Easier to be OS in the olden days?

PenniesMake£s

lessonlearned wrote: »

As you are beginning to find out' in the grand scheme of things "stuff" is pretty useless and it's not the material goods which make for happy childhood memories.

Many of us 'old uns" had childhoods that were short on "stuff" and modern day creature comforts but we had freedom to play outside, and our games were sociable and stretched our imaginations. I don't think we suffered any real deprivation and most of us seem to look back with a certain fondness at the lives we had.

I totally agree and love your idea, thanks x

cavework

I used to stay with my Gran in the 60,s.
She was born in 1894
She had a 3 bed council house she moved into in 1925 where my Mum was born and brought up 4 boys and Mum there
She had lino on the floors ,an outside privy , a coal fire and a potty was used at night.
There was a yard with a wood store out back and the rest of the back garden was for growing veg
The sofa and furniture were all pre WW2
She did have a bathroom in the kitchen but all that was in there was a bath.. she preferred to give me a thorough strip wash, with a flannel at the kitchen sink using carbolic soap. boy could she scrub!


Wash day was a boiler kept in the outhouse and a mangle.
My Mum remembers visiting a friends house when she was about 5 in the 1930's and being fed starling pie.
Gran was horrified when she heard but Mum says it was quite nice.
Grandad and neighbour kept a pig between them every year and Mums brothers used to keep them supplied with shot wild rabbits.
Everything available was preserved .. jams , pickles and to Grannys disgust , homemade wine made by Grandad , who once could not wait until it was ready and ended up with a really bad belly ache when she returned from Whist Drive.
Games included empty Tin cans threaded with string and kids walked around on them.. Mum did this for me when I was a kid and its really good fun
The Xmas tree was a branch decorated with paper chains when Mum was small and the Xmas cockerel was taken to the local bake house by a lot of people on Xmas eve where it was cooked in the ovens for a small charge

[Deleted User]

PENNIES that is an awful lot of money to spend on a single child, never mind that it's a collective effort by your family who only do it through affection but it is a DREADFUL thing to teach small children to expect that much every christmas, what happens if there is a change in circumstances and they can't do it? How will that make the small ones feel? totally rejected. I wouldn't even consider spending £1,500 on the entire christmas for all of us, including all the food. How are your little ones ever going to be able to work out real monitary values if they are given and come to expect as normal the lavish amounts that must bring? Better by far to have 1 big present even if everyone from the extended family makes a contribution towards it and one small but fun present from each family member if they feel the need to do so, the kids will appreciate what they do have much more if they don't have quite so much.

cavework

Pennies .. My lads are now grown up and have left home but they still come back every Xmas day with their partners.
All they really remember and is important to them is the way we did Xmas.
Starting with the tree being decorated, the ham being cooked the day before Xmas eve, the Xmas dinner. Xmas eve when neighbours came round with their kids for a few snacks and a drink.
It was all about Xmas being a special and magical time
I don't think either of them can remember many of the presents we bought them.
xx

mardatha

The book is "All Quiet on the Home Front" by Richard Van Emden and Steve Humphries

Goldiegirl

candlelight_2013 wrote: »

Himself (who comes from Kent) tells me they always had rabbit pie on Christmas Eve, and his Grandad reared the rabbits.

I remember having rabbit pie at my nan's from time to time in the 1960's. It was rather nice, as I remember. (This was in Essex, rather than Kent.). My great uncle lived with my nan and he was a farm worker, so I expect the rabbits came from the farm.

On the subject of Christmas presents, I do remember some of the presents I got as a child, mostly the ones made by my mum and dad. My dad was a carpenter, so one year I got a carved dolls crib, another year I got a dolls cot ( complete with drop down side) and another time a dolls house.

My mum used to make most of her clothes and my clothes, so she'd save left over fabric and wool, so she could make dolls clothes, and that meant I could dress my dolls the same as us.

But what I remember the most is the security of being in a happy family, that's what really stays with me

candlelight_2013

Goldie I think you have hit the nail on the head, it was a sense of feeling secure.

Yes I can remember some of the presents I received, but also that I was loved and that I knew Mum and Dad did their best for us three girls. I also knew that when I went back to school after Christmas we would all have had similar presents, because all our parents were more or less in the same boat.

Candlelightx

meritaten

PenniesMake£s wrote: »

We don't actually buy very much for our children we don't have to...the vast majority of their clothes and toys have been presents from relatives. They have both sets of grandparents, and 3 sets of aunties and uncles. For birthdays and christmas each giver will spend approx £50 on each of the 3 children. Each year this means that at least £1500 worth of new children's clothes and toys coming into our house and that's before we have given our children anything!!! I haven't worked that out before...that is shocking. I am convinced that in the "olden days" relations wouldn't have been (able or willing) to be so generous with grandchildren, nieces and nephews.

