What are your childhood memories of your grandparents' house?

[ChaosTrulyReigns]

I was schrunching some foil today and it reminded me of the Vitalite tub of milk bottle tops for the Guide Dogs (always a concept I struggled to undersand) at my DGP's house.

And the whoosh hit of tomato smell in the greenhouse.

And the tea caddy of buttom at the other DGP's house.

And the duoble loo roll holder for soft paper (guests) and Izal (unfortunate family).

And rice pudding with skin on.

And a shiny 5p coin for whomever had the smallest new potato on their plate at Sunday lunch.

Good times. Bittersweet memories.

Oh gosh loads, especially my maternal grandparents' house in Aberdeen. I can even remember their blimmin phone number, and my granny died in 1983! My grandad's striped lawn, and regimented rows of lovely raspberries and strawberries, and his roses, and the smell of his shed, where we kept our bucket and spade (we didn't live anywhere near the sea). My granny's walk in larder with home-made jam and packets of lemon puffs. And the tins of Tennants with girls in bikinis on them in the fridge. Rowies for breakfast, and my granny's steak and kidney pie for dinner.
I also remember being fascinated by the mirror on the bathroom, which had one of those extending X arms, iykwim. And by my granny's mangle, which she actually used (I am that old...).
And I remember playing fish shops with my grandad. We used to get up really early to visit the (real) fishmarket at the harbour, and then we'd make paper fish and colour them in, and then sell them to my grandad and my parents with our little cash register.
I also remember clearing out the house when my granny died. My wee cousin was about 5 at the time and when my great aunt (my granny's only surviving sister) arrived, he came running down the stairs shouting 'Granny's dead! Granny's dead!' very gleefully at the top of his voice.

I don't remember the inside of my only grandparent's house (my scottish grandmother's) very well. What I remember best is the air raid shelter in her back garden. The shelter was made of concrete, and earth had been piled up over it, from which grass grew, so that it looked like an unexpectedly small and unexpectedly steep hill in grandma's little garden - that was, until you spotted the entrance.
You had to go down a couple of steps. All there was inside, as far as I can remember, was a couple of benches facing each other.
My brother, sister and I liked playing in there. Once, in a spirit of unaccustomed bonhomie the three of us all teamed up together to keep 'the enemy' out. The enemy being our slightly younger scottish cousin, brought to our grandma's for the afternoon so she could play nicely with her English cousins. Her name was Heather, and I invented a particularly witty nickname for her, as I saw it - 'Heather the singing feather'.
We were not nice children.

button box

checking the pools on a satarday afternoon

pulling carrots in the garden and eating them straightaway

lovely sunday roast cooked on the aga

nastursiums growing in the garden

going to stay for a week in the summer holidays with my best friend

grandad eating tinned fruit with bread and butter

always drinking tea out of china cups and saucers

loud ticking clock on the mantlepiece

soda crystals beside the bath (never had bubble bath)

grandads hernia belt

hanging the washing out with dolly pegs

Both grandfathers were smokers so while they were alive there was always the horrible smell of stale smoke hanging in the air. Both of them smoked Players untipped - maternal grandfather (who survived into his late 80s) used to pull his empty packets apart and use them to show us how to draw things, especially how to draw a tree as it grows from a seed, even though he was almost blind. And even though his lines never quite matched up, you could see that they had been done by somebody who could draw, the spirit was perfect. Whereas even if I did exactly the same it just didn't quite have 'it'. Oh and the smell of those old empty packets is the smell of drawing to me.

Aforementioned grandfather had very dicky lungs on basis of all the smoking so he was on oxygen pretty much all the time. He used to sit there with his oxygen mask in one hand and his ciggie in the other alternating between the two . We were always convinced he was going to blow himself up before he died of natural causes - in the end throat cancer got him, the doc said he thought he had a couple of months left and he held on for over 2 years.

