Things that used to be rare/ luxury/ unusual but now really common

[Chubbychic]

When tablets (iPads etc.) Came out, I thought what on earth is the point. There's phones and laptops why would you need basically a combo. No way anyone but tbe very rich will own them...

And now I have one, dh has one, ds and dd have one.

Also lip fillers/ botox
Back in the day only celebs had it done. Now nearly every other person on my Facebook have had their lips done and quite a few have had botox.

Contract phones actually too. Used to all be pay as you go but that seems really rare these days!

On that note computers themselves were a huge luxury you would have needed a huge room to house some of the first computers ... wiring hand stiched ... also did you know at one point gin was common People’s beverage ... most people drank it instead of water ( because the water was so dirty ) and tea was a luxury for only the upper class ... thank god I can afford both 😂😂

Dishwashers

mobile phones

Grapes were only for the ill in hospital, wine was ‘posh’ and for special occasions like dinner parties or Christmas. Eating out even at a Harvester type place was just for celebrating.
Nuts were for Christmas only. Beauty treatments for celebrities.

Lots of the foods we have now (avocado, hummus) were very exotic, I remember when pita bread was seen as a ‘foreign’ food

Definitely computers and mobile phones.

I remember when I was little and we had hummus and I thought it was really exotic and posh.

On my first holiday abroad with my now DH, many years ago, we brought back a load of ‘foreign’ fruit, the likes of which no one at home had seen or heard of. They are now commonplace in most supermarkets. I can remember we had mangoes, papaya, and avocados.

These are good! Going off the grapes are for sick people, we always used top get a bit of lucozade when we were poorly. When I was an adult and my friend bought a bottle just because she fancied some I couldn't believe it Haha. Think I thought it was some kind of medicine!

Coffee machines
Frozen yogurt
Sweet potato
Decaf tea and coffee
Gluten free and vegan products
Sugar free sweets
Anti depressants
3D cinemas

International air travel - the jet set and all that

I don't think I saw Mango's or avocado's until I was in my 20's

Roast chicken was for celebrations and special occasions for lots

Central heating and air con

Cars generally, especially the reliability

Oh, and I've thought of a good one........ Calories

Skiing. Only really posh people went who had chalets etc.

The front room (only there for Best, in case the Queen popped by or something)
Putting lots of jam on your butties
Real coffee not Nescafe
Chocolate - only for Easter, Christmas and perhaps some at Halloween if you went guising
pop
getting a lift, you'll bloody walk and stop moaning

Was thinking more along the lines of Vienetta and After Eights

Seedless grapes. Tiny little ones. We only got them about 2-3 times a year, probably not even that. My dc look at me like when I say grapes used to have pips in.

Salmon-was too expensive before they found out how to farm it.

Ice cream. Yes you're probably laughing at that. My parents only got a fridge freezer in 2001. Before that they had a fridge with an ice box. Ice box usually was too full of necessities (ie one packet of frozen peas and it was pretty stuffed) plus by about 1982 the door to the ice box had pretty much fallen off and was held on with blue tac, so it didn't stay cold enough for ice cream. So we only had ice cream at a birthday when dm would buy it and pretty much serve it straight away. She didn't think ice cream vans were hygienic (and too expensive) so we were never allowed to buy from there.

‘Fresh’ fruit juice - I remember we only had it on special occasions and then my mum rationed it to a tiny glass

Eating out was just for big birthdays. Takeaways from the chip shop would be a rare treat.

Definitely all the free from foods and allergy menus in restaurants. In the old days it was so difficult to find free from food you had to get it from the pharmacy on prescription!

Also pasta - I remember seeing spaghetti on tv in the 1980s and not knowing what it was because I’d only ever seen the kind that comes in a tin!!

DM says she didn’t know what yoghurt was when she first saw it in the 1960s - she still insists it’s foreign muck.

Definitely foreign holidays! We used to have one every 2-3 years as a kid, my dc have 2-3 per year now.
Air travel in general has become far more accessible (although holidays are still a luxury even if you don’t fly to get on one).
Exotic fruit although I try to buy less of that now and more seasonal local offerings (which aren’t as much fun as raspberries on tap).
Going out for dinner - a real rare treat when I was young and now a weekly occurrence.

Multiple TV channels - there was one when I was a young child

When my DF bought our first car it was the fourth in the street.

My first computer was given to me by my then company - it had 4 KB of RAM and DOS only.

Central Heating - as a child we used to break off the ice on the inside of our bedroom windows.

Supermarkets - Sainsburys was a corner shop with marble slabs for selling ham and cheese etc.

Agree re Lucozade - only got it when we were sick.

Chicken was for Christmas Lunch only - normally a capon and it tasted 100 times better than any chicken you can buy today and I only buy free range.

I still don't have an ipod/pad thingy or smart phone or use social media - ie FB. Whattsapp, Twitter etc.

Vienetta definitely. We used to have one for Christmas if we were lucky, and now you get them with a KFC bucket meal!

Pedigree dogs.

Most people had Heinz 57 dog with the exception of Alsatians and Labradors and old ladies with their Poodles.

Now even the poorest person I see in the street has a French Bulldog!

Cashew nuts were only seen at Christmas and in a tin in our home and they were for my father but he used to let me have a couple!

I eat them now throughout the week.

Fruit out of season.

One of my dads first computers had a total hard drive size of 256mb and that included room to run windows.

The single packet of chocolate biscuits per week, which were strictly reserved for DM and DF to eat while reading the papers on Sunday mornings in the sitting room with the children banished to the dining/pLAyroom.

First foreign holiday was my honeymoon, a week in Gran Canaria in february aged 25.

We did have holidays every year - we drove to a sc house and DPs played a lot of golf in mornings, with plenty of “cultural excursions” with the DCs every afternoon....the joys!

Not sure what this says about me but:

Magazines like Shout and Cosmo girl and the likes. Remember thinking that some girls at school had money to burn when they came in with magazines.

DM shoes for school.

Those dark blue shopper bags that you can buy in flight (with the leather handles and golden zip) (I have one but it has rarely had an outing as you can see) every IT girl seemed to have one at uni.

Hair straighteners! Back in the day, only certain breeds had straightened hair.

Jane Norman shopper bags (warehouse too)