View Full Version : Anyone grow-up in a home with all things modern, rather than old-fashioned/frugal?
i.e. Dishwashers, automatic washing machines/electric tumble dryers, microwave ovens, packaged food, garbage-disposers, no clothesline, disposable diapers, etc?
A new thread I just finished posting made me think about just this, after I stated that we never (at any time) owned a dishwasher in our house. As for all other things (frugal), everything was done old-fashioned and frugally in our home the whole time I was growing up. Nothing throwaway, nothing disposable (other than moms and us girls monthly pads).
Sure, mom had an automatic washing machine/electric tumble dryer by the time I was 7-8, but seldom did she use the dryer. Clothesline drying was standard in our home, and mom was strict on that.
The only thing we didn't have/practice (frugally related), was an official compost bin, so scraps/peelings/waste was dumped in the garden and turned-over/in.
Sorry, Mrs M, but my childhood was before most of these were invented so I chuckled when I thought about it.;)
LOL, Razz! The forum has definitely deviated from being a gathering of young-minded folk (as of a handful of years ago), to a more aging and mature based crowd of today.
Mrs. Hermit
5-4-12, 8:25pm
We had all the perks (except the microwave) AND the clothesline. Mom always dried blankets and rugs on the line, and during the 70's she dried sheets there too. We didn't eat a lot of package meals when I was younger, but that changed as I grew up.
I think it's kinda funny to think about what so many these days take for granted.
I grew up without running water in the house until my teenage years. We had a hand pump in the yard, a coal stove in the living room, a wringer washer on the back porch and, as my dad liked to say, cracks in the wall big enough for the cat to get out at night.
Dishwasher? There were five boys to take care of that after the dishwater was heated on the stove.
Microwaves? I was an adult with a child of my own by the time they were available.
No dish washers...oh yes, we did (my brother & myself)! No garbage disposal. When my parents remodeled their kitchen they opted out of having a dish washer installed. No microwave. We did have an electric washer/dryer. Hmm now that I think about it -- before we moved to the "new" house, I don't remember a washer or dryer, it was an old farm house.
I don't remember my mom going to the laundrymatt --- I will have to ask. We had a home built when I was in the 1st grade.
I think I was the LAST person in our High School to have a colored TV. To turn the channel (only 2 options) we had to use a set of pliers. The TV had a built in cabinet base with a fabric cover. On one corner the fabric had torn away from the base so it was a convenient place to stash the pliers!!
I grew up with all things modern. We had a dishwasher, washer and dryer, cable TV, internet and all that. I hear that I had cloth diapers, but I think my sister wore disposables. Heck, I had a TV, stereo and DVD player in my room and a cell phone in my teens. That I actually draw the line on with my kids. No TVs in rooms and no cell phones until they can pay for it.
Mighty Frugal
5-4-12, 9:57pm
We were a pretty basic family. Not because it hadn't been invented but because we couldn't afford it. We had only a washer-my mom didn't get a dryer until 1988. No dishwasher growing up, no microwave until all the kids had left the house.
Basic cable, no video games, no air conditioning, no house alarm, no answering machine, no computer (it was too early for home computers when I was a kid)
Heck my parents kept their rotary dial phone for years and still don't have touch tone-they have the buttons but when you push them you must wait for the 'click click click click'.
Not many people have garbage disposals in my neck of the woods-just something I saw on sitcoms and gory 80s slasher movies:0!
Lots of fun! Great hearing from everyone!
I love thread topics like this, because they allow the sharing of stories. I remember there only being a couple homes with garbage disposals, and having a dishwasher was like living in luxury (when I was a kid). Only a couple of neighbours had dishwashers.
Air-conditioning, answering-machines, house-alarms, and dual vehicles, were non-existent in my kid days... As far as mothers using disposable diapers went, we looked at them (the moms) like they had landed from another planet, and if a family had more than one telephone in their house, they was rich! LOL! Same goes for televisions. One was a luxury.
Re: electric tumble dryers, those, too, were a luxury, and not everyone had one. Hence all the clothesline drying back then...
