What felt like a treat as a kid...

[ClassicStripe]

But now seems like it really wasn't?
Me and DSis used to absolutely love getting to use our mum's bath water once she got out. It seemed even more of a treat as she didn't have bubble bath (?!)

Getting a takeaway
Sweets
McDonald's
Having cherryade on my birthday

Staying up late! Now it's a treat to get in bed early!

Coca Cola. We only had it at Christmas or when we went on holiday. We rarely had fizzy drinks either (seventies child). I don't actually like it now or fizzy drinks in general.

Imperial leather soap, Baxters soup, Marks & Spencer clothes, pirate Betamax videos, those little squishy bath balls that melted under bath tap, Fray Bentos, Branded biscuits and non supermarket brand products, Ellenet hairspray, Lentheric perfume!

Mum serving up bananas(cold, sliced) with hot custard as a pudding.
Jelly and ice cream as the main dessert at parties!
Tins of chocolate pudding-Heinz- that she boiled/steamed in the tin on the hob whilst we ate Sunday dinner.
Cadburys chocolate fingers, party rings or Animal biscuits: ONLY for birthday parties, never everyday.

When Next first opened, anyone buying clothes from there was definitely quite posh!

Cornettos were only for grown ups. Mini Milk were for children.

Getting any kind of take away food.
Going to the cinema.
When we got a shower put in when I was about 14 I felt terribly sophisticated!
Getting new clothes outside of a birthday or Christmas.
Being allowed to have food or drink in the living room!

Noticed a few people saying fresh orange, what’s the difference between fresh orange and orange juice? Or do they mean orange juice vs orange squash?

@MrsHughesPinny yes, fresh orange juice as opposed to squash/cordial. For some reason, back in the day, it was served in tiny glasses, NEVER a tumbler!
I vividly remember being offered it as a STARTER in hotels/restaurants.
Maybe real fruit juice was expensive because you could also buy powdered orange in sachets to make with water that was then stored in a jug in the fridge!

Eating dinner in front of the TV. Also, the ham salads my mum used to make me when they had guests coming for a late dinner party and needed to feed me earlier.

@GellerYeller I remember it coming in dinky glasses when I had breakfast in one of those seaside hotels where the breakfast is served in what feels like someone’s living room when I was little.

We would have orange juice in a normal glass when we were children but my Mum would always top it off with water, for some reason…

@MrsHughesPinny yes! A guest/boarding house, is that the name? B and B type place? Never en suite but maybe a sink in the bedroom?! Always a thimble full of juice only!
I remember a health visitor telling me to give the kids watered down fruit juice with meals to help with iron absorption. Maybe that’s where your mum got that idea? 😊

Yes, I remember the tiny glasses of orange juice served as a starter in seventies guest houses. They were usually an alternative to soup or, occasionally, prawn cocktail. I also remember the sachets of powdered "orange" juice that were mixed with water for breakfast - Rise n' Shine. They seemed very exotic in the adverts but probably tasted horrible. I wouldn't be able to speak from experience as we never had it. Later, you could get concentrated orange juice in tins. I am realising just how much our eating habits have changed in the last half century.

Oh, yes the guest houses with the sink only in the bedroom. The bathroom (no shower then) was shared by every family on the floor and contained the only toilet. The bedroom floor ALWAYS creaked and the beds always had those horrible candlewick bedspreads, to which l was and am highly allergic. We had to take my pillows on holiday as I am also allergic to feather pillows and these were the only ones available in guest houses then. My parents used to take a flask, coffee and Marvel so that they could have an evening drink. They could collect boiled water from the kitchen for their flask after the evening meal. No such thing as kettles and little sachets of tea, coffee and sugar in each room then. A morning cup of tea would be brought up to each adult guest in the morning. We always had to change into our best clothes for the evening meal, which was formal and very traditional British seventies food. Looking back, it truly seems another world and a much more utilitarian one at that but we had some lovely holidays and it was all we knew at the time.

Licking the last bits of cake batter out of the mixing bowl when mum baked on the weekend (cue my brother and I screeching "you got more than me" at each other).

A treat was anything that my much younger (6years younger) sister wasn't immediately given too. Like Girls World styling head - I got mine for my 10th birthday and she was given one an hour later as she "wants to play with you" 😡

everything I had was duplicated and then taken away as she was too young to use it properly and I had to lose mine too.

Viennetta or Bernard Matthews Turkey Roast was a treat! 😁

Lemonade and, even more so, cream soda which we only got at Christmas.

@GellerYeller @Violinist64 That’s exactly what I mean! This would be the mid/late 80s when we used to go to places like Ilfracombe on hols. They always had a very particular smell, too…

You’re right, it’s actually quite shocking how fast things have changed. I remember my grandmother, born in the late 1930s, declaring spaghetti bolognaise ‘foreign muck’ and ‘too spicy.’

Teen DS drinks smoothies for breakfast three days a week and probably eats food originating in 5+ different countries a week and doesn’t think anything of it!

Fizzy pop. I was envious of richer friends whose mums bought it in the weekly shop.

Soft looroll! My dad used to get the hard stuff (actual paper) through his job! A quarter of sweets or a bag of penny things was a treat too.

Ohbyes, Vienetta and cream cakes!

Another one for orange juice, I remember it fondly as being a starter on the menu of our annual holiday for years. It still feels rare and expensive even now and still gives me the same glorious nostalgic feeling whenever I drink it. Also, the white mice pick and mix sweets.

@MrsHughesPinny @Violinist64 that’s brought it all screaming back to me!

What a thread; so many memories! It’s making me really ponder how different my children’s lives and expectations are. It’s not simply financial; I was a single Mum for them and things were tight but it’s more that ‘treats’ are so frequent that they are expected. My 22 year old eats out all the time, she does cook but Greggs, Maccies, Waggas are still a staple in her world. I felt posh buying an M&S prawn sandwich for the first ever time at 17! My Mum and Nan were aghast at the thought of buying a sandwich! I look at my home now with grapes, packets of crisps, fresh juice, actual raspberries- not in a tin, bubble bath just hanging around in a cabinet not used as an ornament in my room, chocolates that can be eaten anytime etc…. What a very different world we live in! They talk about their childhood as if they were deprived but it was still a totally different life than I had in the 70s and 80s.

Strawberries
New clothes from a shop. Not home made, not previously worn by anyone else.