General Chat

Evening all,
Another rainy dull day but it didn't seem as cold out when I went to the bin and that's as far as I've been today.
I did get the bed stripped and remade and got the bedding washed ,I also had a dress to turn up for Katie ,I had to cut fourteen Inches off the bottom of the dress and it will still be well below the knee for her ,I have never seen such a long dress lol

I liked the magic painting books too Ann but I also had lots of the painting by numbers pictures which seemed to takes ages to dry and I didn't have a lot of patience and would start another colour which would then run Into the first colour and usually spoilt the picture .
I liked my Kaleidoscope and I also had a little projector that had cartoon slides and a thing like a camera that you held up to your eyes and you clicked the pictures round I think it was pictures of London .

£10 a go Mel for the chiropodist!! I'm moving down your way. I pay £39 and my lady isn't the dearest round here. The only thing is that your man presumably only spends a few minutes with each client if he can get through 30 or more in a day. I get 30 mins. I hope your feet feel nice and comfortable now.

You're right about girls' toys and boys' toys when we were young AnnG. Reading the thread that Gwyn mentioned I see I posted on it and said I often got knitting and sewing kits. I had forgotten those. They were considered suitable presents for girls but I wasn't a very girly girl and wasn't very good at crafts so I didn't enjoy them very much. One Easter when my children were aged about 3 and 4 we got them both a little tip up truck with an Easter egg in the bit that tips I shall never forget my mother's face when she saw them and being told off for not buying my daughter a little shopping basket instead of a "boy's toy".

It was wet again this morning, although it has dried up a bit this afternoon. We took the seats from our kitchen chairs into the shop in town that's just made new cushions for our dining chairs. The mock leather type material is wearing on the corners of the seats so they are going to recover them in a faux leather and I've picked a forest green. Although it's not real leather it looks and feels good quality. It had better be at £55 a metre plus VAT.

Apart from that I haven't done anything very producttve at all today. The Old Girls' magazine from my old school arrived in the post so I am now going to sit down with a cuppa and enjoy the read. Sadly news of some of the girls I knew tends to be in the obituaries these days :-(

Interesting reading that thread Gwyn thanks. I had forgotten that I had a proper canopy for the dolls pram.

Vera thank you for the photos. what a lovely place to visit. The photos are very good and the colours are vibrant. I think I could see magnolias as well as snowdrops. really nice.

Gosh Mel £10 is cheap. Is he a certified chiropodist?

Back from the foot man I had to pay for last times as I had forgotten my purse so he had a double payment today and mines only £10 a go. I asked if he had had many today as he's only there on a Friday once a month and he said he had had 30 then me and as I went out another man went in. So he had taken at least £320 today and may have had more after me as my appointment was for 2pm.
I am going to get a cuppa now and have a look at the thread Gwyn put up.

Some toy memories here....

https://www.genesreunited.co.uk/boards/board/general_chat/thread/1367784?d=asc

I have to say about toys when I was little, it was definitely dolls etc for girls and cars etc for boys. I had a best friend, a boy, our gardens met at the end of the plots and we played a lot together from a young age. I just loved to play in his garden with his cars, making roads in the mud. And when it was wet I played in his house and as we got older I really liked his meccano set, would have loved one myself. I did have a house building set with different shaped pieces coloured with 'bricks' and roofs that folded so would look like a proper roof when the gabled end bricks were put on correctly. the bricks were made of a type of stone so broke if dropped on a hard surface but I had hours of fun with that set. I have never seen anything like it since.

Well with my memory I wouldn't like to say that I would have remembered posting it but I think we may have not mentioned these specifics. anyway, it is fun to have a recap. :-D

Morning all,

Its 10 degrees here and bl**dy miserable AGAIN. Rained last night but it is not raining at the mo.

I remember mum and dad had the Daily Mirror, The news of the World and the Sunday Express I think. My dad also loved the Giles cartoons and he always had that annual for Christmas From mum nd as I got older I bought it for him. When little he would explain all the things that were going on in the cartoons. I loved it.

This has stirred up so many more memories for us all or is it that we have just forgotten we wrote about them years ago on here?

Good morning all very wet here but our yoyo temperature is back up to 11 degrees.
Nothing at all planned for today which, looking out at the weather, is just as well.

Mel I remember seeing/reading Rupert in the sunday paper Probably in The People, although we had two Sunday papers. I also remember reading The Robins in the daily paper (Express).