His special place was in the greenhouse - he loved growing tomatoes and had a chair at the end where he would sit there smoking and plugged into his oxygen (had a tank out there especially) and ruminate on life to us little grandchildren and if we were good - get to have tomatoes straight off the vine. the smell of the smoke and the warm tomato leaves is now very evocative of him. He would also join in with our games with dolls and teddies when we were little in a way that no other adults would, they would sit there on his chair and he's talk to them just like they were real. No way would he have done that with his own kids though - think he was probably pretty strict then.

his wife - know by all grandchildren and lots of assorted others as gra - got to her late 90s. She was fab, and had a great attitude to life. She learnt to play golf at 50 eventually stopping at about 86, when they gave her an honorary membership to the golf club so she could still go and watch others, hit a ball or two, walk around and play bridge. She also volunteered for meals on wheels and at the local old age peoples club. MoW she had to give up when she got to about 80 as she couldn't lift the meal trays any more, whereas she used to go and help out with the 'old dears' where she was usually to be found doing the washing up as it was nicer being with the younger helpers. She finally stopped doing that when when she moved down to be in a home nearer my mum as she couldn't cope on her own any more; when she was about 92 (and significantly older than most of the old dears in the club!)

My other grandad died when I was about 6 so I don't really remember lots about him. He and my gran lived on the premises of the family business where my dad also worked, we used to be dropped off on a sunday morning to visit her whilst my dad popped over to the office - and then whizzed up to the pub for a couple of hours while Mum cooked sunday lunch.

We also used to have to go over every other sunday for the afternoon, including afternoon tea - aunt, uncle and cousins were also there. It wasn't very interesting as my grandparents liked to watch wrestling (what was it with old ladies and wrestling?) and songs of praise. Tea always involved thin slices of bread and butter triangles, with one row of specials that were flora for my grandad. Always a tin of salmon (made vaguely edible by lots of salad cream), ham, plate of lettuce (with always the same comments about the special lettuce plate that looked like it was made out of china lettuce leaves), tomato quarters, slices of malt loaf and a huge ruddy great fruit dundee cake from Elizabeth the Chef in Banbury. Which was always because it was my favourite - at which point I'd have to point out - again - it was not, I hate fruit cake.

They also had a corgi which was never fed dog food - always meat and two veg and there was always this doggy smell around, combined with everything else. I was never a child that liked animals, unlike my sister, which of course meant that it always made a beeline for me.

The BEST Yorkshire puddings ever!

Walking round the block playing, step on a crack you break your back. Step on a line you marry a swine! Very unsuitable I know when only 6 or so

All the family sat around the table one Christmas lunch and Nanna suddenly remembering that she had forgotten to serve the carrots!

Lovely summer afternoons in their garden.

Good times. Miss them both so much.

Sleeping top and tail with my sister with blanket and not a quilt.

Thinking that going to BHS cafe for lunch was really posh, can still smell the butter on my roll.

Going to stay with them in London and going to Trafalgar Square.

My grandad peeling apples and letting me eat the peel.

Always blaming Grandad for the snoring then finding out years later it was my Nan but he always took the blame.

My Nan and her cappachino sachet drinks, she always let me eat the chocolatey froth.

I miss my Nan. She died 9 years ago from Alzheimers

So glad this is being moved to classics. I haven't managed to read past the third post yet without welling up and this is my fourth attempt. I am going to have to read it bit by bit.

The fire in the kitchen
Wallpaper with concentric hexagons
A medicine drawer that contained things from the 1800's (my mum and I cleaned it out when they died - the contents were amazing)
The smell of hay mingling with warm fresh peaches from the tree
The clacking of hooves from the stable yard
The locks on the gun cupboard and the ever open back door
Checking the kitchen chair for an egg before sitting down
The pile of half crowns on the mantelpiece for me because uncle Albert left one every Sunday after church
The marks on the hearth from my mother's stilletoes which were tutted over years later because she preened in the mirror above it
Grannie's blue rinse and going to the hairdresser with her
Grandad's big white hankies
Looking through the binoculars (I have them now)
Looking through the green leather opera glasses
A book about a dromederie and warm milk in grannie's bed
Old chairs and sips of whisky
Watching the wrestling on Saturday afternoons
Watching the Golden Shot on Sundays
Grandad coming home after the races and sharing his reheated dinner
Looking at my dd who was given grannie's name and who has the same mild and determined manner, blue eyes and identical build and wondering how one wonderful woman whom I adored was replaced with a wonderful and so similar dd nine months before she died.

