The OS Doorstep - a helpful and supportive thread in these tough times

peony40

Just popping in quickly as I forgot to thank Mrs Chip in my earlier post. Thanks for mentioning about the wool from Wilkos; I have never heard of this shop before but I have looked online and see that they deliver ....now trying to decide on colours.

Emm-in-a-pickle

I just read up to date again - more memories! Funny how once you start..... I had the Bunty, cut out and kept all the paper dolls, gave them names and `enhanced` their make-up with colouring pencils. I cried when I tried this with my first felt-tips and ruined a favourite Bunty! (I had `real` dolls but never bothered much with them - didnt get into it till neice & step-daughter brought me their Sindy dolls to make clothes for, then commenced my second childhood!)
And speaking of Nasty Sweaty fabrics - PVC!! I had white PVC ankle boots, and a green PVC coat (mini length) and thought they were so cool at the time!

riversidegirl

Also coming out of lurkdom. Who remembers Crimplene? My Mother thought it was the latest thing and we all had new Easter coats made from cream Crimplene.

greenbee

I had navy crimpelene school uniform. Navy crimpelene Tunics and/or skirts with navy crimpelene jackets and nylon blue or pink and white checked shirts... YUK!!!

[Deleted User]

Ah Friday night was Amami night for many of us years ago, it was when you washed your hair and set it in rolleres with big pins that tended to get stuck into your head:):)
My favorite sweets were Palm Toffee bars especially the banana split ones, they seemed to last for ages, and were amazingly good at removing wobbly teeth, or at times fillings .The school dentist was someone to fear as he always seemed to want to yank out your teeth on the premise that once they were out you wouldn't get toothache again:):)Mum always gave me tomato soup after an extraction I have no idea why ,perhaps she thought i wouldn't notice any bleeding :)

Although we lived in a 13 roomed house its sound grand, but it was a money pit, and falling down around Mums ears. My Dad had decided to buy it as it had a huge garden, and even though there was an inside bathroom on the first floor it was never used.We all lived on the ground floor as the house was far too big to heat or even furnish throughout, so the first floor and top floor was used by my two brothers and I as places to play in.
In the 10 years that we lived there my parents never ever used upstairs at all.Bath night was a tin bath filled from umpteen kettles that were permanantly sitting on the big black range.As I was the youngest I always ended up in the bath after my two mucky brothers had been bathed I hated it as third-hand water ,especially from the lads, wasn't nice:)
Mum would scour us from top to toe, and especially on Sunday night. Knees would be scrubbed with a bar of red lifebouy soap in time for school next day.
The boys took it in turn to clean all the shoes as my Dad was particular that we all had shiny shoes.School uniform was made ready, whilst my Mum scrubbed me red raw whilst listening to the Palm Court orchestra on a Sunday night .Then school gymslip,tie, blouse and green knickers with a hanky in the pocket of the said knickers was laid out ready for next morning
I can't honestly remember ever hoicking up my skirt to get the hanky from my knickers I must admit.It always seemed a daft place to put a pocket:):)
I always longed for a pair of Wellington boots as I had to walk a mile and a half over Blackheath to school four times a day(I came home for lunch )but my Mum refused to let me have any as she said they were what road-menders wore, and not little girls.So consequently I ended up with wet feet and soggy shoes.The toes were stuffed with newspaper and then they were put into the small oven by the side of the range overnight to dry out in the morning they were like putting on wooden clogs as they were stiff as a board and I'd get them wet as soon as I could on the way to school to 'soften ' them up again.How I never ended up without getting ill I can't imagine .Talking about illness my Dad was a chemist, and he had some stuff at home that us children called 'The Black Bottle' God knows what was in it, but it tasted vile, and what ever you were ill with, you had a dose of this .The thought of this revolting stuff three times a day just to be off school was the greatest incentive known to man to get you back to school I'd rather go to school feeling ill than taste that stuff.It sorted out the malingerers thats for sure:rotfl::rotfl:
life was so different in those far off days children really were seen and not heard as you just were never asked your opinion about anything and usually you would do your best to escape from grown-ups as soon as you could.In the summer you spent as much time outdoors playing as you could get away with and most of the games involved very little more than imagination.I loved reading and knitting my dolls clothes ,usually they were a sort of grey colour from unravelled wool from my brothers school jumpers if they were past redempiion.mum knitted for all of us and would haunt jumble sales for jumpers to unpick and re-knit.It wasn't always shortage of money but often it was just the fact there were so few good in the shops after WW2 and everything was rationed .She had 14 years of making do and mending and like most other Mums at that time you just queued for everything My earliest memories are of queueing or 'keeping a place in the queue' for Mum while she queued for something in another shop.Toys were few and far between and treasured .My mums sister lived in the U.S. and would send parcels over to us and inside sometimes there were the odd toy or doll.I had a lovely set of small dolls from her that Mum put in the cabinet and I wasn't allowed to play with in case they got broken.
We also had the first viewmaster i'd ever seen it was black and made of bakerlite and had white 3d reels that went inside .Of course all the pictures were american ones and scenes of different states It was quite educational though as my Dad would test us children on where different states were in America and we would learn to identify them for him. by the age of 9 I probably knew more about the US states than I did about my own country:rotfl:
I loved reading the 'funnies' in the newspapers that came wrapping around the stuff in the parcels .I remember my Mum crying because her sister had sent her some nylon stockings and she kept them for best as well :)
Everything was kept to be made to last as long as possible as you never knew if you could replace stuff.

tattycath

When I was growing up most of my clothes were hand-me-downs, or from jumble sales or if friends had grown out of clothes and their mum gave my mum a bag full now and again. I did get a new outfit at Christmas, but only if I needed it.
I wasn't allowed to wear jeans-I bought my first pair when I was 16.

