Do you remember? household items

My first washing machine (married 1973) was a twin tub. My sister married in 1974 and had an automatic. The outlet wasn't plumbed in and you had to put the hose in the sink.
They lived in a first floor flat. She put the washing machine on and left for her driving test. Unfortunately she forgot to put the hose in the sink...
Luckily she did pass the driving test.

JackyB When you see the colour of your hands after handling newspaper what must our bums have looked like?!!

DanniRae our toilet was across the yard next to the coal house. We didn't have a bathroom but used a baby tin bath in the kitchen (filled from the aforementioned clothes boiler). Baby went in first. Sadly I was the oldest!!

My mother always wore an apron which smelled of bleach with the pattern disappeared from the front as a result of washing clothes in the kitchen sink. Her hands also always smelled of bleach. How on earth she washed the sheets in there I do not know. She did have a mangle though which was very efficient.

When we moved to a council house we had a wash house with a huge sink and she inherited my grandmother's washing machine. This was a big green metal box affair on legs and a handle on top that turned a paddle to swish the washing about. It had a mangle on top which squeezed the water back into the machine.

Willow500 You are right our grandchildren or even children have no concept of how life was then. Maybe we should get together and compile an ordinary person's history book or blog!! Memories are flooding back to me after reading this thread!

I remember my FiL removing burning coals from the fire when it was bedtime and putting them outside to save them for the next day! I'd never seen anyone do that before!

Never wore an apron. Mum did. She wiped her hands on it.
Did you have a nest of 3 tables in teak?
And a pouffe which had a cover made of crocheted squares?
Not forgetting a blanket made of crocheted squares draped over the back of the armchair to wrap round you when it got a bit nippy as the fire burnt low.
It wasn't worth putting more coal on as its bedtime soon. After a certain time in the evening you didn't put more coal on - too wasteful.

I don't wear an apron but my mum always did then progressed to a nylon overall when they ran a hotel. We always had antimacassars on the furniture which she still used till they died. Also dressing table sets (big one and two small side ones) which were usually lace or embroidered (I still have one set I did back in the 70's). My mum (and MIL) had a hair dryer like a sputnik which the top came off and a hose connected to a plastic hair cover - she would get dad to put her rollers in and then sit under it for an eternity till it was dry. We also had a mincer - Sunday lunch roast was always minced for the next day and washing was done in a single tub washer with a mangle on the top. I was given one of these when we were first married in '71 and well remember trying to handle heavy brushed cotton sheets through it and then down the stairs of the flat to hang them out to dry. We had no inside toilet and when that awful Izal paper ran out we had to cut newspaper squares up as well. The shop on the corner sold broken biscuits and sugar was weighed into blue paper bags. So many things have changed in our lifetimes - our grandchildren (or children for that matter) have no concept of life without phones, cars, internet or technology.

My first washing machine was a single tub Hotpoint with top wringer, all the water went back into the tub. First you washed your whites then in the same water the colours were washed and finally the "blacks"!
Shirts being fed through the wringer would often have the buttons snapped in half so I had to sit and replace them later. That happened a lot. Then twin tubs came out.

I have so many aprons I could open a shop, yet I never wear them. Still have my original tea cosy from when I was first married which gets used now and then if I make a pot and must confess to buying the net covers for milk jugs though mainly seem to use them to put over a sugar bowl when it's out in summer to keep flies off. I consider it 'retro' rather than old fashioned!

My mother got a Hoover single tub with an electric wringer on top. She proudly showed it to her mother and sister who laughed at her and said she'd never get the clothes clean properly in it. Good job neither of them lived to see automatic washing machines.

Oh I forgot about newspaper for toilet paper. We had a kind of outside toilet - in was in the porch outside the back door and mum would cut up the newspaper and thread it onto string. But we also had a toilet in our bathroom and that had BOUGHT toilet paper. Obviously guests would be guided to use this one - my darling mum was such a snob!

At least with torn paper you wouldn't be in danger of getting paper cuts!

Did anyone else have an Elsan Chemical toilet? My poor dad had to empty it at the bottom of the garden every week. I only found out years later how it made him retch. Our school was just down the road and my mother would make us go back to school to the toilet (flush) rather than use ours. "Your father has to empty it!"

I used to hear about newspapers cut into squares but we just had to to tear bits off a full newspaper - obviously the lowest of the low!

We had an electric clothes boiler in the kitchen which provided hot water. It had a tap at the bottom which dripped into an Ostermilk tin. As children we balanced a bowl on this tin to get boiling water for washing up etc. Health and Safety eat your heart out! Nevertheless we managed to survive!

I wear an apron for cooking/baking.We have a big stone fireplace and have log fires, so have a black companion set which we use a lot ( great to poke a log fire.)
Don't use a teapot , although we have several, so no tea cosy.
In the past, don't remember any family having a mincer or cream maker , but remember the tub method of doing laundry and the wringer.

Don't all these things seem like ancient history now.

I remember having one of those cabinets with the drop down front, all very retro now.
Also remember my in laws having an open fire with a back boiler. One of their sons installed an immersion heater but they wouldn't use it and continued to have a fire in the middle of summer when they wanted a bath. They wouldn't have a colour TV as they said it was not natural, a monochrome world was obviously.

I wear a 'Grandma's Apron' or one that has my name on it - my DiL loves named items! I love going to junk shops and seeing all the 'retro' kitchenalia as it's come to be known. I remember helping my nan with the mangle and my mum with the mincer and would just love one of those formica kitchen cabinets with a drop down front but have nowhere to put it in my kitchen unfortunately

I wear an apron for cooking and cleaning
Mine aren't posh though, they are from Dunelm.

Ena Sharples walked into Florrie Lindleys corner shop in the first episode of Corination St and asked for a pound of broken biscuits. It was Nov 1960 and I remember it.
The biscuits were in big square tins. Broken biscuits were cheaper of course !

I've still got a toasting fork. Crumpets toasted on an open fire taste much better than any done in a toaster.

We used to have a corner shop, sugar came in great big bags and had to be weighed into blue paper bags (sugar paper). Biscuits were in large tins and were weighed into paper bags for the customer. One tin always had 'broken biscuits'. Beer and lemonade came in returnable bottles.
We had a gas boiler for the washing, then a twin tub. The first fridge I ever saw was in my gran's prefsb.

Daisy It was a metal device into which he slotted the razor and pushed it vigorously back and forth with a bang bang bang noise.
Best way I can describe it! If you google it it comes up

mrsmopp was that razor sharpening thing called a strop? I'll have to look it up.

DanniRae Scott's Emulsion was supposed to be a palatable way for children to take cod liver oil. Not sure how they made it into an emulsion, though.

My dad had some kind of device for sharpening razor blades!
Must have been before the safety razor but I do remember that.

Our Front room had a three piece club suite with antimacassers because men wore Brylcreem. A radiogram in the corner. One central light. One rag rug in front of the fire and a coal scuttle with tongs in it. On the arms of the chairs were flat Bakelite clip on trays to put a cup of tea on.
A mirror always over the fireplace which was dangerous because your dress could catch fire as you leaned over to put your lipstick on. No telly.
Oh and don't forget the set of three flying ducks on the wall Hilda Ogden style.
(We didn't have a 'muriel' though.

My parents too made rag rugs, I had forgotten about them . Also my dad soled and heeled my school shoes. When I wore stilleto shoes you used to be able to buy the wee metal studs for the heels and he used to put them on too