all our clothes and knitted a never ending supply of jumpers and cardigans for everyone. I remember her doing a fine line in baby shawls and tiny cardis. People would turn up with bags of wool and she would knit like the clappers for days. I can still hear the clackty clack of those needles .

There was no shower gel or kitchen roll and all the dusters were made from old vests and dad's work shirts. The day that Mum got a twin tub washing machine was a huge event and the neighbours came round to see it. I was fascinated by the spin dryer and how all those wet dripping things went in and almost dry ones came out. Magic!

It was a very good childhood spent in happy penury and it wasn't till I passed the 11plus and went to a very posh all girls school that I discovered some people had carpet in their living rooms that went right up to the walls! It was a revelation :rotfl::rotfl:

mummygems

I think maybe half of what I have on my shopping list my Nan/Mum didnt back then.

mardatha

I just hate the idea of buying stuff to use for a split second then throw out. That drives me mad. Like kitchen roll and babywipes. Bog roll yes anything else no. Just use it then wash it lol.
I suppose the pig bins were the first ever recyling. And the rag & bone man who blew the cavalry charge on a bugle. Funny how they did it then without all the special bins and lorries and hoohah !

[Deleted User]

Liberty Bodices with those rubber buttons they were dreadful along with wrinkly lisle stocking and those horrible sanitary belts and roll-on corsets that rolled on an up,up up and away...
At my first interview for a job in 1957 one of the suspender things 'pinged and I had to replace the tiny button with a sixpence to stop my stocking from sagging like 'Nora Batty's'I didn't have much money and after the interview I had to find a loo so I could remove the sixpence as I needed it to get the bus home:) I then had to travel home with one leg o.k. and one leg looking like a turkeys neck It never occured to me to remove the stockings altogether Bare legs were considered 'common' and my Mum would have slayed me alive if I'd come through the door with bare legs.By the way I got the job and bought a new suspender belt and got rid of the roll-ons.I remember buying Talor -Woods lifelons which were stocking that were supposed to last 6 months without laddering They were like rubber waders that chaps go fishing in:)Things we had to wear then would be considered child abuse now :)I find it hilarious that folk buy so much stuff ready made and wonder what they do with all the time they save Instant frozen ommelette springs to mind, and instant jacket potato's

SailorSam

I thought i was getting old but after reading some of the things that people did i've realised i'm a mere child, i grew up in 50s and 6os so rationing and tin baths were just something you read about.
Do you remember when that Victorian Pharmacy programme was on Tv, they never had condoms so made them from a pigs bladder so needed to wash it and hang it on the line to dry, then tie a knot in it. Surely no one remembers i going to buy one of them.

westcoastscot

Jackieo my upbringing was just the same - although i'm 10 years younger. We used to have to shop each day - I recall buying a £ of cheese - it just got smaller and smaller and my mum, who never left the house in later years, used to accuse us of eating bits on the way home!!!!
We all had jobs to do - youngest to eldest - all us girls knit and sew - it used to be a summer job that you knit a school cardi for the one younger than you - or two if unlucky - we moved around a lot and school colours always seemed to change. We used to do our jobs and then scarper - if you hung about it was assumed you were asking for another job!!!!
We had very little for birthdays, maybe a sweetie and some dolly clothes, and were allowed one "big" pressie from santa, which we agonised about for months - a wrong choice meant another year to wait. I recall having a twin pram and dolls - I cut the fringes of the dolls and the hair fell out of the top of the head!!!! Mum went nuts!!!! Most pressies were "re-cycled" - rarely had anything new.
tuppence for pocket money each week - always spent wisely. We all loved school - our only social life was school, brownies/guides, church and playing out in the street with friends - although we always had littler ones to watch as well.
Never even occurred to me we were poor - we all lived the same way. We had a family next door once who we loved, but thought were so posh!! they only had two kids, a boy and a girl, and the girl used to wear her hair in a bun - so sophisticated!! we were only young and me and my sisters were in plaits. Their mum used to give them a vitamin each morning - and if I was there to walk to school with them I got one too!!!
My Dad used to bring the first 7 into the bath on a sunday night - it was the street joke that it wasn't always us!!!!
I used to love the library!!! the chance to escape to another world
Well - sorry for the ramble - in answer to the question, the only thing I use is soft loo roll and sanitary pads. I too love my washing machine - although am thinking of going back to a twin tub once this one goes - I wonder sometimes if we've made life more complicated - with a twin tub I washed once a week and always thought carefully about what needed washed.
Love the internet - but am very aware of how time-consuming it is!!!!
WCS

