Things you thought were posh/exciting/unattainable as a child that are actually everyday items

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I'm just searching for scotch tape on Amazon ready for Christmas. It got me thinking how double sided sticky tape was but a dream back when I was little. Blue Peter used it all the time but it was something I'd never have. The same with play dough. I only ever had plasticine. Scotch tape was fancy too, we only ever had yellow sellotape. Ribera. I'm sure I'll think of others.

@Itsthepits hope you don’t mind me saying, as it sounds like times were tough, but egg and home made chips is just absolutely gorgeous and now I want it.

My grandma did homemade chips in the fat that lived permanently on the hob ready to be reused again and again. She would cover the floor surrounding the oven with newspaper ready for the flying fat. OMG! But the taste! Lovely.

The same "through" carpet in every room, without the small thick rug at the door to keep the draughts out.
Fitted stair carpet that wasn't held on with special clips.

Who remembers getting a trim phone?

The height of sophistication in the early 70s and so much lighter than the previous handsets which felt heavy!

The corollary to this is frugal things you still do as a hangover from childhood... child me would consider adult me bloody rich (although adult me doesn't feel it) and yet I will still never buy bottled water, or more than one drink in a cafe, or pay more than a pound for parking. There's no rational reason why as I am not particularly frugal about other things.

Fresh cream, we only had Nestle tinned cream as a treat on tinned fruit. Our neighbour used to get a little bottle of cream delivered by the milkman at the weekend. The bottle probably only held a quarter of a pint. It seemed like unattainable luxury to me.

Having a brand new coat that wasn't a hand me down.

Fresh juice, strawberries, fererro rocher

Stickers were exciting for me. This was in the 90s and DM would occasionally buy me some, or I'd get some in a magazine, etc. She'd always encourage me to save them because they were expensive and harder to find.

Now I can buy my DC a huge book of stickers for a quid and they can go wild with them. But when I was a kid stickers were treated almost reverently! That's also just DM's personality, though...

Yup.
Daft of us really, but you're not the only one.

Sky tv! I remember the fancy family who lived at the bottom of our street getting this HUGE satellite dish erected on the roof, it was the diameter of the terrace house! They were like celebrities in our village because they “were the family that had Sky tv!!”
It was all people talked about and asked about for ages.

Other pps have already posted but also;
showers (we got one installed over our bath in the early 90s and thought that we were so fancy).
croissants (we only had them Christmas morning).
and also rare or medium steak/beef, as my mum overcooked everything! It was a revelation to find that peas were still green when ready to eat and that I actually quite liked vegetables when they weren’t cooked to death and basically puréed!!

Tights that fitted and stretched properly, they were very expensive. My mum got mine cheap from a stall, but no matter what the size, the legs didn't stretch long enough, the waistband was too bulky and loose and I think they were acrylic so they were itchy and uncomfortable.

The worst bit was the too-short legs though and having chub rub at the bare bit at the top. Just awful.

Eating in a restaurant.

Not exactly an everyday item now (as most people have better taste than me 😃) but I always wanted a globe drinks trolley a’la Del Boy Trotter. I thought they were really posh! I remember asking Santa for one for Christmas when I was about 7 or 8.

My uncle had a computer with a word processor on when I was a child (late 80s/early 90s). I loved it and was so excited to just have a big empty screen to type whatever stories and words I wanted.

Now I get sick of looking at the damn things...

YY to the orange juice starter! My parents' ran a B&B when I was little (late 70s) and it was on the evening menu as a starter. I used to watch Neighbours a few years later when they just helped themselves to OJ from the fridge in massive cartons and feel so envious. We get through litres of it every week now and it's just normal (although always get the one on offer obviously!).

Taxis. They were never, ever taken as children and not even when I started work in the mid-90s. My DH still sees them as a but of a luxury. I use Uber everywhere now.

