What are your childhood memories of your grandparents' house?

The smell of gas, we were all electric so for years I thought it was my granny smell. It makes me think of her

Outside toilets and being scared to go in them after dark

Great granny swiping us with her walking stick

Grandad always watching the races

Nanna crocheting huge blankets out of old jumpers. As soon as she had finished she would ask whoever was there if they wanted it. If no-one did she would take it out, we would wind the wool onto the back of a chair and then she would start again. Mum has 2 of those blankets and it is just loely snuggling under Nannas blanket

A houseful in a tiny house

Stairs that were really in a cupboard, the sette was right next to it and if you weren't quick enough you were knocked out by someone rushing downstairs

wish I had some grandparents left

Oh, this is such a happy/sad thread:

Memories of my Mam (maternal grandma) who I lived with til I was 5:

Walking me to nursery school every morning
Going to the "Cwop" and her buying me Lovell's nougat and ice gems
Being allowed to stay up til she went to bed
Eating at midday and always something cooked - usually fried, and always followed by some home baked pudding
Playing dominoes, draughts and gin rummy with me.
The old rusty red swing in her garden that I used to spend hours on.
Mr Brain next door's garden, absolutely packed with dahlias.
Nasturtiums.
Runner beans (which, confusingly, were known to us as kidney beans), their scarlet flowers and the poles.
The hens and henhouse.
Her boxy leather handbags, bootees, hats and those stole things with fake fox's heads
Her overalls/house coat, always had one on, usually brightly coloured floral one.
Her friend Mrs Davies and Auntie Gwennie dropping in (and letting themselves in) every single day
Wrapping my hair in bandages for ringlets.
Washing my hair on a Sunday evening and letting it dry in front of the fire while Tom Jones was on the telly.
Swirly carpets.
The scullery and kitchenette

God, I could go on for ages. She died just before my dc3 was born, 14 years ago, and like others have said, there's not a day goes by when I don't think of her. Sometimes, when I'm dropping off to sleep, I swear I hear her voice calling my name.

That tomato smell
Shelling peas
Playing poker
Scrabble
Bingo in the front room with the ladies from church
Bread and butter with every meal
The honey bee jam pot
Pictures of the pope everywhere and some sort of pope certificate (?)
Making 'things' out of bits of wood and nails in the shed
Baking with my grandmother
Placing pretend bets on the horses
Grace before meals
Chopping wood
Walking about with a book balanced on my head.
Tweed suits.
Playing with my grandmothers jewellery and the beswick animals
Cocoa and a cracker before bed.
Silence must be observed for the news.
Picking blackberries and windberries.
Feeding the birds
Butter softening over the fire
The telephone number in four digits which must be repeated to the caller when answering the phone
Runner bean seeds under the bed

Opening the back door to the smell of something wonderful cooking in the oven.

Being able to dip white bread in the roast beef dripping before adding salt

Being taught how to knit, crochet and sew by age of 7.

Coating plant pots in the back garden with polyfilla and seashells, then varnishing.

Thrice cooked home made chips long before Hester got there.

And always a kind word and support no matter what the circumstances.

This thread is great!

Hydrangeas by the front door.
An open fire with hissing coal.
Grandad pushing the carpet sweeper round (his 'job').
The old belfast sink and wooden draining board.
The pantry with the milk bottle on the cold shelf (no fridge!).
The terrifyingly steep stone steps into the back garden.
Making daisy chains in the garden.

I've just realised, I don't think I ever spent a night in my GPs house! They were quite elderly when I was born, and they didn't babysit!

I still miss then even though they have been dead for more than 30 years.

Ooh was it like on Gavin & Stacey SAHM ? It sounds posher mind you what with the napkins and all

My other grandparents (Dad's side) I remember ;

All getting into bed together in the morning
with tea and dunking rich teas - they often fell in !
Granny buying me new star shaped cereal and eating it at wooden kitchen table with stone floor ( they lived in an old stone built cottage )
An outside loo !
A bit of glamour from this granny ...
sharing her jewelry - lots of bangles, also perfume, and perhaps face powder in a fancy compact - Can just see me sitting with her in front of her bed-side table and mirror !
Their little white poodle called Henry (will only out myself to my brother or sister there I hope ! )
My Grandpa's glamorous old, black car with those curly side-board bits

The address book by the phone that had a dial on the front cover you could stick your finger in and turn - hours of fun doing that.

The pantry which had a very distinctive smell. Lino on the kitchen floor and the 1950s kitchen appliances.

The walk in wardrobe that had two doors on either side of the bed in their bedroom - we used to run through it and play hide and seek. The cut glass perfume bottles on GM's dressing table.

Eating in the dining room which adjoined my GP's painting studio - the smell of oil paints mingling with beef stew and powdery pepper.