We did not have a dishwasher or garbage disposal ever. Microwaves weren't invented until I was grown. We got an automatic washer and drier but I definitely remember the wringer washer and the two large rinse tubs and the sturdy stick that was used to punch the clothes down-I even remember a bottle of bluing. We had a clothesline and used that except when the weather was inclement. I was about 7 when we got a black and white television in a large wood console and tiny little screen. I was a teenager before we got a window unit air conditioner which my parents used very sparingly.
I had all the conveniences compared to my husband who remembers when they finally got indoor plumbing and he no longer took his weekly bath in a washtub.
Neat question, Mrs-M!
I grew up in a house that my parents had built (very basic 3BR, 1BA brick ranch) and moved into about six months before I was born (fall of 1968). There was a garbage disposal. Electric clothes washer and a natural gas dryer. No outdoor clothesline, but my dad did rig clothesline in the basement from the exposed floor joists above for things that had to be air dried (special sweaters and such). No dishwasher until they had the kitchen remodeled in the late 1990s, and no microwave until I was in college - and they used it so little that they gave it to me when I moved away to my first job after college!
There was a 19" color TV in LR. Another 19" but black and white in their bedroom. My senior year of high school (1986-87) I received a 12" TV for a Christmas gift to take with me to college (my brother got the same TV, but he didn't go to college) - I used that TV until well into the 1990. We got basic cable in 1982 - it was a choice between cable and Atari! There were no real home computers at the time, although some people had word processing machines.
The LR stereo was one of those fancy cabinet ones - AM/FM radio and turntable that could even play 78s! I got my own stereo when I was in 8th grade, I think, for Christmas, chosen from the Sears catalog.
I know my mom used cloth diapers on my brother and I (born in early 1969 and late 1970) because a few diapers were still hanging around as furniture dusting rags well into the 1980s!
The house was built with wood floors, but having wall to wall carpet was a preferred thing, and so as they got more money, carpet was installed. My room was done when I was five.
There was no answering machine until I was out of the house for college, at least. No VCR until well after I had left for college. I never remember a rotary phone, always touch tone. There WAS central a/c, but only because a relative was a heating/ac guy and they got a big deal on it. It was installed in the very early 70s, and so I have the unusual memory of never remembering being without a/c, which was unusual amongst those I grew up with.
All in all, it was a comfortable, although basic, house.
Florence and Tradd, love your posts! Everyone's posts are so, so good! Keep the stories coming everybody.
Will touch more on this tomorrow.
Sorry, Mrs M, but my childhood was before most of these were invented so I chuckled when I thought about it.;)
Me too, Razz. I was brought up during the Great Depression and still have many memories of those hard times.
I also remember when WW2 happened, my father joined the RCAF.
I can't get air-conditioning off my mind this morning. At no time over the course of my childhood (teen years included) did I ever visit an air-conditioned home. I wasn't even aware it existed. (I wonder if it had something to do with our countries colder, harsher environment, compared to the more balmy US climate). I was also thinking back to some of the old babysitting jobs I had, and electric tumble dryers were absent in a number of those homes, yet the moms all did cloth diapers.
Re: telephones, if my mind serves me correctly, I remember only coming across one push-button version (late into my teen years), the rest were all rotary versions, and all wall-mounted. One other thing I remember from my high school days, a friend of mine (her parents) had a built-in convection oven in their home, and to me that was totally futuristic! Even though I had no idea what a convection oven did.
LOL Mrs. M. that made me think about my childhood. My mom and I tussled over the air conditioner. She hates air conditioning, but has some breathing problems, so when it was really humid she'd turn it on, but she didn't like it. I was always always trying to sneak it on behind her back. I hated being too hot. I have come more towards her way of thinking as an adult, but as a kid I LOVED air conditioning.
LMAO, Stella!!! And isn't that just the way. It can be a stinking hot day, so I'll use the air in the vehicle, but as sure as Murphy's Law resonates a level of surety, so does my mom, and she'll say to me the instant she gets inside, "oh, dear, you've got it so cold in here". >8)
Keeping in mind, had I not turned the air on, dear old mom would have for surely said to me, "oh, dear, it's so hot in here". http://sausandesigns.com/forum/images/smilies/gahhhh.gif
I've not opened my windows once this spring. The pollen and such are particularly bad this year, since it was so warm (80s!) in March. I ran the a/c then, and I ran it a few days ago when it was in the 80s. I had a nasty sinus infection a few weeks ago and I was still feeling pretty bad once I had finished the antibiotics. The doc gave me a steriod nasal spray (Flonase). What a difference! I think my allergies have gotten a bit worse as I've gotten older. So I have to run the a/c. I don't like heat and humidity, anyway!
