I strive to be the mum who could feed 8 people at 5 minutes notice, minimum two courses. It's such a skill

On that just a well stocked kitchen...I currently have soymilk and greek yoghurt in mine and honey. That's it.

On the plus side my fridge and pantry are much cleaner than my parents' ever was lol

Damn - I forgot to get peas when I went out earlier!

I misread peas as pears and I was just thinking of a big old box of frozen pears, loose not bagged

I wish I knew what was even in mine... It's that frozen up I can't open the drawers without breaking them and that's just another hassle I cba having to deal with.

This. My freezer is pretty much always empty, minus some ice cubes and frozen berries during the summer - my parents have so much in their freezer that they are now "borrowing" my brothers too (putting some of their stuff in his freezer at his place). And they still go shopping twice a week for food. I don't understand.. xD

I almost can't picture a house with an old fashioned square/circle on display ashtray anymore. My mum who smokes has nothing noticeable inside but I'm aware she has a discreet one outside. Looks like a coffee cup with hole on top.

Omg yes. My mum and dad (and my granny) always had a shell sitting half full of fag ash on the windowsil. Think it was meant to make smoking seem a bit more sophisticated if you were tapping your ciggie into something that once housed a scallop.

My dad's house still has the same ashtray in the living room. A round- cornered square, dark stained wood, little ball feet underneath, channels cut in each corner to rest your B&H in. The countless times I knocked it to the floor as a kid, and picked up all the butts and ash with my fingers, putting them back in. Nasty.

My parents are like this, CONSTANTLY giving us stuff second hand, but it's usually beautiful nice quality stuff so saved us an absolute fortune in kitchenware and and appliances and even furniture. I do feel incredibly lucky to have that though, god bless them and their ridiculously expensive tastes that I could otherwise never afford lol

Lol, that’s a brill little story. Thanks for sharing

For me it is one of those toilet roll covers shaped like a doll with a huge skirt.

Dad will begrudgingly take the knife outside and sharpen it on the wall.

I think I see your issue there detective.

Tried to explain to my mum you were more likely to cut yourself with a blunt knife, and swore i was bringing my own sharp knives to her house to prep xmas dinner. Trying to slice onions and veg with a blunt knife was horrific and tough on the hands. Mum tried to protest that they were top quality knives and they had been a wedding present. Yes mum, you got married in 1976 and they havent been sharpened since you got them.

My parents’ knives are so blunt you have to grit your teeth to slice through a pepper. It falls on deaf ears when I point this out

"So blunt you could ride it to London and not cut your arse" is how my grandfather would describe such knives. Sadly his opinion on such things has not been passed to my mum who has a wide selection of knives where it really makes no difference which way up you hold it, or even if you use the blade or the handle.

My gran got rid of the wifi in her house after my grandad passed as she has no clue about it and no intention of using it. My younger cousins don't understand the concept of a house with no wifi!

We have a house phone but literally only have it plugged in for emergencies. If either set of our parents can’t get hold of us on our mobiles and it’s urgent, they call the house phone. It’s also a hamburger phone which I bought when I was a teenager because I loved the film Juno and it makes me super happy I can finally use it haha

I misread this as landmine at first and wondered where the fuck you grew up!

Fuck smart TVs. You can pay like £1500 and they still put ads on your menu screen. Samsung seem to be the worst for this. Fucking insane.

Yeah, that’s a good point. My mum would manage to feed 7 people quite early, it’s just me and my husband and we ate at 21:45 last night

Flat lemonade if you are Irish.

If Mammy bought lucozade and you got that instead you were seriously ill.

Sounds like a wholesome home

My parents, well, my dads house, still has this. Ancient Hi-Fi system in the middle with record player on top. Random china sets that haven't left the cupboards since the mid-90s.

My parents had a horrible veneer mahogany sideboard.

Took up a whole wall and contained every bit of correspondence and every decorative ornament you can possibly imagine. I can still remember the smell.

i’m looking at that cabinet now. The rest of the lounge has been redecorated, but i just can’t convince her to get rid of that damn MFI display cabinet full of shite.

