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

Possession

For some strange reason, in the 70's, as well as Mr Bacon selling pop we used to have a toffee apple delivery man on a cart. My mum didn't approve of toffee apples though, unsurprisingly, so I only ever had one once.
JackieO your grandsons sound very lucky. My grandma used to do 'nature' stuff with us, like bark rubbing etc, but she wouldn't in a million years have played french cricket!

fuddle

I was brought up in the 'no ball games allowed' era. Shagwagon :rotfl: I looked up fibreglass curtains and have a vague recollection of something woven and bright but I don't know whose house.. maybe Del Boy's flat actually!

The big change we have today effecting children and being out to play is traffic. My children can't even play along the back street because of cars zooming along and cars reversing off their drives. They play in the garden and use it as en extension of their bedrooms. Imaginations run wild when they are in the garden. No I'm not happy about and ideally I would like to live in a place that has a quiet cul-de-sac with field and small wood, but I don't. We are in the process of ticking off 50 things to do before you are 11 3/4 from the National Trust https://www.50things.org.uk/ super for ensuring children have the same experiences as children years gone by. Not ideal but it's the times we live in now. What can you do?

Winciette? I loved winciette but didn't like my mother shrieking " get away from the fire, you'll burn!" :eek:

Pinkdebster

Another newbie here but I just wanted to say thanks to you all..........I was born in the mid-60s so remember most of what you all recall.........however, my parents died when I was 16 so it's been a really lovely trip down memory lane for me. I think my childhood (which was wonderful) got lost somewhere along the line with the death of my parents so it's been really nice to remember it all.

My favourite game was using a couple of tennis balls and trying to juggle them against an outside wall - I'd also play for hours until someone yelled for me to stop that racket!! Magazines were also Twinkle (my brothers had Beano and Dandy), followed by Mandy, Bunty, Jackie and then Blue Jeans! I also loved the paper dolls with the cut out clothes!

I remember Sunday teas especially - always used to be my favourite time of the week. We'd have a high tea and then this would be followed by the permitted weekly bath. My Mum would then put rags in my hair so I'd go to school on Monday with ringlets. And yes, I also recall the old nylon and crimplene clothing - I remember having to dress really quickly in the cold mornings infront of the fire........once it was so cold I lay my pinafore dress over the fireguard and it melted with the heat of the fire.

Happy days indeed and fondly remembered - thanks everyone x

FairyPrincessk

Oh, you all laugh, but the room has very plush orange carpet, very heavy orange velvet curtains and there are some indications that it was once painted a goldenrod yellow with burnt orange trim and radiator. I really enjoy colour, but the flip side of that is that I have strong colour preferences. Orange, yellow and red are the worst offenders in my view!

I've just hung out the washing on my tea break and checked on the strawberry. It is taking its time! I'm tempted to pick it anyway and chop off the green bit! But I'll wait. The weather is supposed to be a bit nicer later this week, which is good as I've got things that need to go in the ground.

I was born just a few years before the other Princess, my younger brother is the same age as her. My mum ran wild during the summer as a child, she used to go to her grandparents' farm and stay out all day. She wanted the same for us, and within reason we roamed about a lot. Since we moved house so frequently there were always different rules for different places. In one small town, there were woods behind our house that I played in, and a local pool that I was old enough to walk to with my friends. Once you were over a certain age you didn't need a parent. I had a summer swim pass-the pass was sewn to your costume so all you had to lose was a towel! In one big city things weren't as safe. We had a designated place that marked off the furthest part of the pavement we could play on. We knew the lady who owned the house two houses down, she had a huge mansion, built in the 1910s I would guess--but in disrepair. She was quite an eccentric and would invite us in to play with her dogs. If we couldn't be found my mother knew we were there. We didn't have a television for most of my childhood--a conscious decision on the part of my parents, and the idea of one in our bedrooms was just too unfathomable to even ask. I remember when a friend got one of the first nintendo systems about the time I was 7 or 8. I went round, but was cross at the end of the day as they'd played it all day and didn't stop for our usual games of dress up etc. I had no interest in the thing and though it boring. Later my brother was very into computer games, although my mother made him work for them--giving him things like old laptops etc. that he'd have to get working good enough to play them. I was quite a loner as a child--still am. I had friends but spent a lot of time either playing in my room or wandering around on my own. I was such a voracious reader, that I was once scolded by the school librarian for checking out Jane Eyre at age 11. I didn't know what I was doing wrong, but she insisted I was just being a show off and wouldn't read it. It ended up being one of my favourite books for years. I also built fairy houses in tree roots, and when i was older i had a doll's house that I researched and decorated as accurately as possible. To this day I have some of the strangest random knowledge of victorian era decor. I also made many of my own clothes, assisted by my mother who used to custom make children's clothing. She's a wonderful seamstress, I'm fair to middling, but I don't have a machine and don't enjoy handwork as a hobby like she does. Fortunately my mother abhors synthetics--as do I, so I was spared! I didn't always appreciate the handmade clothes and I got teased a lot for being different, but it made me who I am and in my teenage and Uni years I was quite the queen of vintage and thrifted fashion. It helped that I knew about garment quality, construction and history.

