To ask for your weird family behaviours that you didn't realise weren't normal until you were older?

[Coffeebiscuitsrepeat]

1. We called a toe poking through a sock hole a "potato".

1. Whoever made the most mess at the dinner table "won the prize"... And the prize was to clean up the mess!

"- having no heating in any room apart from the living room, so doing almost everything in there (eating meals, changing, drying hair after a bath etc)"

This was totally normal before central heating.

^ I know but this was in the 90s so not normal for the time!

I remember the TV being unplugged in thunderstorms although I think my mum only ever did it to humour my grandma. I also remember them telling me that my great grandma used to go round and cover all of the mirrors in the house if there was a storm.

@topoftheshops

^ I know but this was in the 90s so not normal for the time!

It was definitely normal in some council housing until the 2000s. It affected those who already had tenancies, just as the Fit Homes Standard only applied to new tenants. Upgrading/modernisation programmes often left out the individual/not on an estate properties as well, because they weren't so profitable for contractors.

It was definitely normal in some council housing until the 2000s. It affected those who already had tenancies, just as the Fit Homes Standard only applied to new tenants. Upgrading/modernisation programmes often left out the individual/not on an estate properties as well, because they weren't so profitable for contractors

Ok... I do apologise, it was just not the norm among my friends, family or anyone I knew so I included it in my list. I take it back!

“Had a set dinner for each day of the week”

We had this too

‘If it’s Friday it must be fish’ 😂

We always had a teapot, cups and saucers, milk and sugar on the table at dinner time. yep!

More cold dishes in summer though especially if it was actually hot weather. But generally iirc:

Sunday - roast - Also a cooked breakfast (I think that was bribery to get us up for chapel!), but roast was at dinner time and having had a Cooked breakfast we didn’t really have a lunch just soup and bread

Monday - something that used the roast leftovers, usually a stew or a pie

Tuesday - sausage and mash

Wednesday - pasta usually mac cheese

Thursday - our busy eve with guides/scouts etc so freezer to oven deal, eventually this became micro ready meal day when we got our first microwave

Friday - fish - parents Catholic so this is the norm for them even though it’s no longer required by the church. Occasionally we’d have a chippy tea but it wasn’t a regular thing

Saturday - ham egg and chips mostly or salad - with chips 😂 so healthy!

I mentioned on another thread recently we had soup & bread when we got in from school too to “keep us going” home made soup is a big thing for Scots.

I dated someone who’s family served NO drinks at mealtimes! Wtf! I NEED a drink to wash down the food even just water will do.

From high school age we got both a later bedtime AND “supper” - big mugs of tea or hot chocolate with some kind of hot carby treat - buttered toast, crumpets, scotch pancakes etc before bed.

“Chocolate once a week on a Thursday night. One bar. No sweets ever.” Omg that reminds me! We had 1 chocolate bar between 3 of us! It was sliced up and shared out!

Picnics and pack ups for travelling (dad was army both parents Scots so MANY hours travelling to visit grannies etc at least once a year) consisted of:

Home made soup in a flask
Hot water in a flask for teas
Doorstep cheddar or ham &
Sweet pickle sandwiches
Boiled eggs and (this is the weird bit) halved tomatoes which there was a special Tupperware picnic salt shaker for using on - I still love salted tomatoes!
Similar to the chocolate we’d have one SMALL pack, like 20g bag, of crisps shared among 3 of us kids
Small slice of some kind of sponge cake each

That was on the way there, on the way back we were loaded up with Scots goodies to eat 😂 plus whichever gran we’d been staying with the night before would have packed a HUGE picnic, there’d still be home made soup and water for tea though.

We did go out for meals but it was very much a special occasion thing (birthdays, anniversaries, major achievements at school) and to “proper” restaurants not fast food places and we were taught how to behave (was watching pretty woman recently and omg that was so similar I remembered “napkin in lap not studded into your collar!” And they taught us which cutlery and glasses to use) but we also got to try many different cuisines which was quite unusual for the era (70’s and early 80’s)

Reading the newspaper from 7 or so. I was expected to have an opinion I could defend on any current topic. We used to debate everything over the dining table.

Yep! Both parents were shop stewards at one point, we were expected to be well informed on current affairs from a young age but also not to blindly accept what was in the press/msm!

A habit that’s stood me in good stead actually and that I practiced with my own dd too and it’s serving her well too.

On camping holidays, my dad would sit in the car in the rain listening to the radio. When asked what he was listening to, he’d always say: ‘propaganda’. my parents and your dad would probably get on! 😂

@Disquieted1 - my ex INHALES his food! He also puts his arm round his plate to “guard” it and cuts it all up at the beginning and uses just a fork to then eat or even a spoon! He’s the youngest of 4 and claims it’s all come about because if he didn’t do this stuff his siblings would eat his food! 😂gross eating habits eats with mouth open too 🤮

He’s not an overeater or greedy he’s slim still but just weird at mealtimes.