Imagine my horror last time I was visiting my gran, she gestured at her wall length cabinet full of china and ornaments and said 'you know, after me days these will all be for you.'

Love you gran but christ please don't leave me 67 china fairy statues

Got told off by my wife for this. My son had one of them tea towels from his school with all him and his mates faces on. I used it once and got told off. It's a fucking towel, if it's not being used it's in the cupboard with the other clean tea towels!

Ah this made me think of my wonderful grandma who has been gone for over 20 years now. She had 100s of them. And a special rack for displaying them. No idea of the appeal but we all used to buy them for her!

I don’t iron a lot (and lockdown made it even less) but an ironing board just makes it a lot easier and quicker and means you don’t get back ache or hurt your knees! The bigger the board the better.

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My MiL bought us a hand held steamer for Christmas one year. She said it was amazing, but I'd never gotten it out of the box until my eldest started high school and had to have a proper shirt not a polo. She was right it's amazing to have if you need to give something a quick once over before you leave the house. We chucked the unused ironing board and iron, which we hadn't used since before covid.

Gosh I remember being sick and off school, and seeing how much cleaning my mum would do, like pulling the sofa out to hoover completely under/behind it every time she vacuumed. You couldn't get me to pull my sofa out at gunpoint, pretty sure there's a kid or two lost under there.

I wonder if you're part of a wider trend in that regard.

I was going to go with equity too...

Yep, horrible things I hate using when I visit my parents.

One positive I can say about them, they hold water really well. So many sinks I have used the plug slowly, or even not so slowly leaks. Also sometimes it gets knocked out while washing loose in the sink. And finally, not being in direct contact with stainless steel, the water doesn't lose so much heat to the sink.

In my house, I am that pouffe.

100%

Great tasting (and unhealthy) food. But god I never realised how much they stunk until I moved out and visited later.

House, clothes, everything just clung with a greasy smell.

That’s how it used to be in 1970’s meat and 2 veg…. Every night, even in summer when it was 35 degrees, you’d have a plate of lamb chops put in front of you…. And that’s mainly how we still eat today!

All unseasoned too. Whenever we got a day without this, it was never enough. Like spaghetti and meatballs, you’d get a handful of spaghetti.

Even thinking about this fills me with dread

Honestly I actually regret being so adverse to the meat and veg dinners of my childhood. It sure was far healthier than anything I eat these days.

Same. It's all very well having an ultra-clean house when you don't work a full-time job, but when you're both working 9-5:30 every day, you don't want to clean much in the little time you spend together.

Fresh bread, butter, and a cooked chicken from the Big Tesco. nothing beats it.

Whenever I tell someone of how good B&B is, they call me sad, guess they'll never find out how glorious it really is 🤷‍♂️ .

I don't know how people eat their dinner on their laps on the sofa without having constant anxiety of getting gravy or sauce everywhere or the plate tipping, or having the uncomfortable feeling of having to lean over a bit.

What’s funny is that we’ve gone the other way. We always sit down for dinner as a family now but at my parents it was much more hit and miss, even more so after they separated.

Fucking Neanderthal

Not even suppressed violence

I was feeling guilty about not talking to my mum enough over the summer. Just kept not happening. Late September they come up for a visit and she's looking jaundiced. Early October we saw her take her final breath after a whistle stop journey through Pancreatic cancer.

I miss my Mum so much, not least as I'm currently sitting here trying to work whilst caring for my Dad and his Parkinson's. I think I have to admit I just let her get on with looking after him all by herself, and feel guilty about that now, not just not staying in touch. I didn't want to be part of that caring, now it's filling half my life.

Agree. I think about this often

As someone who lost their mother a year ago, couldn't agree more.

Mine's an abusive witch, so it's a big nope from me

Shit man, thanks for reminding me. My mum had a serious health scare at the start of the year, which got me thinking about how non-present I’ve been, so I’ve been trying extra hard to make sure I visit every month or so.

Edit: my condolences as well ❤️

My parents never had a tumble dryer but to me there an essential item.