if you go back to my post - I had lots of aunties and uncles and one set of grandparents and parents - my pile of presents on Christmas and birthdays was HUGE! individual presents may not have been expensive - but the quantity was there! and my parents bought loads of presents too - for my cousins and their parents and my grandparents. EVERY member of the family and some friends got something. mum and nan spent weeks just wrapping up the presents.
just totted it up and mum and dad would have bought for 14nieces and nephews, Dads brothers and sisters, mums sisters, mums parents as dads were deceased, next doors two kids, Friends - some elderly neighbours - I think it was about 40 or so gifts maybe more.

nursemaggie

Isn't it surprising how so many of us shared a similar childhood even though we come from all over the country. My dad made all our presents dolls house, dolls cot, a kitchen cabinet, no one else had one of those. It was quite big and I kept it in the hall. I used to make that my kitchen and I had an ironing board and would iron all my dolls clothes. My brother had a farm, a fort, a garage I am sure we both had more my dad was very good at toys. He was a good carpenter. He wanted to be a cabinet maker but his mum thought that was beneath them so he had to work in a shop. I think he would have been very happy as a cabinet maker.

I don't know how he fitted it all in because he had a big garden and grew a lot of fruit and vegetables. Three times a year he would be making scenery for the church lads brigade who did a pantomime every year and something in the summer and around Easter time the Mums And Dads did a review called the MAD Show. My mum would do the costumes. She also made a lot of my clothes but I also get hand me downs from my cousin and they went to two more cousins. The youngest always said her children would not wear hand me downs. I guess they were pretty worn by the time she got them. Some of them came from my eldest cousin's cousin not related to us. Lots of the clothes my mum made were cut down from adults clothes.

Birthdays and Christmas we made our own games. It's the family get togethers and the games we played that were the highlight of Christmas, not the toys. Did anyone else have a glass of lemonade with about a teaspoon of port in it. We thought we were so grown up.

Birthday parties we always had either meat paste sandwiches or if you went anywhere that was a bit posh you got salmon paste and egg sandwiches everywhere too. Not many cakes or biscuits as sugar was on ration until I was 6. There would just be birthday cake and jelly.

We were very happy with all the games. None of the fancy things they have now going somewhere and having entertainment. When DS20 was about 5 or 6 must have been just before mum got sick I nursed her for 3 years. We had the school room at church and did a birthday party just like we had had. The kids loved it lots of running around and very noisy. Every child came to thank me and said it was the best party they had ever been to. Just proves today's kids would be just as happy with what we had.

DS is happy to live OS he has little choice with his mum a pensioner and him being unemployed.

When my older ones were young we lived by the sea on Anglesey. The village was well off the main road so they were free to roam like we did. They went miles on their bikes just like we did.

I really think it is wrong the way kids are kept in these days. I don't think it is dangerous. There are no more pedophiles than when we were kids we just hear about it more. The traffic is the real worry though. The kids in this street still play out in the back streets on the cobbles.

When we first moved in, when the nights started to draw out DS heard screaming he picked up his phone he thought he could hear a woman being raped. He looked out it was the kids playing tag in the street. We have 11 little boys in this street and 3 girls. By can they make a lot of noise. They have not really changed it is us.

ragz_2

I lived 'old style' as a child through my (hippy) Mum's choice, as I was born in '85. My Mum was a single parent until I was 6 then on and off with my step Dad, who never had a regular income anyway, and we mainly lived in caravans with no electricity or running water, though we did have a few short 'proper house' residencies. Mainly I remember things like lighting the fire before school, keeping our cartons of milk in a big churn filled with water, to keep it cold. (The same water we used for drinking etc, which my Mum had to carry over from the farm.) We had TV at one point, a small black and white one that we powered off a car battery (when it started to run low the picture would go funny half way through a programme!) that was charged in the farm dairy (still remember the smell of that place!). We used to have ice on the inside of the windows in the caravan in winter, Mum used to have to wash the clothes in a bucket, and us in a pan of warm water! I remember her getting stuff 'on tick' from the local shop, we were usually living on 'benefits' or whatever they were called then. Mum collected firewood when we couldn't afford to buy any, and food wasn't plentiful... shops were a long walk away and not open as often as now so we had some very strange meals sometimes! Clothes were donated by people in the local village who took pity on us and generally didn't talk to my Mum, but occasionally dropped off a bag of hand me downs... it was like Christmas going through the bags! There weren't a lot of shops nearby so new stuff was usually just school uniform and that often paid by 'assistance' from the council which only allowed for one set of most things.

As it was her choice to live like that we were very 'different' and it was hard being the 'gyppo' with scruffy grubby clothes. I am still grateful every time I use my washing machine etc, but also am able to get by with a lot less than many of my peers... I could go back to that life and manage quite well, often it's tempting to look back with rose tinted glasses and think how simple that life was and how little we needed. But it must have been awfully hard work...

Birthdays and Christmas I'd usually get a budget of about £20 and a catalogue and get to choose my own present, Mum would pay it off weekly at the local toy shop until it was paid for in time for Christmas. We also got a stocking, but we had no relatives to buy for (though I got a selection box from my aunt and uncle and usually a tenner from my grandparents through the post). These days I still only really buy one or two presents for my children, though they are lucky to have relatives who buy for them as well.