Our neighbors when I was growing up had a color TV; this must have been around 1964. I was pretty little but I kind of remember that the other neighbors thought this family was might uppity for splurging on one. My family didn't get a color TV until well into the '70's. My dad, a metalurgical engineer with the driest sense of humor ever, stuck one of those Dyno Label tapes on the TV in which he had typed out "Garbage in Color is Colored Garbage."
We grew up with all things modern - as my mother grew up in a Kentucky coal mining town, she loved the modern conveniences that made her life a lot easier. As I grew up in the mid-sixties, there was no A/C until we got our first window unit in 1970 (luxury!), our first microwave was a gigantic Amana RadarRange that took up half the counter (Christmas present in the 70s), and only small b/w television sets (Mom won the second one in a raffle at our local drugstore) for many years.
Glad you're feeling better, Tradd. We've had a bit of a pollen reprieve this year due to all the rain we've had. So nice when the rain works it's magic.
SiouzQ. Dyno Tapes!!! Thanks for the stroll down memory-lane! Never would have remembered without you mentioning. One of the niftiest inventions ever! And most everybody had one. LOL about your dad.
Crunchycon. Talk about memory lane this morning! I watched the Price is Right (a lot), when I was a kid, and I remember Amana appliances (Radar-Range included), always seemed to be one of the prizes! LOL! I'm trying to think back to when my mom and dad splurged on their first microwave, only difference being, the one they bought also had an exhaust fan built in, and the entire unit sat over top the stove. Uber modern!
We had modern things too -- dishwasher, washer/dryer, color TV (and one black-and-white), disposable diapers (apparently I got a rash from cloth -- ??). I remember when we got the microwave though -- a giant, built-in behemoth! And when Dad found $800 he had stashed in an old film reel can, and used it to buy a VCR, which probably actually cost $800 at that time.
Even Grandma had a washer/dryer in the basement, although I remember her next door neighbor had a big metal clothesline in the yard that we would do flips on when no one was looking.
No dishwasher. We did have a washer/dryer in the basement, but Mom used the clothes line any day things wouldn't freeze solid. Had a propane furnace, but mostly heated with wood (which we chopped). We got a B&W TV somewhere in the late 60s. One of those tiny screens in a huge cabinet that held the stereo, too. Even had a built in turntable! We did have indoor plumbing and even finished off a second bathroom with a fabricated-on-site metal shower in the basement for the boys. That was living when we got that because there was no shower otherwise, we just cleaned up at school after practices when we were old enough. No microwave. Not sure exactly when they came around, but I do remember Mom was convinced it would give us all cancer. The greatest luxury of all, for me, was when I saved enough to get a 10 speed bike. A Schwinn Continental, baby blue and FAST!!! Life was good.
When I grew up in Maine in the 70s, there were few "modern" appliances but I do remember my mother's JOY when she got a dryer. They made a big deal about wash 'n wear clothing then but even that gross stuff wrinkled when hung out to dry. So my mother thought her job would be a lot easier with a dryer. No more hanging laundry and lots less ironing. Of course, a few years later, she just gave up ironing all together. Before that, though, we ironed sheets (yes), tea towels, and of course dad's shirts.
I didn't experience a disposer, dishwasher or microwave oven until I had been married a few years. We got a VCR about the same time as the microwave: substantially later than most of our neighbors. Air conditioning is pretty useless to me but I married a man with pollen allergies and he had a window unit that he needed for the bedroom. And when we lived in the south, I did become a fan of air conditioning. When I moved back North in 1994, though we had central air, I tended to use it very little. Here in the maritimes we don't need it, even with pollen allergies.