GP would make us poached eggs for breakfast - it was only when I got to uni I realised they aren't called Grandpa Eggs

Playing chess and draughts with GP and always losing (not sure he would have approved of the notion of letting a child win).

Toffees in a little silver dish on the coffee table.

One set:

Barry Island!!!

Laying the table for breakfast the night before (with NAPKINS)

The little mouse that supposedly lived in a hole in the garden path!

Tea in a thermos in bed in theimorning

Sherry

Izal!

Other set:
Thornton's treacle toffee
red cabbage
ginger wine on cold days
solitaire with marble marbles
Turquoise everything!
Knitting, button box, embroidery thread

Only had my maternal grandmother, and only until I was 9, but I remember:

The cleanest, neatest bungalow in the world.

My uncle arriving every Thursday evening to mow the lawns for her.

A faint smell of gas in the kitchen.

Listerine mouthwash (when it came in a glass bottle with some sort of polystyrene sleeve, if I've not imagined that).

The ticking of the kitchen timer.

A surprising variety of knitted/crocheted articles in the bathroom, for the purposes of hiding loo rolls and anything else that lent itself to being hidden.

Baking together.

Classical music in the afternoons and teaching me how to waltz.

Stories of working in the fields as a girl (I do believe threshing machines played some part in these tales).

Tea and home-made cakes served from the hostess trolley.

Washing my face as follows: "Brow berry, eye winky, eye winky, nose nobby, cheek cherry, cheek cherry, mouth moppy, chin choppy- and that's where the cats tickle! [under my chin]"

Well I lived with my gp's from a very young age so my experience might be a bit different to others?

Things I remember most-how much fun we had. Nothing big-we really didnt have any money-just going to the park,or for a wander round town. Or at night playing bingo or cards or singing.

They were the best people in the world-taught me to read,ride a bike,swim and I hope how to be a half decent person. I love them forever.

Feeling so very nostalgic now. Don't know where to start with the memories though. But you have made me feel a lovely mix of sad and happy all together.

I forgot one for my grandmother. When my cousin and I visited her we always wanted to drink out of the little boot glasses she had.There were two of them,not much bigger than shot glasses,shaped like boots.I think they were from The Canaries. There was a blue one and an orange one,and for some reason we always fought over the blue one.

I wish I had them. I don't know what happened to them.

I also had the smell of tomatos as my GP were market gardeners and had big greenhouses and a greengrocer/flower shop in the high street. The smell of flowers shop always reminds me of my nan. They had 4 acres of land on the River Wye

There was a picture of jesus in a meadow in the bedroom we slept in and going out searching for badger sets in the morning.

My nan cooking welsh cakes.

My nan making wreaths and wedding boquests, dying the tips of carnations for buttonholes.

My granddad showing off he could weigh a perfect pound of tomatoes every time.
Feeding the chickens and collecting the eggs in the morning.

My other grandad died when my dad was 2 and my greek nan lived with us until she died when I was 9, unfortunately I have no good memories of her.

Oh, the story telling!! Another of the things I regret not listening to more at the time, were Grandpa's war stories. He spent the whole war in North Africa, in the Royal enginers, and used to tell us all sorts of things. Some may have been true, some a wee bit embroidered- I wish I had paid more attention. As it gets closer to Remembrance Sunday, (when he used to polish his medals and walk through Manchester with the Vets) I miss him a lot.

I also gave ds his name as his middle name. I'll never forget when he visited in the hospital and we told him. He was so pleased. (I wanted to call dd2, last year, Florence after gran, but DH wasn't keen on Flo as a nick name). And he said Flossie sounded like a sheep dog

I can still remember my dad's dad even though he died when I was 4. My dad looks very like him now which helps.

semolina with lemon curd. my favourite. also they lived in a bungalow on the farm until ill health ,that backed onto a wood we used to play in and they had a large garden that we loved to explore, my sister and brothers used to pretend we were in the famous five/secret seven.though this was back in the seventies when we all felt safe.

Ginger ale not beer I meant.

I am also in tears typing this!

Staying over every Tuesday night

Drinking ginger beer and Mellow Birds

Eating poached fish and peas for tea, which was always about 4.30pm

The toilet which was always cold

The bathroom tiles which had been hand painted by my great auntie, grandma's sister

The big bed in the spare room, which was incredibly warm and cosy, crisp sheets, electric blanket and eiderdown, but I was terrified of the big wardrobe in there

Christmas round at great auntie and uncles. Lots of raucous laughter, card games around the table, grandma having a couple of whiskys and becoming the life and soul of the party while usually being pretty quiet. She died suddenly when I was 11 and Christmas was never quite the same after that.