savingqueen

JackieO - I love your post. I was born in late 60s and some of your memories match mine - some from my parents and others from my grandmas.

JackieO wrote: »

Well back in pre-historic times 1940s-50s we went shopping almost daily as my Mum never owned a fridge,freezer,microwave,electric kettle washing machine,t.v. ,

We didn't own a car, telephone or any of the above apart from a fridge when we were really young and when we were a bit older - a washing machine (and black & white TV and phone). Mum did have a twin tub when my sister was born in early 70s which helped with the terry nappies and I remember using big wooden tongs to lift the wet clothes into the spin section. My grandma washed with a scrubbing board and I used to help her put the wet clothes through a mangle.

Milk was kept cool in a bucket of cold water in the larder
ditto for Grandma. She eventually got a fridge when she was in her 60s (in late 1970s) and put absoluntely everything in it. I can remember when we went to stay - she lived 300 miles away - biting into her lovely iced and freezing cold fairy cakes.

Food was no where near as varied as it is now.the only take-away was fish and chips and you didn't get that often. You certainly didn't walk along the street eating it. It was briought home and kept warm in the oven until the table was set with knives and forks and bread and butter and a big pot of tea (no teabags)Then you all sat together at the table to eat (elbows off the table as it was considered rude)Sounds archaic doesn't it.

Ditto for my sister and I in the 70s!! I had never eaten a curry or even garlic until I started work in mid 80s!!!!

Re: the elbows on tables - we enforce (or try to) that with our 5 & 7 year old in 2012!

Puddings were almost anything with custard or rice (no boiled rice) spices were cinnamon or mixed spice in fruit cakes.
Shop bought cakes my Mum cosidered were for lazy women who couldn't be bothered to do their job of cooking for their family.
Yes, same here!

Recycling was unheard of as nothing got thrown away if it had any use left in it . Bin men came to the back door to pick up the dustbin and returned it empty afterwards, no plastic bin bags.Milk and bread was delivered along with coal.

Yes - well we had electric/oil heaters but my grandma only ever had a coal fire and no other heating in the rest of her masionette. I used to love climbing onto her coal bunker in the back yard.

Mum's always seemed to be doing something and rarely sat down until the evening then they would be knitting or sewing the childrens clothes.Shoes were often mended on the cobblers last and my Dad would batter metal 'blakeys' into my brothers shoes to make them last a bit longer.Clothes were bought 'to grow into, and not out of', Yes!

I see no point in wearing myself out going over the carpet with a sweeper as my Mum did. Well I sweep hard floors rather than hoover and shake rugs and sweep stairs carpet by hand sometimes to save leccy and hoover bags!!

ludo,snakes and ladders,draughts,domino's and cards that was it for entertainment.

Also played these games lots although wasn't our only entertainment as we had a TV when older and also a record player and toys but not the latest/expensive ones, lots of secondhand/home made things.

I wouldn't have swapped my childhood for anything though It made me the person I am today

Lovely to hear that. I appreciated lots of similar things in my childhood and although we were quite poor, my parents, especially mum were very practical, resourceful and hard working so we were never cold, hungry, bored (well only in the way all children are from time to time!) or felt we were 'hardly done by'. The only thing I wished for really was a shop bought outfit for the school discos (aged about 9 -12) and so I used to borrow a friend's clothes and get changed back before I went home!

sq:)