Silly things your mother did (lighthearted)

[RaraRachael]

Trying to lighten my current mood and started to think about things my mother did - and insisted that I do - as they were "the done thing" back in the day.

Turning the clothes inside out to put on the washing line in case a bird shat on them
Lining every shelf in your kitchen unit with patterned greaseproof paper
Stuffing the chicken and then sewing it up with a needle and thread

Suffice to say, I stopped these ridiculous traditions when i realised there was no valid purpose to them

Ahhh some of these are so cute.

My mum taught me to iron by ironing underwear and teatowels.
She still irons teatowels... why??

House always got a deepclean before we went on holiday (to be fair, it's nice coming home to a clean house, so I do it too)

I put ready salted crisps on my mac cheese, gives it a nice crunch haha

My grandma alway put tomatoes in mac cheese, my mum refuses so as a result my dad covers his in tomato ketchup every single time.

Saluting magpies, this is something I picked up, she always played/s "what's going to go wrong" when she saw a solo pie.

My aunt still airs clothes before they go to the wardrobe, I discovered this when she was living with my grandad and I went to get a towel and encountered masses of clothes in the airing cupboard.

Saturday was washing day, the kitchen floor would have piles of sorted laundry on the floor every Saturday rather than just doing loads through the week.

Sunday dinner was always set up on the table for us to dish up ourselves, dad always had to carve the meat and open the wine.

I do miss living at home sometimes haha

I'm 43, my DM is 77...possibly relevant that she was a 'surprise' to her parents... my Grandad was a Victorian etc
Her 'quirks' include :

• men should always have the first choice of seat in the lounge. I used to refuse to do this and DM would utter dark mumerings about never finding a husband with this attitude.
• men should have approx 50% more food on their plates than women. Cheers Mum, a lifetime of disordered thinking there.
• the drawer of 'stuff' in the kitchen.... To this day I can phone DF and he'll be able to find for me the obscure battery size I need that was discontinued in 1997.
• plastic bags stored, folded, in another plastic bag.
• slips should be worn with all dresses and skirts

I'm sure I'll think of others! I love my DM dearly, but due to some of her opinions on gender roles etc, I'm far closer to my sainted DF who has been my cheerleader my entire life and got me out of some tricky situations with DM as I was growing up.

These are just hilarious!! My mum is in her 50s and I can’t think of a single thing!

Another one by my DM. After food rationing ended in 1954 she wanted to try something more adventurous so decided on spaghetti bolognaise. Unfortunately she wasn't great at reading recipes.

I caught her just as she was about to put 12 strands of spaghetti into boiling water (for four of us) insisting that 3 strands each were loads as it swelled up during cooking. I made her read the recipe and she reluctantly increased the strands, fully expecting them to increase hugely in size and tumble over the side of the saucepan.

@Fuckingcrustybread

Yes to the sultanas and coconut but with sliced bananas!!

Slathering bruises in copious amounts of margarine proclaiming it would "Help the bruising come out"

If she needed to return something for a refund she would only take it back in a carrier bag from the same shop because it was rude. So she would return items to Tesco in a Tesco bag, it was unthinkable to return a Tesco item in a Morrisons bag!

@Shosha1

I still line shelves! Especially the ones that hold food such as oil or treacle.

My favourite of my Mums was after ironing dry clothes, she would then but them in the airing cupboard before they went into into the wardrobes. Why!

my mum still does this! (she also irons everything).

I've just seen someone mentioned licking a finger and wiping your face! My mum used to spit on a tissue and wipe our faces 🤮 I did it to her a couple of years ago and she was disgusted

@Fuckingcrustybread

She used to make curry with sultanas and serve desiccated coconut and chopped hard boiled eggs on the side. I'm sure that the recipe came from one of those 1970s "exotic" cookbooks.

when dm makes curry we have the following in bowls on the side:

• peanuts
• really salty cucumber
• minty tomatoes
• banana slices.

it was something that i thought was normal when i was a kid. dh thought it was weird.

@Fuckingcrustybread

She used to make curry with sultanas and serve desiccated coconut and chopped hard boiled eggs on the side. I'm sure that the recipe came from one of those 1970s "exotic" cookbooks.

I was just about to say exactly the same (except mine didnt add the boiled egg). Just a touch of curry powder...wouldnt want it to be too spicy..... well its a curry isnt it?

@Fuckingcrustybread

She used to make curry with sultanas and serve desiccated coconut and chopped hard boiled eggs on the side. I'm sure that the recipe came from one of those 1970s "exotic" cookbooks.