I too had a scooter it was a Mo Jo red and yellow. That was the other book Hans Anderson Fairy Tales with the Grims. I always had the beano annual and the Dandy and Rupert. My dad made my swing and my dolls house the same as the bungalow we lived in and I too had a homemade rocking horse nothing like the one I wanted. It was a rectangle box with a cut out head (nothing like a horses head really) and it had a maroon padded seat nothing like a sadle and its mane and tail was made from polumbing hemp. It was painted white with a handle put through it neck to hang on to.

Dad used to read me Rupert out of the Sunday paper I think and Captain Pugwash and there lies another tale told to me by oh. Captain Pugwash was not all that children thought he was and it was really quite rude.

Glad your OH’s eyes were ok Ann and that you managed to fight your way through the traffic. It is horrendous in our village at school home time,m even though they have different end times all the schools seem to be on the roads at once completely choking the village as there are three primary and two senior schools in the village.

I had forgotten I had a scooter, it was quite big and it had a brake at the back

I missed you there Mandy! Even OH has said he will try to get earlier appointments in future after seeing all the traffic. I came home a different way after picking him up, but they were coming out of one of the senior schools that way and cars and parents everywhere! I know what you mean about chilly necks as I had mine cut this week too and put a thick scarf on today. I never had a swing or scooter or a rocking horse that I wanted! I think OH was a bit worried about his eyes needing to be checked, but was really pleased they are ok.

That's good your MOT at the docs was fine Mel. I've never been offered one at our surgery, but maybe it's because my BP has always been ok. I hope the patches help with the sciatica.

Oh yes, I'd forgotten I had Rupert Annuals and Hans Anderson fairy tales. I also had a walkie talkie doll and mum called her Mary as I couldn't think of a name! Like Gwyn I had a plastic teaset. After seeing one at a house mum would work at and would take me at times, I had a spinning top that hummed. Lots of toys were painted metal then and held together with bent over metal tabs. The top had lovely pictures painted on it. After seeing a kaleidoscope there too I got one of those one Christmas and loved that.

My Christmas stocking would be crammed with all sorts. Nuts in their shells and an orange at the bottom......didn't understand why I should want those! sweet cigarettes, crayons, white sugar mouse, little magic painting book, plasticine, a game with silver balls you had to get in the holes, hair slides, one of those plastic toy animals you pressed the base of and it's legs would bend (I think it was Pluto) and those plastic toys you stood on a slope and they would 'walk down'.

We didn't get the snow that was promised here today, but the traffic near the city was a 2 mile crawl that made my knee ache keep dipping the clutch. I dropped OH off and he walked the last stretch and said the queue to the hospital carpark was as far as he could see down the road. The eye hospital was jammed, no seats and lots of people standing. Luckily he met one of the nurses who worked there on the way up and, as he had to have a series of eye scans she would be doing and those machines weren't being used, she took him through and did the eyetests as well. When he got back to the waiting room one of the 2 consultants that spent a couple of weeks lasering his eye a few years ago recognised him and called him across and saw him straightaway which was good. He said his left eye looked like a battlefield one side with all the lasering he'd done, but that it was holding well and looked fine. There was a small tear in the retina of his right eye, but that had healed itself perfectly. The journey home was just as bad as the journey there. So tomorrow we'll be back at Boots looking at glasses for OH and to hopefully get mine adjusted.

Evening all,

It's been a horrible dark dreary day and this morning we had a little sleet ,this afternoon it did stop raining for a while but its coming down again now .

I remember having one of those big dolls from the fair I had to sit in my pushchair and hold on to it as we came home down the hill from the town where the fair was always held ,I don't know if mum won it or dad but I do remember feeling so happy holding onto the doll .
Books , I had all the famous five and secret seven, Rupert Bear and Briar Rabbit and I remember there was a set of big red religious books that I remember had some thin red almost transparent pages in and when laid they were over the picture in the book it changed the picture but I could only look at them with an adult not on my own .

I loved my swing in the big willow tree and my three wheel trike that I was always turning over because I turned to quick, I had a friend called Julie and when I use to go and play with her I use to love having a go on her brothers scooter as I never had a scooter .

The hairdresser came today so we're both feeling a bit chilly round the neck now .

Ann those industrial buildings will be so close and having lights on twenty four hours and all the noise too won't be very pleasant.
Hope OH got on ok at the hospital and the drive home wasn't to bad for you.

Mel thats good you got a clean bill of health from the doctors ,you say about trying the patches for your sciatica had you stopped using the patches .

I had three cards in the post today so they have been tucked away until Sunday

Memories Vera, Yes I remember that your brother’s funeral was just before Tony’s. We didn’t have snow but it was very cold and it is so sad to remember the few people we were allowed to have were not even allowed to be offered a hot drink. What a horrible time that was making the loss of someone so much worse. And I still wonder if it was necessary. Monday is the third anniversary of Tony’s funeral. Hope all has gone well for Joan today.

