Anyone got any family anecdotes?

[merilyn64todhunter]

My great aunt was an indulged child, whose favourite saying was "Me first! Me first!". It was her aunt's wedding day, and though living in the 'Gorbals' in Glasgow, the family had put on a wonderful spread, the trestle table was groaning with the weding cake, their best china, glassware and silverware (some of it borrowed) and assorted plates of food. Aunty Jean rushed up and plonked her elbows on the table. "Me first!" she shouted. The table collapsed with a mighty crash, and Aunty ran upstairs and hid under her bed. She said it was the only time in her life she got a smack!

[mazwad]

When my mum and dad got a stainless steel sink my dad used to polish it up bright and shiney every evening.  Poor old mum was only allowed to use the sink to wash the evening dishes, during the day she had to wash up in a bowl on the table and empty the water down the loo.

Dad was the same when they got a new cooker, he polished the rungs on a Sunday night and for the rest of the week and they didn't go back in the oven until Saturday.  He put two bricks in instead for her to balance any dish on.  The funny thing was the rest of the kitchen was never that clean and he never did any other cleaning in the house.

Another of his foibles was when their  first and only new carpet was laid in the sitting room he virtually covered it with those carpet square the you used to get in sample books. 

[Mogsmum]

mazwad, that reminds me of my Father.   

As recently as 2003, he bought some 'modern' dining room furniture which he and my Mother thought was absolutely wonderful.   Unfortunately being inexpensive, although it looked like wood, it was in fact chipboard with a paper veneer (a fact which Father refused to believe until the paper began to peel off!!).   

Because they were both disabled I'd do their housework etc., and twice a week Father insisted I polish this wretched cheap rubbish, moaning all the while I wasn't doing properly since it never shone  .   

No-one was allowed to actually sit on the chairs (although of course they were wooden), but rather we were required to use one of the folding plastic chairs kept hidden behind a curtain and this, despite Father being particularly delighted that the new chairs had come with 'protectors'.   Having lost the battle over the paper veneer I didn't even bother trying to explain it was packaging     (although I had no trouble selling them after they died!!)

[Jean McGurn]

Another I remember when I was 10yrs old in the 1950's and children wore those white vests.

 In those days bath day was Sunday.  My brother, who resembled the late Roy Kinnear in size, came downstairs after his bath grumbling that his vest had been shrunk.

"Silly beggar" declared my sister "You're wearing Jean's vest" 

He had gone to the airing cupboard and took the first one he found 

Jean

[jethorp]

when I was little(many years ago) I had been quite ill and mum used to sit me on her knee and rock me and sing "me and my teddy bear".Dad came home with two goldfish for me, he put them in an old glass sweet jar(without the lid) that he got from the shop on the corner of our street.I used to sing songs to them as they swam around,and one day mum said she was just nipping to the shop and I was too ill to go so I had to "Look after the fish"
I can remember feeling very important so I got them out of the water and sat and cuddled them!When mum came back the fish were floating on their sides in the sweet jar.I told mum to shhh as the fish had gone to sleep and I had "wooked after them like she did me!"
I also remember waiting for my aunt and uncle to arrive and was very sleepy but mum sent me out in the front garden to watch out for our visitors.I had just started sunday school,the week before and sat in the garden thinking about Jesus and how he knew when to take people into heaven, and feeling very sleepy started to nod off, but was disturbed by a big crane which was passing on the road.Thats when it hit me,I screamed so loud that the nextdoor neighbours rushed out to see what was the matter.I told them Jesus had come for me with his crane to take me to heaven because I had my eyes closed and he thought I was dead.My siblings have never let me forget  that

[Paul Caswell]

I'm sure everyone has got at least one of these.

My grandma used to keep a few empty jam-jars in the pantry for a very specific purpose. Every time she broke something in the kitchen she would grab two jars from the pantry, walk down to the end of the garden and smash them. Everything happens in threes she used to say. 

Paul

[genjen]

My mother was a WW2 evacuee, with her mother and two much younger brothers. They lived in Haxby, just outside York. This is a short passage from mum's memories:

"The large house had obviously had servants because, in the kitchen, there was a row of bells hanging from the ceiling and bell pulls in the main rooms. There was a large, white-washed dairy with a sink and a back scullery with an oven. It was a long walk to the kitchen and we were plagued with mice which came alive at night and kept us awake, scratching. We later discovered that the large locked room at the front of the house was stuffed from floor to ceiling with boxes of Rowntrees chocolate, given to the WI for distribution amongst the evacuees but noone knew it was there except for the mice and they had chewed their way through all the boxes and contaminated the lot. Such a shame. Sweets had gone from the shops and until I worked at Rowntrees and was given a monthly ration, the boys wouldn't taste a sweet.

One Sunday morning, mam had made mince and dumpings in a shallow dish in the oven and I wandered down to the kitchen to get a second helping. I pulled the tray out of the oven and there in all its bloated glory, sat the biggest, fattest mouse, looking just like the dumpling it was sitting on! Dish, tray dumplings and mouse all went up in the air and I shrieked. Even mam couldn't help laughing."

Jen

[grandma]

My grandfather was illigitmate. They lived on the prairies in Canada and had a young 15 year old girl helping grandmother in the house. After WW1, their son, my uncle, comes home from the war and gets the girl pregnant. Grandfathers remark was," You marry the girl, one bastard in the family is enough"
Mary.

[4kithnkin]

My grandmother wasn't particularly superstitious, however, if she spilled any salt while preparing the Sunday roast she would throw a pinch over her shoulder. The salt always landed on my grandfather quietly reading the paper at the kitchen table. He never said a word.

One Sunday morning I asked Gram why she threw the salt at him. She didn't answer. My Grandad, dead-pan, said "she's still upset that the butcher's wife thinks I'm "one of the good ones, salt of the earth and all that."

Kate