If we ate out he’d be finished when I’d only just finished with the condiments!

Solidarity to those with less than ideal homes and childhoods, was true for me too but mainly in late teens and I left at 17 as a result.

I have very happy memories up to the age of about 12 though.

The melon and ginger sounds yum must try that

@WindsorBlues I now associate lucozade so strongly with being ill that the smell makes me nauseous!

have birds forgotten to drink the milk? not forgotten but never learnt - it’s not the same birds! The ones from the 70’s are dead!

them being obsessed with the food being hot. So plates warmed in the microwave

Slightly off topic but can someone explain how to warm plates in the microwave? I keep hearing about how people warm their plate in the microwave but I can’t figure out how.

I thought microwaves worked by heating the water inside food so you could really only warm an empty plate by putting an amount of water on it before microwaving but then isn’t the plate wet when you take it out?

Sorry for the detail but I really want to know!

AFAIK they just put them in dry in a stack, and it did work... I don't really know how microwaves work so I can't answer re. the water!

Answer the phone by saying the number
All main meals served with potatoes (no rice, pasta etc)
Vinegar on fishfingers
Dad had butter on Weetabix (still does! Must be like sawdust!)
Pilot light out when you go on holiday
Car went in the garage every night
Coats, shoes and school bags all had to be put away before Dad got home from work.
Always had to ask to leave the table after the evening meal
No drinks with meals
Ribena and milk to make a 'milkshake'...
Or drinking chocolate which never disolved!
Bovril on toast - never Marmite
No eating in the street
Meals out were very rare and for special occasions only.. and always a carvery (see previous point re potatoes - I was 21 before I had a curry!)

No central heating or double glazing- which meant virtually living in one room in winter, dressing downstairs & only going in the bedrooms to sleep. I had the smallest room in the three bed 1930s semi. It had 3 outside walls and black mould! My parents tried to get rid of it by sticking polystyrene tiles all over the walls under the wallpaper. It had polystyrene tiles on the ceiling too (surely that was a huge fire risk??!!)... nothing worked though... the new paper still fell off with the damp and had to be held in place with drawing pins in places!!!! This was the 70s! I'm the only member of my family with asthma now - we all blame that room!!!!

Oh no feet up on the sofa - ever! So you had to sit 'properly' and not allowed to have your legs bent to your side! Apparently it would damage the sofa cushions!!!

@AnneOfCleavage Great if embarassing memories

We only ever had fizzy drinks and crisps on friday nights. We would decide as a family what combination we wanted, "dandelion and burdock with monster munch!" And off Dad would go to the shop to buy it. If one of us went with him we would often get a secret car snack to eat on the way home and never speak of it.

There are many things ringing a bell on here.
I dont remember ever eating out with my parents, my grandparents took me to the likes of cafes and little chef and rarely the pub.
I never ate a Chinese meal until my 20s. Someone asked me what I wanted and I didn't know what they meant so they just got me a sweet and sour chicken thing. I hated it so I didnt eat another Chinese meal for years.

My mum made a fry up breakfast every Saturday. To this day i cant stand any of the fry up ingredients. She could not cook for toffee.
Rarely we would get a chippy meal, and years later I wondered why the fuck me and my mum would walk the 15 minutes to the chippy and 15 minutes back, when my dad had a car and could have just gone and got them. Why the hell was it mums job?

Until we got a computer (a BBC type 2 or something, I played games on it that had to load via a cassette tape) we all ate at the table. Once the computer came there was only room for me to eat there. I had to squish my tiny self up so dad could see the TV behind me. Why we didnt move stuff around so I too could see the tv was beyond me.
I had to read the classics and have a view on them. I was 7 ffs.
I was the tv remote until actual remotes came to be. Dad would say I want ITV and I had to hop up and change it over, quickly too.
I wasnt allowed to watch any TV, unless of course the parents were out, then I would put it on low so I could listen out for them coming back.
All the kids at school talked about neighbours, I'd never heard of it. I had to be always reading a book and improving myself.

And the drinks thing, I think i must have been permanently dehydrated. I would have been fine with just water but it was never offered. I remember my cousin coming over for tea, only the once. She asked for a glass of water with the meal and both my parents did a little shocked intake of breath. But still it never occurred to them that I might need a drink more often.
I dont even know why drinking water was such a no no. It's not like they paid by the litre like we do now.
Theres more but that's enough for now.

@Lincslady53

I grew up in Leicestershire. My Scouse partner thinks it is off to have a slice of bread and butter with a bowl of tinned fruit (with evap milk). I am sure it was a regular East Midlands thing. Anyone else?

Following my earlier post about remembering mum doing this (without the bread and butter), I was chatting with my dad earlier and he did (and does) have tinned fruit, evap milk and bread and butter! Leicestershire born and bred, too.

