Sayings that your parents (or grandparents) used but you don't hear anymore.

[Fizbosshoes]

Inspired by another poster explaining their username which was a saying, my parents (mainly my dad) seemed to have lots of sayings that I rarely hear any more . I'm sure I don't have as many that I say to my kids - ill have to ask them in 20 or 30 years! These were some I can remember (they probably said them in the 1980s/90s)

For someone being clumsy or making a meal of something they were like
-a bull in a China shop

• a bull at a gate
• a fart in a collander

If laughing at something they didn't think was funny

• you'd laugh to see a pudden (??) crawl

Describing a child who was very chatty

• they had more mouth than grub to put in it

Describing someone who was probably overweight

• they're built to last

Surprised at something

• Well I'll go to the foot of our stairs

If you wanted something you couldn't have

• if wishes were horses, beggars would ride
• beggars can't be choosers

If someone seemed to be lucky or get away with something

• if they fell in the sea, they wouldn't get wet.

And I can't remember in what context it was used but
-If grandma had wheels she'd be a bus.

I'm sure there were more but I can't think of them all . Does anyone else remember these or have other ones?

"you're not made of sugar and shit don't melt"

I use the expression cut off your nose to spite your face!

I’ll show my bottom on the Town Hall steps.

I remember when I was small and when my dad was getting me dressed, when he took off my top he used to say ‘skin a rabbit’ but in a playful way. I never thought anything of it at time and just remembered it as something he used to say.

I said it to my son a few years ago and immediately though ‘eew no!’ And never used it again 😄

I’ve seen milk turn quicker
No use crying over spilt milk

Will ponder on some more…

Tail wagging the dog
You can tell who wears the trousers in that house.....
A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush

you go up the woden hill to bedfordshire - was the full saying

@Handsoffreturns

‘Do that again and you’ll have a clip round the ear / be laughing on the other side of your face / not be able to sit down for a week / insert mildly abusive 80s parenting threat here’

Oh yes we also had "laughing on the other side of your face/not be able to sit down for a week" too.
I had forgotten about that!

yer daft 'appeth which I think was half penny worth referring to you not doing someting sensible or being silly (not worth a penny for your thoughts only halfpence???

"Five and twenty past" for twenty-five past (whatever) o'clock

"I could shoot you without a gun" was a favourite of my mother's when I was little.

"Gee whiskers" said by my mother's friend and I've never heard it anywhere else. Was it something from the 50s or 60s?

"TTFN" (ta ta for now - ie goodbye) but funnily enough someone at work said it last week.

"Afters" for pudding or dessert, but sometimes I see it on MN and feel nostalgic.

"What a Herbert" = what an idiot

And who was "Gordon Bennett"??

How OLD (young) are some of you?! Many of these still in use in my circles and I'm not 103!

Though I haven't heard "Eat all your dinner there are staving children in Biafra" for many many years. My mother used to say it when we refusniking her cooking.
(There was a famine in Biafra in the late 60's/early 1970's & almost two million people died of starvation - three-quarters of them children. Medicines sans Frontières was started as a response to it - a fact I only just learnt when googling where the phrase came from).

My mum used to say " she's run off with a black man" when asked where someone was!!!!!!
She's the cats mum(when calling someone she instead of their name)
Give over crying, or i will give you something to cry about!! when we were moaning and whinging.
Mum always called us duck heads( or was it duck eggs?)

The 'up the hill to Bedfordshire' is part of a lullaby I used to sing to my children.

'You're a sleepy baby, I am tired too
Close your eyes for mummy, I'll tell you what we'll do
We'll tiptoe very quietly, so no-one else can hear
and we'll go up the wooden hill to Bedfordshire'

“It’s a bit black o’er our Bill’s mothers” when it was bad weather coming.
Looking all gone out.
Charlie’s dead. When your slip was showing. (This lead to the most cringe making event of my life with a dearly loved older relative whose, yes, husband had been called Charlie)

Oh, and “what did your last servant die of, old age or over work?”

Would you jump in my grave as fast? - if someone went out of the room and came back to find that someone had taken their seat

That's put your gas on a peep - that's you taken down a peg or two

That will learn ya

If someone went in front of the telly, “I can’t see through you!”, or if asked to get something/do something- “what did your last servant die of?”

@somewhereoverthechipshop

Or when blocking view of the TV:

You make a better door than a window

'Stick a brush up my arse and I'll sweep the floor!' If someone has you running around doing things for them

'She's got a bob on herself!' when talking about a particularly confident or big headed person

'Like a fairy on a gob of lard!' If someone was clumsy or uncoordinated

@Fizbosshoes

I use the expression cut off your nose to spite your face!

Everyone says that

I'm not getting this thread at all, most of these sayings are in normal everyday use. Why are posters thinking they are unusual