My nan hammering steak with a meat tenderizer (is that the word?)
Mashed potatoes with 'cream of the milk' mixed in
Sitting on her lap and looking inside her gold locket
The Anglia televison man - a sort of Knight on a horse that came on in between programmes
Her amber coloured glass sweetie jar that always had buttermints in it that I wasn't allowed to eat before dinner.

my granddad died today. this thread has unfrozen me. I remember - red lino on the floor, a huge 1950s fridge. orange pop. lying next to him while he had his afternoon nap, reading alice in wonderland and waking him up to ask him words i didn't know. my grandmother's utterly soft skin and smell of talc that always surrounds her.

Oh oranges.

My thoughts are with you.

thank you. I want to talk to someone. I had thought about starting a thread but this one is just perfect. He so believed in me and I loved him so much.

I never had a grandparent until we moved back to Italy when I was 6.5yo.

When we moved there we lived about half an hour's walk from my grandparents house and I spent so much time there I can remember, even now, the smallest details like the smell of particular cupboards; the sounds different doors made; the routines, and jobs we all had to do (grandchildren) like mopping the floor after lunch.

I can remember the lining paper she had on shelves; the first sounds of the cockerels; the exact way you had to turn the tap on outside to get it working.

The smell of pomodori being processed for the harvest. Lying out in the corn that had been left to dry out and getting a smack (for my grandfather benefit) but a big kiss and some icecream when he wan't looking

I could walk back there tomorrow and it would all be different as she has passed on, and I wish, from the bottom of my heart, I hadn't been so unbelievably stupid as to not go back (for lots of reason, none of which are bloody valid).

I'm sure lots of my childhood would have changed anyway, even if I had gone back, but maybe they would have been gradual changes. You know., The tap night have been fixed. The paper in the bottom of the cupboards would have been different...

But I know that I can lie down in bed tonight, and I feel so lucky that I can walk my way through that house, the out buildings and the farm and recall all of it. Sight, smell, touch. It's all still there. And I am so grateful as it was the most beautiful, happiest time in my life.

And it was all down to my utterly beautiful, ridiculously strong (in many ways) Nonna.

I'm so sorry to hear about your granddad, Oranges, he was obviously a special person and very dear to you.

Your feelings must be raw at the moment; I hope you have the support of family around you. As this thread shows, grandparents form such a significant part of our lives - when they have gone, those memories stay with us for ever.

All my grandparents have been dead for may years now, but I still remember sight, sounds amd smells that are as vivid now as when they were alive.

My thoughts are with you too x

Oranges, my thoughts are with you. I wish you much strength in the coming days and in the future. I hope you can gain some comfort from your memories of him and your times with him x

Too many memories of my grandma's house. The loch, the burn, the hills, red squirrels on the birdfeeder in the early morning.

Proper black dark - if you woke in the middle of the night you couldn't see your hand infront of your face (I'm a city girl so this was always a bit scary), but also millions of stars on a clear night. Peaty water in the bath, the smell of her soap.

Playing with her jewellry box on wet days, and a million adventures outside. It was a tiny, tiny house but outside was huge and we had the run of it from a very early age - single track road and miles from anywhere.

I still have dreams about my paternal gran's house. It was a big Victorian villa and I dream about secret corridors and rooms that I didn't know existed. Shelling peas, making perfume out of rose petals, climbing the big tree to see my dad's initials which he'd carved when he was 10, a set of old encyclopedias, the hornby trainset, the Rayburn and the two pulleys that my brother & I would dream of climbing on. The press and larder the scullery - names for things that we didn't have at home. My gran's cooking - she was an amazing cook.