Coca-cola was extremely aspirational, even though aforementioned B&B had a bar. Although we were allowed luminous orange Fanta in glass bottles on very rare holidays to Spain and that was so, so exciting. I hate running out of Diet Coke now!

Also yes to everyday crafting things like "double-sided sticky tape", cellophane, clean lolly sticks etc.

Eating out just was not a thing. The most exotic it got for a big celebration was chicken-in-a-basket at a pub. My kids take Five Guys, Wagamama, pizza etc completely for granted (I mean they are appreciative and it's not an everyday thing, but it's not that exciting or sophisticated or luxurious for them).

And yes to sticky back plastic/tape. It was always mentioned so casually on TV like everyone had it lying around as a staple, but I honestly don't know where you would have bought it from back then.

Lots of biscuits.

When I was a kid we had a biscuit jar and every night we were allowed to choose 2 biscuits for our supper. They were never, ever chocolate.

Now I'd smash a whole packet of choccy hob nobs if they were in front of me

Also yes to everyday crafting things like "double-sided sticky tape", cellophane, clean lolly sticks etc.

We had proper washing up liquid bottles though, they were decorated to make 'candles' at Xmas etc.

Vienetta, swear I could give that to friends after a meal now and they would think it was a big treat.

Baxters soup, only ever had it on Christmas day.

Pate, had it at my mums friends house and I thought it was fabulous, remember telling my friends at school on the Monday....I was 13.

Central heating, was only installed after all kids had left home, so I suppose to stop us getting too comfortable.

Holidays.......anywhere, I was 26 when I stayed in a hotel for the first time.

Shop bought cakes, how Mr Kipling was the height of sophistication I have no idea.

Yes to stickers. They were very precious. My friend had an enormous collection, thanks to relatives abroad buying them for her and she kept them (unused, still on their backing) in a photo album. There was a wide variety of "scratch and sniff" stickers of all sorts of flavours, and also coloured pens that smelled of corresponding fruits. I was wild with envy.

A bidet!

My parents fitted a maroon suite with maroon carpet, we felt so posh, my mum had wanted one for years - used it for washing her feet when she came in from the garden (downstairs bathroom)!! 😆😆

Fancy coffee.

A coffee bean was only something I'd ever seen being shaken on an ad on the telly when I was growing up.

The idea you could grind them at home and serve them with hot frothy milk! How exotic!

Yes - but it was the first phone we had.

I remember it being a treat when we had anchor butter or other "real" butter. Even now I still slather it on decadently and it still feels a treat even though we only buy real butter now 😅
My great auntie and uncle used to come to ours every Christmas and she always used to go to Asda and buy all the deserts and puddings. They had no children and used to spoil us rotten. Black Forest Gateaux with squirty cream still makes me think of her. The nearest Asda and Tesco were over 20 miles away so they always seemed almost exotic and posh haha. Coke was a rare treat, and we would guzzle it in a day leaving my mum to say "I've just bought that!"
McDonald's more than once a year, ALWAYS after our primary school Christmas play which was always performed at the town hall. We would walk to McDonalds and have a treat.

Does anyone remember McDonalds pizzas? Not many people seem to but they were the bomb!
We only had a knock off KFC in our town, favourite friend chicken (still there to this day somehow) and I remember going in with my dad to collect it, and oh the smell of the chicken skin. It was such a treat. I don't remember eating out in a restaurant until I was well into my teens, perhaps 14 so that was definitely seen as a bit posh.

Vienettas. My hubby and I have often said about how we thought they was the height of sophistication growing up, and definitely seemed much bigger than now.

So many things but also, I feel very fortunate for being able to access and afford for the most part these things now. Stuff that is normal everyday food now being such a treat shows how hard things must have been for the majority of our parents, and makes me thankful for all the things we did get when we could.

Eating out for us was for birthdays or an occasion, not "just because".

Days out we took a packed lunch & ate it in the car.

Some times I wonder though-did we appreciate things more then because they were rarer?