Things your parents led you to think were 'special' or 'expensive' that you now take for granted?

Soft drinks, especially Orangina. We had supermarket own brand cola for special occasions. Fizzy water, especially Perrier.
Branded toothpaste. Shower gel or liquid handsoap (bars of soap only).
Patent leather shoes.
Going to the carwash instead of washing the car by hand with a big sponge.
Any toiletries or household items that were in any way "frivolous". Think coloured loo paper, patterned kitchen roll, scented soap etc. Anything cheap and brightly-coloured marketed at kids.
Buying food on the go instead of waiting till home time or bringing a packed lunch. (This did not include nice restaurant meals though: we did that quite a lot.) Anything prepackaged. I remember thinking my friend's mother terribly fancy for buying the little yellow bottles of lemon juice in the shape of a lemon.
Cinema. Takeaways. (We didn't do/get either.)
Taxis a rare treat. Having a mother who drove/had her own car and drove kids around.
Heating on during the day. Phone calls, and especially before 6pm. Cordless phones.
I remember the huge excitement of a school trip because I got to go to the shop with my mother and choose a Ribena AND a packet of cheese and onion crisps AND a chocolate bar for my special day-out packed lunch EVERY TIME.

LadyInCement and *TheSmallClanger^ you are my kind of people!

Agree too about the best night's sleep in a duvet being the one before you put your foot through. It's so sad! (I have a favourite one which is waiting for me to turn it from a double into a single, because the top split, fabric at that spot too thin to repair, and it's so lovely I can't bear to throw the whole thing away.)

Slightly rough towels dry your skin the best.

I remember those mini packs of cereal. They were for holidays only, and my brother and I used to fight over the Coco Pops. Coco Pops were also only allowed during the school holidays.

One thing that was a proper treat was when my DB and I stayed with my aunt at Easter. We lived in a tiny village, and she lived in a real live town, with a shop you could walk to to buy sweets. This was an amazing novelty. Anywhere with proper shops was terribly exciting for us. Multi-storey car parks were even more exciting.

ok well worn in duvets are the best. so soft and smooth

Oh, yes, ArcheryAnnie, you can't beat a stiff towel. Even better if they're at least 20 years old.

Same with duvets and sheets. They have to be worn in. The best night's sleep you'll ever get is the night before you put your foot through the sheet.

The cereal advent calendar out of stock?! I was going to get one today!

I had one in my stocking - but unlike Zaphodsotherhead I had the whole pack . Obviously we were very flush!

Second the dads doing diy. I can't remember that we ever had a workman in. Ever. And this was Not A Good Thing. Df even bought himself a chimney sweep set out of the local paper. It did not end well as df failed to confess he'd lost the brush up the chimney and when a fire was later lit it ended in the fire brigade being called out

lastnamefirstfirstnamelast same with the fabric conditioner, but it had the opposite effect on me - I actively like air-dried cardboard towels (they are so bracing, as they used to say about Skegness), and find fabric-conditioned, tumble-dried towels weirdly greasy!

Mine, too, LaBelleSausage and MrsHathaway! They weren't even particularly flagged-up, just a big cardboard unit on a corner full of them. (Saw them yesterday.)

Thanks @LaBelleSausage that's a good tip (and a great NC ).

@MrsHathaway they had loads in my local Tesco yesterday so it’s worth looking in store

Any fancy cereal/breakfast food. We had bran flakes or weetabix.
Being lactose intolerant made this much worse for me, as my parents didn’t buy milk substitutes so I had to have weetabix and water (mildly less awful than bran flakes and water).
On a Sunday it was porridge. Also made with water.

Ice lollies were also an unknown. We made our own with a tiny bit of lemon squash and some water, so it was basically like licking a large ice cube.
The first time I had a commercial ice lolly the syrupy flavour blew my mind!

my cousin was never ever allowed things like cocopops or sugar puff ans oneday when she was staying at mine she said she was too excited to sleep as we were having cocopops for brekki! xx

Just to save anyone else searching, the cereal advent calendar is out of stock.

Sad how many of us thought those selection boxes of cereal were a luxury! We used to get one (small box, not the entire selection) in our Christmas stockings! But my parents really were quite hard up for most of my upbringing.

Tescos are doing a mini-box-of-cereal advent calendar, just so all you similarly-deprived 70s children know... One bowl every day!

Tescos are doing a mini-box-of-cereal advent calendar, just so all you similarly-deprived 70s children know... One bowl every day!

Viscount biscuits, only ever bought for Christmas or an adults "big" birthday.

Oh yes! in their shiney green paper

*to eat while watching

Ok so my parents divorced when i was like 4 and i remember certain things from which ever one i was staying with at the time;
DM-
Shopping on a thursday, i was allowed a small pick'N' mix that had to last until the following week.
Bath 1ce a week
Take-away was very rare
one slice of wafer thing ham per sandwich
mixed mini cereal packs were for holidays only

DD
Never ever used fabric conditioner, the towels were like cardboard
50p pocket money - i felt rich ( this was the 90's)
microwave meal to watch while i was watching gladiators (best part of staying for the weekend)

DParents and PIL have strong opinions about how my generation spends money, eg on furniture which was cripplingly expensive when they were newlyweds in the mid-1970s (before IKEA). I note this morning that their first houses are now worth £400k and £300k respectively

New shoes. We had to wait until ours were broken.

Mum did relent when I got accepted for the Youth Orchestra at 15, but I then fell foul of a rule about shoes there that no-one had explained.

Mum used to buy this horrible cheese called Cracker Barrel that was meant to be a treat at Christmas. Dream Topping was also considered a wonderful treat for some reason. Both disgusting.

Putting the heating on.

Fizzy pop was 2 bottles at Christmas for the whole extended family and guests (upwards of 14 people), although that's probably a good thing as my teeth have suffered from overindulgence as an adult . Similar goes for takeaways, meals out, sweets, biscuits, etc.

We had books from the library every week, but only ever bought new if you'd had a book token as a Christmas or birthday present. I remember what a thrill it was to go to WHSmith and smell all the clean new books

When I started my first job my mum bought me two smart skirts, two blouses, two pairs of tights, all from an actual shop (not the market!), and said "right that's you started, anything else you need, you're earning now" :) she gave me a load of jam jars and a marker pen and showed me how to put aside money each month for board, share of the council tax/phone bill, transport to work, savings and spends. I was earning an absolute pittance, but weirdly never ran out of cash for the essentials because of the jam jar system.

I vividly remember finding a bar of Lux soap on a car park once at the supermarket that had obviously fallen out of someone's trolley and been run over. My dad said we could keep it and 6 year old me felt like the Queen of Sheba having baths for the whole time it lasted

Absolutely the height of luxury were Viscount biscuits, only ever bought for Christmas or an adults "big" birthday. They're currently on sale in our corner shop, a 14 pack for £1!

We must have been spoilt as we had treats, take aways, new clothes, foreign holidays and my parents had a car each. But we were never allowed pot noodles
I still feel my mums disapproval when I have one now and she’s 200 miles away

Dum=dm=mum