Five normal things in your home that your mother wouldn't have had a clue what to do with

[sadpapercourtesan]

Excluding obvious tech stuff like mobile phones, Alexa etc. I'll start:

Olives - we always have at least 2 kinds, my mother would have thought they were poisonous berries

Cat tree/electronic cat toys - one did not provide entertainment for cats when I was growing up! Ours have more stuff than the kids

Different oils - extra virgin olive for salads etc, sesame, sunflower. I don't remember mine actually having any, she didn't really cook with oil

Trainer socks - one of my DC will ony wear these. My mother would have been utterly confused about socks which stop at the top of the foot and leave your ankles bare. She was obsessed with pulling your socks up and not getting cold ankles

Sour cream - I seem to get through so much of this for various things. She would have wrinkled her nose and thrown it out!

Diffusers - especially my electronic one from the white company which Mumsnetters, I have to tell you is the best gift I've ever had

Julienne slicer - god knows why I have one of those

Bluetooth speakers and earbuds

Sanitary protection "with wings"

My toddlers mini laptop

How old were your mothers??? Are you sure you don’t mean grandmothers

My mum is 86 and would certainly know how to use the things mentioned here.

how old are your parents that they wouldn't recognise any of these things ? Mine were born in the 1920s and 30s and wouldn't bat an eyelid. My dad is glued to his iPad, has always made fresh coffee, salad, had their first dishwasher in the 1970s etc etc.

Hate the casual ageism on here sometimes.

@jaundicedoutlook

Corner sofas.

Indoor temperatures above 10c in the winter.

Lol, corner sofas aren't new!

Only thing that would be a complete mystery to her is my stand mixer - my mother is not a cook, let alone a baker

Nope nothing my mum is 78 and actually taught me about all the things you talk of back in 1981

I'm now a fully functioning human woman 🤣

My mum offered to make dinner at ours and I said 'don't worry there's risotto ready'. Later on I asked her where the tortellini had gone. She said 'oh the spinach parcels? We put them in the rice'.
1 tortellini
2 any seasoning, spice or herb
3 my children
4 quorn

Figure skates
Bicycle
She’d manage most things as was very determined

The fact I have frozen chopped onion, frozen chopped garlic and frozen chopped ginger. She wouldn't understand the point. I can't stand chopping the stuff, so it's worth it to me.

I’m young and I don’t do/own/eat most of the things mentioned on this thread.

@sadpapercourtesan

Would you know what to do with a clamp mincer, dolly blue, pulley maid, flat iron, scrubbing board, eubank, twin tub. Work wise, a telex machine. Switchboard, mimeograph.

She was very wary the first time I made her tacos...came around quickly, though.

Most seasonings and spices! We were a very plain eating family.

What's with these recent threads about things your mum did or didn't or can of can't do? Weird.

My grandmother can do pretty much everything I can do and more, as I'm pretty shit at tennis and don't drink coffee. She, like all humans, has capacity to learn and hasn't continued to blunder through life ignoring everything invented post 1950.

I find some of the things listed here - and the young ages at which people are apparently completely unaware of them - mind-blowing. I've seen very little listed on this thread that my grandmother wasn't familiar with, and she'd be in her 90s if she were still alive. I don't know if my mum (60) and MIL (69) would laugh or be mortally offended at the idea that either of them would be at all unfamiliar with such basic stuff! I was given olives as a toddler in the late 80s...

@HoneysuckIejasmine

What's with these recent threads about things your mum did or didn't or can of can't do? Weird.

My grandmother can do pretty much everything I can do and more, as I'm pretty shit at tennis and don't drink coffee. She, like all humans, has capacity to learn and hasn't continued to blunder through life ignoring everything invented post 1950.

This. Also, why mothers and not fathers ?

My 90+ grandmother is familiar with all of these things. She hasn’t stumbled through the last 60 years with her eyes closed and ear muffs on for gods sake.

• number1&2 loo flush
• thermostat
• sash windows
• washing machine with buttons
• recycling

Nothing but she’s only 57!

Sash windows redcandlelight. Are you having a laugh? 😂

This thread has reminded me of the time we went to MILs for Christmas dinner and she proudly announced she’d found a recipe for red cabbage in red wine vinegar, but she didn’t have any red wine vinegar so she’d cooked it in red wine and malt vinegar

@redcandlelight

- number1&2 loo flush

• thermostat
• sash windows
• washing machine with buttons
• recycling

This is a joke, correct?

I am a middle-aged woman, and the thread isn't about age, as has been patiently explained on more than one occasion

There are many things my mother had/did that are alien to me, as well. It doesn't make me feel "murderous". Because that would be weird.

Surely the point is that people learn as they get older and adapt to change. You don't go backwards in time so you maybe won't know (for example) how to darn a hole in a sock.
The intention of the thread may not be ageist but many of the responses are. The other problem with these threads is that people assume that their experiences as children was universal. It really wasn't.

That was the point of this thread though - that we're not all the same and neither are our backgrounds. I was cooking dinner and saw my row of oil bottles, and thought "Mum would have been really bemused". Not because she's old/ignorant/from Mars, but because she was from a completely different cooking mindset and had completely different habits and ideas. It's BECAUSE she's not particularly old that I found that interesting. I was curious to know about others' family cultures and how their lifestyle differed from their parents. It wasn't meant to be a sneering thread about old people and how little they know.