This !! We had all those garnishes and sliced bananas. I loved it

i found a recipe the other day for potato and egg curry made it and it was delicious. the eggs sit on the top. and if you get them at that not quite hardboiled not quite soft boiled medium stage they are so yummmm.

@Knittedfairies

My mum always cut Brillo pads in half; it gave me the heebie-jeebies.

Mine too! Then they last twice as long

(To be fair, they do go rusty once they are wet so that is not as batshit as it first sounds)

Having to unplug the tv and the video every night. First job in the morning scrabbling around to turn then back on.

Being taught how to use a dustpan and brush on the stair carpet. Sweep top step onto one below... sweep top 2 steps dirt onto one below. So some dirt was painstakingly brushed off every stairs. Bonkers!

This is a lovely thread. I haven't seen my DM for over a year (different countries), and I increasingly find myself telling my DD stories about my DM, the kind of thing this thread is full of. Mine did a lot of the things mentioned here (recycling underwear into dusters, ironing tea towels, airing everything, don't leave your washing out overnight unless you want the neighbours to think you're a slattern, etc). She also used to send me to the local Co-op for bits of shopping, and she'd tell me I could buy a small Mars bar as a reward for going (1970s - small Mars bars were tiny), but i was to bring it home unopened. She would then get a knife out and divide the tiny Mars bar not just between my sister and me, but between everyone she could think of. My cousins might pop round, so better but them pieces. The little girl next door might want a bit. Maybe my dad would like a bit when he got home. And so on. I would eventually be handed my share of the Mars bar (my 'reward' for going to the shop!) and it would be an almost invisible sliver.

[quote MostIneptThatEverStepped]@Fuckingcrustybread

Yes to the sultanas and coconut but with sliced bananas!![/quote]
Same ! Your mum and mine must have had the same cook book.

Sugar on peas.

Spaghetti lasagne. Tinned spagetti between the layers of pasta.

Her dog is currently on a diet of bacon offcuts in custard.

When I was at college and she got wind of me staying at a girlfriends for the weekend she’d if I’d got my pyjamas.

ooh spaghetti lasagne. sounds oddly yum

Some of these are really hilarious. My own DM isn’t really guilty of any of these that I can remember, particularly the laundry-related ones as I grew up in the US where we had a tumble drier since I was a toddler (putting your washing out on a line was VERY “low-class”) and the vast majority of our clothes were in that poly-cotton blend that didn’t require ironing. The most bonkers thing I can think about my DM was the lengths she would go to to avoid profanity, and the shame she felt on the very few times she let rip. And she had 3 sons in 3 years so she had a lot of occasions to test her!

I do, however, recognise a lot of these in my D(and sadly departed)MIL. Ironed everything in sight, including knickers and tea towels though “rebelled” and put clothes to dry on the “rads”. Curry with sultanas, coconut and bananas - check. Fretted for days about making sure she had nice new pyjamas for a cruise holiday because “what would the stewards think?” Only ever allowed me two potatoes at lunch though DH could have as many as he wanted (she was extremely generous otherwise with her meals though!).

Keep them coming!

my mother is a sociopath and i don’t have many happy memories.

she was also a BIG fan of curling tongs and used to do my hair for school photos. the end result being a row of 10 year old girls in plaits and bunches and me in the middle looking like fucking Liberace.

cheers, mother.

My mum used to save the cover off the top of the margarine (the bit under the plastic lid that you peel back)
They would be folded up and put in the drawer and brought out if any baking trays needed greasing and then put back for next time

@JustNotFunAnymore

My mum used to save the cover off the top of the margarine (the bit under the plastic lid that you peel back) They would be folded up and put in the drawer and brought out if any baking trays needed greasing and then put back for next time

Love it!

Also the lady whose mother kept a written record of removal of airing cupboard contents to wardrobes.

Hilarious!

We always had to wear a petticoat under our skirts but heaven help us if said slip was showing below our skirt!

Men used to get served more food than women - my MiL still does this.

My mother would ask every bloody time if she was allowed to use a Tesco bag when we went to Asda etc.

When I was about 11 (because my sister had been about that age when she started her periods), my mother rather secretively put a packed of cloth towels and a sanitary belt - yes, remember those horrors! into my bottom drawer saying, "Just in case you need them". I had no idea what they were or what purpose they were going to serve in my life.

Ironing everything including underneat, tea towels and duvet covers.

Feeding me apples with sugar and cinnamon sprinkled on top of it as a tv snack.

Underwear not underneat