It's the smells though. I can conjour up the smells from both places - amazingly evocative. I had such happy times in both places.

oranges. Your post is lovely. It's hard even when they've had a "good innings".

Playing with Grandad's bus drivers hat.
Nannie ALWAYS having toffees lurking in the bottom of her handbag.
Her pretending to phone the police if we were naughty when she was looking after us.
Him making her laugh and them still being in love after 60 years of marriage, getting through WW2, 8 kids, death of one child and never any money. Inspirational (and make me ashamed of things I whine about sometimes ).

Val

So many wonderful memories.

I hope my grandkids will think of me with as much affection as I do my Grandparents

I love this thread, it is so evocative. It is my favourite thread of all time.
I would love to see it made into a book with old photos.

Is it strange to enjoy the memories of others so much?

Here are mine;

Ancient fairy lights and paper Christmas decorations in beautiful pastel colours. none of that matchy matchy stuff you get nowadays.

Tinned fruit with evaporated milk.

Kitchen with faint smell of gas.

Slippery green satin eiderdowns.

Treasures from Woolworths before the war. Nana had a pink flowery chintz teaset that I coveted and now I have. I am sure she influenced my future taste.

Great thread.

My nan and grandad live on the isle of white.
I remember the excitement waiting to go on the ferry, then the smell of the sea when we arrived.
we always had cheese and piccalilli crusty rolls.
Waking up in the morning to the sound of the cockerel.
Watching countdown.
Feeding the horses that lived in the field at the back of their garden apples.
God there are so many we used to stay with them for a couple of weeks in the 6 weeks holiday.
A funny memory I have is that my brother sister and I used to lay in bed at night and try and plan how we could escape the island and go home to our parents coz we missed them .

paternal gran - playing in the close in her tenment where she raised 9 kids in a two bed (a lot of it alone as she was a widow). Friendly neighbours. Functioning outside loo. Loo inside with the high cistern and chain. Huge knickers hung out on the washing line in the communial gardens (no shame!). All the furniture/carpets were dark colours. Sash windows. Gran running about playing with us and having lots of fun.

material grandparents - very formal, better off grandparents (relatively speaking). Lots of cake, children should be seen and not heard. Alpine man delivering lots of bottles of ginger in vivid colours that made you hyper (and you still had to sit still!). Very fat cat. Sandwiches in condensed milk???????

Paternal grandparents- skips and chocolate biscuits. Battenburg. Too many people squashed into a room. Grandad always sat in his chair. Not understnading a word he said due to broad zummerzet accent. Take a break magazine. The back room with its organ. Photos everywhere. Having to kiss everyone hello and goodbye (was not fond of this). Chickens in the garden. Nanny chasing a balloon across the field when it blew away.

Maternal grandparents - the smell of coffee and cooking, gala pie, bovril sandwiches, mincing left over meat to make shepherds/cottage pie. always being slightly cold due to windows and doors being open year round, the tea tray, the hokey for sweeping up crumbs after tea, the sausage dog, beds with sheets and blankets, cabbage patterned curtains in my parents' room, very bubbley baths. Gadgets everywhere, the old amstrad computer...

Grandma and Nana wearing pinnys
Headscarves
Baking
Coal fires
Sweets
Yellow fish
watching doctor who
great grandma used to watch wrestling
carbolic soap
Jumping on the beds
1970s swirly wallpaper and lots of orange walls and carpets
all gone now, died over 25 years ago, Nana had altzheimers

Max Factor Creme Puff face powder, and the "front room" which was only used for "best". I NEVER saw it used!! Hovis bread, cut really thin (by hand) and tinned mandarin segments with evaporated milk for tea. The black and white telly. Her addiction to Crossroads. The goat in the garden. The smell of coal fires (and all the other rooms perishingly cold). Sitting on her knee with her teaching me to knit. One in a million, my nana was....