Four years ago I convinced my new DBF that we could in fact have a dishwasher in our renovated kitchen. I have been very happy with that, and though it is his FIRST dishwasher, I don't hear any complaints from him, either.
Oh, my first experience with disposable diapers was as a teen age babysitter. I subsequently used both with my children; my DIL used cloth for my grandson, though. What goes around comes around. Or something like that.
I do very much like this modern convenience of a computer and the internet.....I was offline for most of the day (not sure why, even now) and that reminded me of how much I appreciate this convenience...and community.
Maribeth. Love the sounds of your dads secret cash stash! Yeah, the old microwaves, especially the counter-top versions were monsters weren't they! And ugly as sin, too, with their fake plastic wood-grain finish/decor. I remember that's the first thing you'd see when you visited someone and walked into their kitchen, a huge microwave staring at you, hogging valuable counter-space. And heavy as a fish aquarium filled with water!!! But they were the coolest things, so us kids thought. The countless melted-cheese sandwiches we made in the micro (at friends places)! LMAO! Re: the rash thing, it's strange the way kids bottoms are. What gives one kid a rash, doesn't fizz then next.
Gregg. You post made me think about/remember moms old console stereo. It was as big and long as a Cadillac, ugly as the dickens, and housed an LP player, 8-track player, and a reel-to-reel player, and when one of us kids didn't replace moms doily collection, just so (which sat on top), mom went on the war-path! Now when it came to our music, it was always too loud, "turn it down" mom would call out, but moms music was never too loud... Re: bicycles, there was a neighbourhood kid who came from a well-to-do family, and I remember he rode a bright red Peugeot. Put all our bikes to shame, and he knew it. Spoiled rotten brat! LOL!
Leslieann. I remember when my mom got her first automatic washing machine. She was in heaven!!! No longer did we have to endure the whirring and whining of the old wringer (or the danger). We still rib mom to this day, saying things to her like, "you used to don your Sunday's finest to do laundry once you got the automatic". Gets a rise out of her every time!
Re: disposable diapers, I remember thinking they were so space-age! ROTFLMAO! Dealt with them very rarely. Everyone used cloth. One thing I remember using disposables, they were actually plastic in my day, and popping open a sticky tape to check for a wet diaper always tore the plastic. To refasten, you had to use a diaper pin, and you had to fight (like the dickens) with the pin to get it through the paper and fluff! The absorbent cellulose fill would gum-up/stick-to the pinhead, and then the pin wouldn't go through the plastic! Remember that? No elastic gathers, either.
Hmmm... what else... Yes, absolutely, I love the modernity of the internet. It would be a great loss to me to loose this community.
ApatheticNoMore
5-8-12, 1:46pm
Well I grew was born in the mid 70s, so grew up in the 70s and 80s. We had a washer of course (and indoor plumbing - hahaha, please this was the modern world).
But no dryer, I remember my mom hanging clothes on the wash line (California). Childhood was not necessarily happy but THOSE are actual good peaceful memories. So watching mom hang the laundry - good times, always will remember fondly. Never had a dishwasher growing up (only have had one apartment with one as an adult and didn't use it!) - dishes were washed by hand. Never had a microwave growing up (as an adult gave mine away!). Never had cable t.v. (not as adult either - geez I LIVE THAT LIFESTYLE I was raised, don't I? geez, hopefully not so much the bad emotional parts). Always had some fruit trees and herbs growing on the property, parents planted some veggies every year (no we weren't self-sufficient in food, we also went to grocery stores as well of course. This wasn't radical back to the landism, this was just growing tastier tomatoes and greens mostly in the summer). No compost bin or anything back then though. No disposable diapers, we had cloth diapers. No air conditioning (but a house with a giant shade tree didn't really need - my apartments really do need it - I make it a requirement, I don't use it that many days a year, but it's not optional!) Did have heating of course (natural gas). No t.v. dinners, though like I've said mom was not a great cook, so the food left something to be desired. Did learn how to bake though at an early age, always from scratch. Grandmother canned apricots and made jam (massive aprocot tree). Was taught how to sew but forgot it all (quite hopeless in that regard). Went on more camping vacations than I care to recall early on. None of those things do I mind (although prefer the lodge to the campground now :)), but it was all good. Were my parents hippies? Hahaha, not even, at all, in any way shape of form (and too old to be boomers anyway). But we didn't really do the modern stuff.
