Did anybody grow up in the 70s?

We had a gas cooker that you had to use a taper candle to light. Used to scare the living daylights out of me.

Oh, and getting a lift in a friend's car to a fireworks display. Had at least three adults and 6 children in. Me being the youngest travelled in the front passenger footwell and a couple of kids went in the boot.

@BikeRunSki I'm in Dublin, Ireland so we had your channels plus two of our own rte1 and rte2. About the only thing we were ahead of you on back then

Got a satsuma and nuts in their shells in our Christmas stocking.

Only 3 channels on the television and they stopped overnight. It took ages to warm up the cathode ray tube so had to put the tv on five minutes before your program started, you had to get up to change the channels, either by twiddling a knob to retune or press in massive buttons which made a loud ker-chunk noise. (Quieter ker sound as you pressed it in, a click then a louder chunk noise when you let loose and it came out at speed.) Only having about an hour of kids programs shortly after school ended.

Little portable black and white tv with the circular indoor aerial you had to twiddle about to get a decent picture, then had to stand holding said aerial to watch as when you let loose the picture started going.

Looking through the Argos catalogue to choose Christmas presents to give mum an idea what we wanted. Gave her a list but knew we were only getting one of them. This went along with the aforementioned stocking which also included the usual socks, handkerchiefs (with flowers embroidered on the corner for me), chocolate and another couple of sweets.

Playing outside our house on the roads (not the main road) as there were not many cars. Playing kerbsie with my brother. Playing split the skipper with brother and his flick knife and no one was bothered that an eight year old and a five year old were playing with knives!

Having a regular fish and chips night once a fortnight on a Friday after mum got paid.

And adults squeezing unfeasible numbers of children in to the back seat of their cars for trips out - "one sit forward, one sit back, one sit forward - squeeze up everyone".

Paper bags for fruit and veg in the grocers or (tiny by today;s standards) supermarket.
Slam door trains, and running along the platform with my mum trying to find the non-smoking carriage.
Cotton summer dresses made by my Grandma and sent up in a parcel once a year.
Having the candles ready for power cuts.
No freezer at home til the 80s, just the tiny compartment in the fridge.
A brown and orange sitting room.
Bomb scares.
My dad making us watch the news the day Thatcher was elected PM [he wasn't a fan].
Greenpeace and CND pin badges.
I was trying to explain to DS the other day that children's TV when I was little was "children's hour" and there was no recording programmes to watch later, or catch-up or on-demand services - he thought I'd lost the plot.

I grew up in the 70's. I remember.
Lots of power outages. We had a gas cooker and boiled a kettle for the neighbours in the mornings by candle light.
We had one gas fire in the front room that was the heating for the whole house. Ice formed on the inside of the windows in winter.
We didn't have a TV for most of the 70's so I missed a lot of that unless I was at a friends or grans house at the weekend.
Spent most summers out and about from dawn to dusk riding ponies all over.
We bathed once a week, I must have stunk like a horse.
I remember the new big Asda opening one town over, but with no car we couldn't do a big shop, but went by bus and enjoyed looking.
We went to closest town once a week to bring home the shopping the rest came from the paper shop in the village that sold sweets, fruit veg cheese etc.
Milk man came daily and delivered milk, juice, bread, potatoes (we only ever got milk and cream from him).
We could walk up to local farms for fresh eggs and veg that was seasonal.
Teachers could hit you in school.
The rent man came around once a week to collect and stamp your rent book.
Then Mum learned to drive and the world opened up.

Cathy and Claire

Deposits on glass bottles

So many wrong things!

Gary Glitter
Rolf Harris
Lots of smoking and underage drinking
Hitchhiking
Oxford Bags

Good things

Biba
Glam Rock (excl Gary Glitter!)
Phone boxes
Platform shoes
Glitter nail polish
Disco 45
Jackie magazine - esp for Dear Cathy and Claire
The smell of Bonfire Night

Corona fizzy drink man with money back on bottles.

Buying a freezer from Bejams. Growing quite a lot of fruit and veg, Aunt and Dm buying a pig and sheep each (slaughtered) then halving them and butchering them into joints, chops etc.

Lying down in the back of our friend’s dad’s van to fit more people in!
NHS specs!!
Dinner money envelopes

Mull of Kintyre being played endlessly!

Oh yes, the phones! My mother used to tell each batch of outgoing students to absolutely NOT cancel the phone when they left because if they did, we had no chance at getting a phone line over the 6 odd weeks we’d be there. It took months to get hooked back up again!

I was a young child in the 70s, remember the last half of the decade.

I walked myself to primary school from the age of 5yo by myself and back home.

Parka coats and balaclavas.

I remember the first supermarket in town (Asda) opening and it was like a different world. Before that I'd had to trail round all the different shops with my mum.

Mum had a top loader washing machine which had to be attached to the kitchen taps with a hose and was pulled into the middle of the kitchen when in use.

I wore all my older brothers cast off clothes and Before that they'd belonged to my cousin!

Was allowed to roam round the neighbourhood with other kids for hours at a time. Just had to be back for tea.

The tv channels didn't use to broadcast for half the day. I would sit and watch the test card some afternoons as I was so bored!

Summers seemed hot and lots of water pistol fights. Winters it always seemed to snow. School would shut for a few days and we would go sledging. The local dads would take it in turns to tie a sledge to their rear bumper and pull us round the estate!

My brother had a chopper bike. And I might be imagining this but I swear I had a bike with solid/concrete wheels....no tyres!

Local phone numbers only 4 digits long - how many of us use old phone numbers as PIN now, I wonder?

5 TV channels @cstaff?

We had BBC1, BBC2 and ITV.
Great excitement when C4 started in 1982, even more excitement when we managed to tune it in in about 1987!

Bedroom was painted green. Not a pastel green. Not a mint green. Absolutely bright racing green.
Habitat.

Sharing a bath - weekly.
Mum not working, she'd walk into town on market day and come home with shopping bags of fresh veg & fruit, plus fresh bread from the bakers.
Car journeys with no seat belts, how many of could fit on the back seat?
2-star petrol

Our coal fire
No central heating
Bath once a week
All clothes being a massive fire risk!
Psychedelic wallpaper in our lounge.
Tufty the squirrel telling us how to cross the road.
Scary public service ads about horrendous ways you might die!
Mary Mungo and Midge.
No supermarket in our town just small shops.

Decimalisation

Grease!

The black and white minstrel show - imagine that now.

5 tv channels

Rainbow - supposedly a kids tv show.

Going out to play and just make sure you're back by 6pm.

Phone boxes

Moving house in 1976 and not getting a phone for 4 years

Scrubbing the front step.

Being “allowed” to stay up to watch Morecambe and Wise abs The Two Ronnies. Ie: parents didn’t want to miss itZ
oh yes. Live broadcast tv. TV was on when it was on, possibly repeated at 4am 3 days later.
Phones were attached to a wall or a phone box.