Goldiegirl

Emptynester wrote: »

The memories of nylon have brought me out of lurkdom. I was born in 1960 and suffered with nylon in the 1970's. Did anyone else have nylon shirts for school. I shudder when I think about them, this was before I won my battle for a daily bath, both my parent s had grown up in homes without bathrooms and felt a bath once a week was quite plenty. They washed daily but they didn't wear nylon shirts uck! Worse still was the day I ironed mine (why?) and melted the inside of the collar. I wasn't allowed a new one, no money for it, so I sewed a piece of hair ribbon over the burn to protect my neck from the scratching and spent the rest of the school year trying not to let anyone see the mend whilst changing for PE!
This is a lovely thread, please keep posting everyone.

Yes, I'm from 1960 too.

Although I suffered from nylon at home, my mum had a bit of a thing about nylon school shirts and insisted that I had cotton blouses for school, I was about the only girl in the class with cotton blouses

I didn't escape crimplene though. My mum made a lot of my clothes and I had various trouser suits in groovy colours which I wore with ruffled blouses, which I wore around 1970. I must have looked like an extra from an Austin Powers movie!

Pooky

It's so lovely to read all your memories.

JackieO - I love your posts, so full and descriptive - you should write a book.

I was born in 73, my parents lived in a flat without a bathroom and the loo was in the cupboard under the stairs. We moved in with my grandparents when I was 4, they had a huge Victorian terrace and we had the top two floors - no heating and very little furniture and carpets at first. Going to bed involved getting changed in the living room (nightie was warmed near the electric fire - the only heating in the whole house) and it was a quick run from the warm living room up the stairs into a cold bed......my sister and I did the cold bed dance (like Mirandas) to get warm whilst Dad read our bedtime stories. All veg and fruit was grown in the garden by my grandparents, summer treat was to go and pick a bunch of grapes from the greenhouse or a fresh bunch of tomatoes that my nan would cut up and sprinkle with salt. Food wasn't plentiful and my cousins would always be round for tea (so my parents and aunts could share what food they had) but there was always someone to play with, someone to go to the park and beach with and plenty of love. We spent summer hols at the beach every day, even if it was foggy. Marmite sarnies and warm squash kept us going until tea time when we'd trudge home via my aunts for a bowl of whelks or cockles to eat on the way.

My girls talk of their childhood memories now and it's full of lovely memories of tents in the garden, mud pies, paddling pools and baking. I hope they keep these fond memories as they grow up. We've never had a lot of money and made the best of what we've got. Memories cost nothing and are lovely to make.

Waiting for my roast to finish cooking, it smells lovely.....my first roast in my new kitchen, I've even dug out the best china!

[Deleted User]

'LO everyone, well what's this? I go away for a weekend and you've nattered 12 whole pages without me!!!!! I shall be all evening catching up, oh well, I can think of worse ways to spend my time. I'll read through in a mo but I just wanted to say THANK YOU to FUDDLE for giving us a lovely new thread to natter on, good on you girlie and hello to everyone who is posting old friends and new ones let's make this thread in friendship and harmony and help all of us along lifes sometimes boulder strewn pathway.

I've had such a lovely weekend with my youngest daughter, we have shopped for England and had a lovely time together, her poor OH flew back in from the US this morning having not managed to sleep on the flight, he was grey poor lovie, so we left him to doze and went out into the city and had some lunch and a pootle through some jewellery shops looking for a pearl pendant to wear on the wedding day, we found a couple and she's deciding which one will go best with the dress, only 8 weeks to go, I'm getting a bit like a kiddie on Christmas Eve with excitement, but, it's nice to be home again, with my boys, my slippers and my armchair ---- ye gods, I even sound set in my ways to me, but I like home, and it's nice to be back!!! Have a lovely evening everyone, Cheers Lyn xxx.

jpscloud

Ahhh 1976, endless summer, blistering heat, paddling pools, water bombs, a ladybird invasion (I was on studland beach when a huge wave of them swarmed over us). I was a gawky awkward geeky 13 year old girl that year and remember it as clear as day.

It's funny that we haven't had another summer quite like that ever since - although I do believe there was another ladybird invasion in 2009 (I must have been in a relatively uninvaded area for that one!)

Anyone remember thrupenny bit lucky bags? I visited the old shop I used to walk half a mile to buy them from the other day, it's hardly changed at all - that can't be said for many things in life eh?

I used to get Jackie. I wasn't really a girly girl though - much more geek than beauty queen!