I don't necessarily want to go back in the past. While life may have seemed simpler, I'm sure things were stressful in other ways--but I do think it is important to remember what was nice about those times and not to throw out the baby with the bath water!

fuddle

Welcome pinkdebtster

Please, please, please tell me this is elderflower. Please



It smells very strong of floral/sweet/fruity - lime notes I would say. I would have took photo of the tree (did come from a tree) but the dog was pulling.

If it is, it's on my doorstep practically. :cool: I have walked for miles in the hunt for this stuff.

if it is, how do I wash it? You told me last year but I can't remember

EstherH

Got a few pages to catch up on later but just skimmed through and when I read about VJmums freedom, it was totally different from my own very protected upbringing. I'm just passed 50 (and no, you don't believe it when you get past it either lol). Then I read Ginnyknit and yes, I think mine was more like that and I remember adults whispering so that children couldn't hear but that was more frightening because you knew something was up and blew it up even bigger in your own mind. Not talking about the Moors murderers because you couldn't get more shocking and frightening than that, but other things like someone dying, or someone's child getting ill. Esther x

Byatt

The Summer of '76...the time I got married, so you can all blame me for the sun

Goodness, Mrs LW, for some reason I thought you were in your 50's when you met "he who knows"...:D

My experience of growing up is similar to many, but like Molly says I wouldn't want to go back to that era, bits were bad and bits were good and bits were lovely, the freedom to roam for hours upon end. There were also things adults talked about but assumed children didn't understand , I often remember worrying myself silly because of snippets of conversation I had heard, being a very quiet child I suppose they thought I wasn't listening either. I aslo remember being approached by dodgy characters, but maybe I seemed vulnerable, once a couple in a car stopped me to ask for the time...and wanted me to come nearer the car...this was at the time of the Moors murders (not that I knew that then). But my instincts were on high alert so I imagine my parents had drummed into me about stranger danger, although I don't recall it. Also there was a horrendous murder in my small village and 2 children from my class were killed. No support or counselling then of course. A case of getting on with it.

And if we didn't have progress, none of us would be on here now, talking about our past lives.

Anyway, I'm sure you're all saying shut up Byatt, we want nostalgia not misery...so I will shut up.

edit, I do remember how kids used to knock randomly on people's doors asking to take their dog for a walk, and in some instances babies! Remember those days when babies in prams were left outside by the front door for the fresh air, and how prams were left outside shops!

peony40

Pinkdebster wrote: »

My favourite game was using a couple of tennis balls and trying to juggle them against an outside wall - I'd also play for hours until someone yelled for me to stop that racket!! Magazines were also Twinkle (my brothers had Beano and Dandy), followed by Mandy, Bunty, Jackie and then Blue Jeans! I also loved the paper dolls with the cut out clothes!

Happy days indeed and fondly remembered - thanks everyone x

Hello pinkdebster. I remember Blue Jeans, my school friend used to buy it and she would pass it around during school breaks.

Also, used to enjoy the paper dolls and would also cut out paper dolls where you would have a whole lot of them holding hands.

Another thing my friend and I would do is cut out items from mum's catalogue to make a family and their home, we would lay out these cuttings all over the sitting room floor and play with this for hours.

I too, used to be a bookworm. During the school holidays I would devour Mum's books and was reading Arnold Bennett books at age 10, together with many other classics.

I too, was not allowed to have a tv in the bedroom. We had one tv in the sitting room that was put on for Jackanory. If I wished to watch it any other time I always asked permission.

Oh well, best get on with mundane household tasks.

Possession

My children are still not allowed a TV in the bedroom, and TBH I think that's the case for quite a few of their friends, not because their parents can't afford it but because they want to limit screen time. We have our old TV in our bedroom but it's never watched by any of us. It makes a difference that DH & I hardly watch TV at all - when I was a child the TV was on most of the time in the evenings at least. For a start, it was the main way to get up to date news, whereas now I get all my news from my Yahoo home page pretty much as it happens.

mardatha

I hated the summer of 76. We lived in a multi story flat on the 7th floor, I had 2 small children and nowhere to sit apart from the grass around the block or the concrete roof that was too hot and made the kids all skin their knees.
I was an only child too Emm, and was out all day every day. At night I used to read with a torch under the bedclothes Rainy days I made a ganghut in my dad's shed with the kids next door. I kept a load of mice in a big dolls house and can still mind the fuss my mother made when they all escaped..