if you could....

Can't think of anything from when they were young apart from a washing machine! However, when they were teenagers, mobile phones would have made contact so much easier and made me worry less.

I agree with the digital camera.

Social media!
At one point I felt particularly isolated. I think being more easily in contact with family and friends would have made life more pleasant.

An automatic washing machine instead of the tiny 1940s vintage single-tub with wringer that we "inherited" with our house!

Probably a decent washing machine as I had a top loader with a mangle/wringer attached and it took ages because of rinsing the washing as well. Nappies were boiled in a bucket on the stove. I probably spent half a day just doing the washing. I didn't complain at the time because it was given to me.

Mobile phone. DH was away a lot, in inaccessible places when DC were small, and to have been able to talk to him every day or so, instead of sometimes going weeks without contact. Also, finding myself so often driving distances with DC, to know that I could pick up the phone and ring for help, if needed, and not have to hope someone would stop to help me, or let me use their house phone.

A washing machine for me too. I don't know how I managed. All we had was a spin drier. All the washing a baby creates. I used to wash sheets in the bath and lug them into the kitchen to the drier. It was either that or a trip to the launderette, which I sometimes couldn't afford and which wasn't kind to baby clothes.

We had a twin tub when first married but 10 yrs later when DD arrived we were fortunate to have an automatic. Mobile would have been great, as for the first few years we were married it was a walk to the phonebox !
I'd agree with travels a digital camera would have been wonderful. A video camera would have been even better.

I have video films from 30 years ago of my eldest GD so that one day her children can see how naughty their mother was as a 5 year old child hahahaha.
It shows Christmas celebrations and also some of my hols in Oz.
Up to now I haven't watched them even though I have a comparatively new video player. I'm blowed if I know where the camera got to.

Definitely a washing machine and a digital camera would be my luxury item.

I agree, a digital camera.

Also, a shop such as Asda, where reasonably-priced children's' clothes could be bought, along with groceries and household items.

I would have loved one the buggy steps for my older DD to stand on when the youngest was in the pushchair. We walked miles every day and she would often want to balance on the back which made it hard work to push. When I saw the buggy board (not sure what they are actually called) a few years ago I wished I’d invented it!!

Disposable nappies. Just coming in when the boys were tiny. Couldn't get them in Jamaica where we lived 40 years ago. ( i know they aren't environmentally friendly but so much nicer than all that soaking of nappies and huge blue pins.)

Also much preferred my red striped Maclaren to the " buses" of today.

Oh a mobile phone...we lived in Africa from 1975-81 and would have liked contact with my family and friends in the UK ..didn't even have a landline..and with three children under 5..there were often times I would have loved a chat...

Colour television. Automatic washing machine. Camera phone.
We managed without these things so none are indispensable.
I wish we'd had a telephone when we had our first baby . DH had to run down the street in the rain to call the midwife from a call box.

A modern husband, who didn't think children and housework was 'women's work!'

Oh yes, a washing machine! What a joy it was, to hand-wash the terry toweling nappies....! Not to mention everything else. (I remember a night when DS was unwell: I changed the cot four times, using up all the cot sheets, so I had to resort to using single-bed sheets, duly folded.)

A washing machine definitely and a tumble dryer to save the house looking like a laundry with nappies etc everywhere especially in the winter,our first daughter was born in November . A freezer would have been nice to save the constant need to shop with two little ones in tow.

Have just been sent lovely clips of DGD opening her advent calendar. I wish my mum and dad had had that to see when mine were little. So a mobile phone and WhatsApp would be my wish.

What a great thread travels . Unfortunately the more I have read the thread the more I’ve changed my mind .

My first thought was an automatic washing machine ( I had an old twin tub that had been my aunties and walked across the kitchen )

Then I added a freezer ( oh to reach for a packet of fish fingers or the likes when I got in from picking my son up from nursery )

Then I thought about the digital camera . I lost almost every baby photo of my lovely daughter in a house flood many years ago . It really upsets me that I can’t show her a photo of herself as a baby ( she looked just like her own baby daughter) .

Then I thought of disposable nappies . Oh what a joy not to have to steep the terries in a bucket and try to get them dry in an upstairs flat .

Oh dear then I thought of a phone . Any phone . The joy of hearing another voice when I was a very lonely single parent stuck in a flat in an unfamiliar town .

Sorry to be so greedy .

A mobile phone which had a great camera. Ship to shore phones were not the best way to have private talks with your husband for weeks on end.

A modern washing machine must be first, followed by a dishwasher, freezer and powershower.

Another vote for a washing machine here .

Earlier in the week I described to a group of younger women how we used soak nappies in a bucket by the side of the loo.

Their faces were an absolute picture !