He also mentioned eating rich fruit cakes with a slice of Stilton cheese. Apparently also a thing in our area, at least for older folk.

@wanderings

Birthdays would only be birthdays if the birthday child was blindfolded for a little while. Unable to see, they would hear the presents being brought in, and a few decorations put up (or they might be led into the decorated room). They'd have to feel each present, and eyes had to stay covered until everyone had sung happy birthday. If a birthday outing was involved, the birthday child would always be blindfolded for some or all of the journey there.

I never heard of other families doing something like this. We loved it, and it made it fun for the unbirthday children. The being blindfolded before presents only lasted about three minutes, but I remember it feeling like an eternity! I asked my parents why we did this; they said it was to build up the excitement.

I love this idea - birthdays are a big deal to me and this sounds so much fun!

topoftheshops oh yes everyone having their spot 😀😂 We all had our spot at the dining table and you never deviated from it even if a sibling wasn't there. It's weird though but I have a fave seat in my lounge even now but it's not the be all or end all if someone else sits there but you do feel a bit nonplussed when you walk in and see someone else there.

I remember another tradition that our family did that no one else seemed to and that was on boiling hot days my mum would fill the bath a few inches with cold water and we'd sit on the edge and cool our feet whilst eating ice lollies (homemade made in egg cups and flavoured with pink or orange squash which we'd eat whilst paddling). In the winter every afternoon she'd warm our slippers on the fire guard so we had warm feet after walking home from school.

Tempted to try the melon and ginger sounds nice!

Ginger on melon was very usual, as was a sail made from a toothpick and a slice of orange.

Yes, we also had our own places to sit - at the dining room table, on the sofa. We also have our own coffee mugs too. I still have my own mug at my parents, as does my DH and he's never lived there.

But the weird thing my family does, is to take our own cutlery away with us on holiday. Only self catering. But my parents always take their own cutlery, mugs and wine glasses. The rest of the crockery we use theirs (plates, bowls etc). My parents even have a holiday cutlery set stored in a box for whenever they go away. I genuinely thought everyone did that until work colleagues laughed at me a few years back,

I recall having a friend over for tea after school and her being amazed that my Mum read the evening paper and made comments on various issues of the day, she had never seen her mother read anything other than Woman's Own. At elections her father told her mother who to vote for.

@Tittie

Broccoli as a side dish for most dinners. Chicken korma? Serve with broccoli. Spag Bol? Serve with broccoli. Chicken nuggets and chips? Serve with broccoli. It turns out my parents didn't think it was normal either, but it was the only veg they could get me and my brother to eat. I wish they'd told me it wasn't normal before letting me go off into the big wide world on my own.

Ha!! Must remember to tell DS1 that raw carrot, cucumber and apple on the side of everything isn't normal. But aside from broccoli and cauliflower (which I put with normal meals), he won't eat any other veg/salad so I take the wins where I can.

"At elections her father told her mother who to vote for."

That was very common unfortunately. You still hear older women now say 'my late husband always voted...' and they keep it going even though he's no longer around. It's one of the reasons why I don't like generalised postal voting - dominant people in the house can force the others to vote their way.

We all ate the same evening meal, no-one allowed fads, It's a home not a transport caff, my dad used to say.
There was certainly less pandering to children, at the risk of sounding 72, would some of the problems families experience today be reduced if children were not to rule the roost quite so much?

This is a great thread. Loving accepting being a fatality, and dancing to shawms and crumhorns

A nice tradition we had was that DSis & I always had birthday parties. Our DM would make a cake and DF would stay up late decorating it - and they were spectacular, things like a cake piano, a cake birthday tea table, a witch’s house, a fried breakfast (in a frying pan) etc. We had a spare room on the ground floor and the cake would be in there on the birthday party morning - it was always a wonderful surprise as we had no idea what the cake would be.

We had ginger on melon. I still put sugar on strawberries if I’m having them with cream.

I remember our parents not being good at explaining things and they seemed to get annoyed when I didn’t know things. I don’t know where they expected me to learn them! This was when I was under ten. Or they’d answer literally - eg my dad got the Times Educational Supplement, if I asked what it was he’d probably just say ‘the Times Educational Supplement’. Or if I asked why DGM’s coffee tasted funny DM would say ‘because it’s got chicory in it’. I had no idea what chicory was of course, but she didn’t tell me. Looking back that seems so odd.

Melon and ginger people: I need to know more as I want to try this. What type of melon? Just ginger or salt too? Presumably had to be powder not fresh?

Def powdered, few people had seen fresh ginger in the 60s/70s. Usually a honeydew melon, cut a wedge, sprinkle with ginger and add a sail made from a slice of orange and a cocktail stick, voila, a Viking longboat.
I wonder in 30 or 40 years time which of your habits will seem odd to your children/grandchildren? Will they find the amount spent of having food delivered or going for a takeway odd?