Ah you have jogged a memory of the desk with a lid that my dad made for me. Didn’t we have good dads in those days. I guess it was easier to make those things than buy them and my dad continued to do the same for my two children.

Mel I wonder if the book with the swans on the cover was Hand Anderson illustrating the Ugly Duckling?

Yes, it is interesting hearing about other people’s presents. I do remember having a china teaset when I was about 4 and my Dad made me a desk with a sloping lid when I was about 6. I often got board games and books. When I was young I had the Mary Mouse books, fairy tales from the brothers Grimm and Hans Andersen and my favourites were the Rupert annual and Alice in Wonderland. I don’t remember getting Enid Blyton as presents. I wasn’t really a dolly sort of girl but I had a teddy and a gollywog. That would be a no-no these days but to me it was just another cuddly toy. Quite often I would get clothes. I had an aunt who was only 6 when I was born and a great aunt by marriage treated us like sisters and bought or made us identical clothes. I remember a lovely tartan skirt with crossover straps when I was about 4 and one year we both had astrakhan gloves. That was a definite step up from our usual hand knitted ones. Happy memories :-)

It’s been raining and chilly all day. 3 years ago today was my brother’s funeral and it was snowing and icy and we wondered if we would even get there. I will never forget my son and dil driving nearly 250 miles in awful conditions, attending the 25 minute service and then driving all the way back again as lockdown meant we couldn’t even give them a meal. I’ve been thinking of Joan (Amakovid) in Scotland at her husband’s funeral today and hoping she isn’t having to battle the weather on top of everything else.

This morning we went for our Thursday coffee get-together with friends. I can’t believe how quickly Thursday comes around. There were only 6 of us today. We had lunch and I did some ironing and now I am waiting for a Tesco delivery. They are supposed to be here between 5 and 6 pm. I think I’ll go and make a cup of tea before they come. I might even spoil myself with a dark chocolate digestive as I’ve had a double pack hanging around since Christmas.

Oh yes, jogged my memory Mel. Little women, *****men and Jo's Boys loved all of them.

I'm back from the docs with a clean bill of health blood pressure wise and she took a whole armful of blood. I also picked up the script they can't leave down the shop as its a controlled drug. Its my Codine patches. Thought I would take them and see if they help with the sciatica.

I had Grimes Fairy Tales and Heidi. Can't remember if I had Black Beauty but I think I st have done being horse mad and I had Little Women. Were there two books of the Grime series? I can remember seeing pics of swans in one. I have never been able to find out what that book was I had that was all in black drawing with only red colouring but I still remember my dad reading it to me with the best part:- Up and up went the big red lorry off fell the pots and pans". I can still see the picture in my head of the lorry going up a hill with all the pots and sauspans falling into the road. Its strange the things you remember from childhood is'nt it. I was an only child so no sibling at all but I think at one time mum and dad thought about adopting as I can remember dad asking me if I would like a brother or sister. They never did in the end.

I am now going to make myself a nice COT to have with a very naughty chocolate eclair ooooooozzzing with cream.

So interesting to hear about your early toys.
One of my first must have been my Teddy, but it was unusual as it was made from sheepskin. I don't know how old I was, but pre two and a half because that was when my sister was born. In later years, when I asked Mum why Ted's fur was so thin on his back, I was told that I used to put him on my shoulder and rub his back, as I saw Mum doing with baby sister.
Another toy was Sarah-Jane, a doll with a cloth patch face and an all-in-one body covered with blue normal Teddy type of fur. She was a firm favourite and I was really upset when Mum. thinking I'd 'outgrown' her gave her to the Scouts for their jumble sale. Sarah-Jane was named after an elderly lady who gave her to me, together with a lovely wooden dropside dolls cot. The lady had been very kind to Dad, as a boy and I think in turn we children were almost like grandchildren to her.

No china teaset for me, but I still have a very pale blue plastic? teaset from about 1950. The pot is rather tall, more like a coffee pot and that has a large crack in it, but the cups are all intact. We used to have tea parties out in the garden and if Mum gave us small cheese biscuits or iced gem biscuits to share we thought it was wonderful.

Another well-loved toy was a homemade 'Village Stores', which consisted of a wooden box with hinged flaps so the top lifted up and a large side opened up as a counter. With our toy cash register, weighing scales and little glass jars like spice jars, but full of Tom Thumb drops or other tiny sweets, we had hours of fun.