Can you share your pithy, old-fashioned sayings?

[JohnnyMcGrathSaysFuckOff]

DS is 7 and has a very folkloric imagination. He is always coming out with sayings that he has invented but that sound for a sec like they might be real.

I am going to make him a list of real proverbs and sayings as I think he'd get a kick out of it.

I'm starting with "many a mickle makes a muckle".... can you help me by adding your favourites???

Ah these are so good. I also realise I use many of them myself!!

DS will particularly love the wreck of the Hesperus, I think. Thanks!!

I didn't come down in the last shower

I also like... I may have been born at night, but it wasn't last night!

Build a man a fire and you'll keep him warm for a day; set a man on fire and you'll keep him warm for the rest of his life.

The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago; the second-best time is now.

A ship is always safest in the port... but that's not what ships are for.

Better late in this world than early in the next (speeding)

Good night sleep tight don't let the bed bugs bite

My uncle used to say there was enough blue "to patch a Dutchman's trousers". That intrigued me as a child.

All gong and no dinner (I prefer all fur coat and no knickers but considering it's for a 7 year old 😂)

couldn't hit a barn door with a banjo

thick as mince

That's put your gas on a peep.

Would you jump in my grave as quick?

It's raining in Paris.

You've got egg on your chin.

Ive been up and down all day like a tarts knickers ( busy day)

I could ride bare ass to London on that ( blunt knife)

Well she’s a bright beauty ( sexually attractive woman frowned upon by older middle aged women)

All mouth and no trousers (Gobshite)

Womens troubles ( anything remotely related to women’s health )

Shes no better than she should be ( sexually promiscuous woman - or anyone wearing red lipstick/nail varnish)

I didn’t come off the collide with a banana boat ( don’t take me for a fool)

lights are on but nobody’s home/ not the sharpest tool in the box ( a Wally /pratt)

The devil makes work for idle hands

night, night, don’t let the bed bugs bite

so many more lol x

Oops just seen they are for a 7 year

My favourite is my grandmother’s “I’m not as green as I’m cabbage-looking” 😆 🥬

Flee wi' the craws, get shot wi' the craws
My belly thinks my throat's cut (hungry)
A wee hour in the shawl (a nap)

‘Little Drop of Shut-eye’ - said in a strong Wiltshire accent by my lovely auntie Elsie referring to her homemade rhubard wine.

that’s just brought me to tears remembering that.

She also called any unmarried woman under about a 25 a ‘little maid’

‘How be you, little maid?’

floods of tears now xx

We had that one and ‘enough to make a sailor a waistcoat’.

We had “All kennel and no dog” for something that is all style and no substance.

Also “fried wind and snowballs” if anyone asked what was for dinner!

‘Where 4 eat 6 eat’

my lovely nan making a bit of dinner/ tea go further when my grandad brought a waif/ recent widower back from the pub ,

also, when I found out I was having twins when I already had two very small children and wasn’t planning on anymore!

DH uses that for untidy kid’s rooms.

It’s like the wreck of The Hesperus in here.

‘Nan - how do babies come out?’

‘Same way they went in, now eat your tea’

These are absolutely brilliant!

Like a rat up a pipe

As much use as a fart in a windsock

Neither use nor ornament

Not the sharpest knife in the drawer

Oh and another favourite of my nana’s: “Cast ne’er a clout ‘til May is out” (translation: don’t take off your winter underclothes and coat until June 😆)

If she was asked how old she was, she’d say “as old as my tongue and a little older than my teeth”.

With my folk historian hat on: it’s thought that “like Piffy on a rock bun” is a comic music-hall play on the Shakespearean phrase “like Patience on a monument/smiling at grief”, meaning someone moping around performatively enduring their suffering.

Up and down like a bride’s nightie.

I raise your ‘brides nighty’
to ‘tarts knickers’

my nans fave phrase x

Tin-kers were itinerant workers who repaired tin, like cookware. Historically I think they travelled with fairs.

I think he’d appreciate a good old fashioned Irish seanfhocail .Have a Google.

A nod’s as good as a wink to a blind horse. (Never really understood this one! 😅)
Built like a racing snake. (Skinny)
About as welcome as a fart in a spacesuit.
Were you born in a barn/Nah mate, yer thinking of Jesus
He’s too fow t’make arseholes (He’s not an attractive man) (not really for seven year olds this one)
You can’t polish a turd - but you can roll it in glitter.
Up there for thinking, down there for dancing. (In between for romancing)