Have I finally flipped

I remember those baskets, DM had one!

What I would like (but can't find) is one of those Bakelite beehive shaped wool holders - you put the ball of wool into it, thread it through the top then it stays nice and clean and doesn't drop onto the floor when you're knitting.

Darning needle. Hudl!!!

Ps. I have my mother's circular basket with lid that she kept the darning wool in. It still contains the darning wool plus earning needle and a few loose buttons.

When the bread came in waxed paper, we used to keep it and take it to the park to wax the slide. You went down much faster after someone had been down a couple of times on the bread paper! I have started to keep the bags the bread comes in now that DH doesn't bring carrier bags home. It is useful as a pooper scoopers when the dog is out.

also for covering a pudding basin if I'm making a steamed pudding!

ooh steamed pudding, haven't had one of those for a long time!
With lashings of custard mmm

She also kept all her children's old name tapes in her button box

Oh dear, is that odd?

My neighbour came to my door and asked me what I did with the jumpers that my mother- in-law knitted for my boys when they were outgrown. She asked if she could have them, ripped them out, and re- used the wool.
She also washed out all plastic bags, and hung them on the line to dry.

My mother always washed and reused small polythene bags. Also her kitchen tiles were frequently covered in pieces of cling film that she was drying after having washed them. I'm afraid for me life's too short for such things.

However, I do have several boxes of buttons - ones that I have collected myself and others that I've 'inherited' over the years from elderly relatives. Earlier this year I spent many a happy hour with my granddaughter as we sorted the buttons out so that all the same colours were together in the same box. She was fascinated by the stories of where some of the buttons had come from and by my frequent exclamations of 'Oh that came off your Dad's baby dungarees, dressing gown, first duffle coat, etc'.

Katek I would love to have seen that blonde hair!

I use the waxed paper from cereal packets to separate chops and bacon rashers before freezing them. Wash and reuse plastic freezer bags. Also put jute shopping bags used for now unwrapped veg in the washing machine. Came out stiff as new.

Alima that is a good tip re the pastry brush - I probably don't need to use it as much as I do.

Phew, have never bought packet bread sauce, nobody likes it here. Have recently tried packet cheese sauce, much better than it used to be but still not as good as home made.
Still have a button jar, still remove zips and some buttons for re-use. Find that a butter wrapper is best for greasing, saves having to wash a greasy pastry brush.

my mil always washed out bags and pegged them on the line. She was a very critical woman, so when she came to stay I used to peg some out and she was thrilled that I was so 'sensible'! She also kept all her children's old name tapes in her button box and I was able to use them for our DCs as we have a very odd surname.

I am still using mil's button collection. I scoffed but I don't now.

That thing with the cereal packet and butter papers - I still do it!

Don't get me started on people who buy packet bread sauce.

All this is so familiar. Our mothers had the right idea; living through the war they had to 'make do and mend'. When I cleared out my parents' house, I found umpteen plastic/paper/carrier bags, christmas paper which had been ironed for the next year, odds and sods of wool/string/thread/material and heaven knows what else - all waiting to be used. I sent her button box to a charity shop and have lived to bitterly regret doing so. The throw away culture in which we live will have to change and I am guilty as the next one .....

I still have my granny's button box which is a slightly rusty tin that used to contain National Dried Milk! Some of the buttons must be getting on for 80/100 years old. She used to cut them off anything that was outgrown and if was a knitted item she would unravel it and use the wool again.

Funniest story I heard about waxed paper was my husband's aunt using a bread bag to cover her hair as she was bleaching it in the 50's. Her hair turned out blonde with an image of the bread's name imprinted on it!

rosequartz I have butter in a block too and a couple of wrappers in the door of the fridge ready for the next time I need to grease a tin!

I used to save good bits of foil, but I hardly use it these days and I have a small collection of buttons, but it's mainly the spares in the little plastic bags.

Yes, I've got a button box as well. Actually I've got two - one packed with inherited and buttons saved from old garments; the other mostly new buttons mainly bought in packs for craft use, though some are sewn onto new baby knits if I can find enough of the same ones!

Our butter still comes in blocks and I have just used the paper to grease the cake tins ..... call me old-fashioned
You're not alone, rosequartz - I save mine too and use them for greasing cake tins, also for covering a pudding basin if I'm making a steamed pudding!

Yes Grandma2213, I have got a button box. Not as big as it used to be though, and I have another jar with hooks and eyes, press studs , trouser hooks, you name it it's probably there.
Last week I was volunteering in our local charity shop, and was sewing a button onto a Christmas jumper for the character who had lost his nose. It was wanted by a customer who asked why I hadn't sewn on a white fluffy bobble one ? She pointed to my very fetching Santa hat that I was modelling, and said, " one like that on the end of your hat". There being no substitutes, I offered to sell her a hat for a DIY project, but she didn't take me up on it, but asked for a reduction in price of the jumper. As it was new, (apart from the cosmetic nose job) and only cost £2.50, she had no takers, but did take the lovingly restored jumper home with her. Some folk are never satisfied.

It wasn't till I was middle aged that I found you could actually buy greaseproof paper as we always used the waxed paper from cereal packs too. My mother used all these saving tricks mentioned and so have I.

I've just bought my first pack of pedal bin liners as I have previously used plastic carrier bags.

Has anyone else still got a 'button box' where buttons are cut off old and worn out clothes and saved for reuse. My DGC love going through mine which also contains old coins (pre decimal) , hooks and eyes, press studs and lots of other stuff that seems to have ended up in there!

We're so wasteful these days!

My mother did exactly the same with the waxed paper cereal bags! She also reused tinfoil time and time again as long as it was clean and had a drawer full of neatly folded paper bags and little plastic ones. She also had a huge ball of string as she just kept winding any new pieces onto the ball plus a rubber band ball. I think it was the war that trained her to think like that. She told me she had once made a dress out of her brothers black football shirt and had pleated pink dusters for the skirt. Very much admired apparently.

It goes back to the days when butter and marge came in blocks and the lining paper was used to grease cake tins and such with butter

Our butter still comes in blocks and I have just used the paper to grease the cake tins ..... call me old-fashioned

Years ago my friend used to bring her sandwiches to work in waxed cereal bags.

Years ago when we were camping we noticed that another camper (French or Belgian) had pegged out tea bags on the line to dry - were they going to make another with them?

But yes, I would wash out the bags if they were new ones! But I would dry them with a tea towel and finish off on the radiator!

That's a relief!

S'ok, now in airing off by the radiator!