Hi, ApatheticNoMore. I was thinking about cable TV, and how television has changed. Tons of channels now as compared to way back when. In a lot of ways, cable TV, stood for only a handful of channels back in the 70's, and not movie type channels or anything. So fun to think about and remember the past (how it was).
I often wonder think about restaurant outings and how prevalent they were (back then), as compared to today. I know the worldly population has changed (grown exponentially) since our childhood days, but it seems to me that no one went out and ate. It was such a rarity. I tell my kids, "if you walked around the neighbourhood (summertime) when I was a kid, you could smell the savoury goodness escaping out of everyone's houses! What's your take on the matter? The eating out/restaurant going thing?
Yeah, baking from scratch, the only way. The best way. Rosemary, mentioned (in another thread) how today "companies have done a good job of making simple things seem complex". Everything pre-made, packaged, pop-in-the-oven- ready. I don't even know if stuff like that was available when I was a kid, but if it was it never got past the front door of our house. "From scratch", was my moms daily bread. She lived by it.
This is so enjoyable!
ApatheticNoMore
5-8-12, 3:51pm
We went out to eat about once a month growing up, it was always considered a treat and sometimes even a celebration. If there was something to celebrate my dad was "let's celebrate and go out to eat!". I think I like it that way. We never really did take out or drive throughs.
I only occasionally like going out to eat now, I mostly prefer to cook. (I can't believe I didn't bring lunch today or even resort to my backup and stop at trader joe's on the way to work - and so I had to go out to eat. But the restaurants around work are *particularly* uniquely bad, not at all what I would choose in restaurants, so it's always a bad choice when choosing among them :)).
We had Market Day, which was a service that sold pre-packaged frozen meats, fish and other meals. You would place an order every month and go pick it up at the school gym. It benefited the school in some way. So we did use some convenience foods but we rarely ate at restaurants. Grandma was home to do all the cooking! The big treat was Saturday night pizza with a movie on the VCR.
For cable, my dad would get the 2-month trial package, then cancel, then after the 6 month waiting period, sign up for another free trial again. Our neighbors also had a fancy VCR that could copy tapes, so they would rent movies and make copies for us to watch. Then we would return the tapes and they would tape over them with new movies. We used mix tapes created from the radio as our low-tech form of illegal music piracy. :)
Re: diapers -- Mom claims that her sister, as a still-teenager with two young babies, got sick of always folding the diapers and decided to just sew them that way. She probably could have started up a business in the current age of fancy cloth diapers...
Re: eating out/restaurants, you trumped us by far, ApatheticNoMore! :) We were lucky to see the inside of a restaurant once a year, and even then that was pushing it. Our household budget was so tight it squeaked. LOL!
It really is amazing, but once you get used to eating at home and preparing homemade lunches and things, there really is no substitute for that, and you're always at ease and rest assured that everything you are eating is clean, fresh, and healthy. One thing that never fails to put a smile on my face and make me feel so happy, is when one or more of the kids will ask me, "mom, can you make such and such for us". Never fails to take the bite and burn out of those days when you think no one appreciates all of your hard-work and effort, when in actual fact, everyone does, just with kids, they seldom think to express their appreciation and thanks unless it's "at the moment".
Maribeth. I am so jealous of your Saturday Night Pizza Nights! We never got to enjoy such a thing. Sunday night dinners were the star attraction around our house, and while delicious, those dinners weren't fun like yours. They were always more adult oriented, like roast beef with all the fixings/trimmings, or stew, or some other hardy option.
LOL, about your dad! That's called creativeness!!! :) My husband (as a teen), used to visit Woolworth's or some other department store and buy a cassette tape or two, then race back home again, dub the tape, then return the bought tape for a full-refund. I remember the first time he shared the story with me, boy did I ever brow-beat him! LMAO!
Re: diapers and folding, your aunt missed her calling! :) Too bad we can't take what we know now, and go back a few decades with it! Nice part about folding, you get to customize the kids bottom to exactly what the kid needs.
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