The china cabinet - turning the little key in the lock and looking at all the knicknacks - coronation mugs, ashtray with 'a present from Scarborough' on it, a tiny pair of china clogs from Holland, odd little cups and saucers.

Being allowed to poke the fire and sweep the ash from the hearth. She also had a brass tub of coloured 'spills' on the hearth (think they were for lighting pipes with? Not that she had a pipe!) which I used to play with for hours.

Sitting on the treadle of her singer sewing machine and getting a smack for doing it . She died 10 years ago and that sewing machine is mine now - the drawers are still full of cottons and buttons and they smell like Grandma's house

Fortunate to still have one set of GP (never knew the other set really as they'd both passed away by the time I was 5) although some part of them has left through dementia. But called back to their original house in London where my father grew up a couple of years ago and a kind man had just moved in and allowed us a tour. Lots of changes (which my Grandmother would have approved of) but a lot of mature plants/shrubs in garden that they would have planted and cared for. My memories though are of:

the hatch between dining room and kitchen where we'd get wafts of women's hour interrupting our play
the little hand-sewn dried-pea-filled frog door stop
the coloured paving slabs outside the front door (so we took a different coloured hopping route to the front door each time we visited)
the best roast potatoes/dinners ever
watching crackerjack on their old TV
making model structures out of drinking straws
picnics including table-cloth in Richmond Park, London
The following records: pinky and perky, Gracie Fields singing The Dicky Bird Hop, and Wally Whyton singing children's favourites like "there's a hole in my bucket"
Oh and getting pins in our feet if we dared not to wear slippers as Grandma made lots of her own clothes
Drinking a snowball "with a cherry please" at Christmas and Black Magic chocolates
Playing cribbage
Being fed pieces of peeled raw apple that were surplass for pies and crumbles with a nice sprinkling of sugar on.
Weetabix with hot milk for breakfast
The "changing towel tube" for changing on the beech, draw-string around the neck
Oh and popping beads. Bead necklaces that you could pop out the beads to make different lengths... it was real costume jewellery

Goodness, I am copying this and gonna scan some old photos in and make a photobook with my memories and thanks and get it to my Grandparents quickly before it is too late. Love them to bits.

Thanks for this lovely thread, she says, typing through a torrent of happy and sad tears!

My Grandma and Grandad's house:
Faint smell of gas, very hot living room, freezing front room, lots and lots of toast with butter. Dominos, whist, always having to move my grandma's knitting to be able to sit down. Mad carpet. The 'rogues gallery', a wall with all my cousins' pictures on. Love, so much love.

My Granny's house:
Pantry, peat smell in the living room, being given raw jelly cubes as a treat, hiding behind the sofa in a den, lavender, geraniums, gooseberries in a bowl on top of the freezer. Tweed skirts. Dark chocolate digestives and lemonade. Still think of her when I see or smell all of these.

Miss all three of them very much.

Only one memory of dad's parents, 2 dark red wingback armchairs facing a gas fire, youngest DB mut have been baby at the time cos I was feeding my dolly and pulled my Tshirt up and Nain told me 'nice girls don't do that!'

My mum's mum - house stank of fags, she hated cats and would bang on the window whenever one came in her garden, plasticine we were only allowed ot play in the summer house nowhere with carpet, sitting on the kitchen worktop smelling all her spice jars, taught us beggar my neighbour and rummy and newmarket, always had a big dark brown owl money box collecting coppers for the local hospice which we used to raid for gambling on newmarket!, mr kiplings french fatties fancies, toby jugs in the little shelves in her stone fire surround, for some reason she had a good collection of walking sticks (don't remember her ever using them) which we loved to play crutches with

Roast dinner, usually chicken or lamb, with roast potatoes and yorkshire pudding in a big tray, and carrots and peas.

Two big armchairs by the gas fire.

The big, old, slightly mysterious barometer.

Having a bath ( they were rare at home ! )

Climbing the old oak tree and the rope swing hanging from it's branches.

Sweeties in the car - blackcurrant pastilles from granny.

The visiting ice-cream van and it's loud little tune calling us out.

And the old-fashioned grocery van too.

Grandpa's barley sugars ... and his smelly old pipe.

Playing in the fields out the back amongst the gorse bushes, and with sky-larks high overhead.

The greyhound racing board-game.

The large pebble I'd painted holding the bathroom door open for years !

Having thought about all these memories, just realised I would have kittens if my parents or inlaws "let" my two do these things but will try to relax (!!) as it was all very important in my childhood. Maybe its because mine are still so long but I wouldnt be impressed about chips at midnight ... oh oh high maintenace mummy!

I can't think of my grandparents without remembering his cigar, and her bitter lemon (and B&H)... the height of sophistication it seemed to me.
(actually I still love bitter lemon).