Phrases your mother used

"Take your coat off" (indoors or in a car) "or you won't feel the benefit." "If you haven't got anything nice to say, say nothing."

If you said: “don’t care” you would get the reply: “don’t care was made to care - put in a pot and boiled his hair!”

If you protested “yes but ...” would be asked: “who’s yes but - the brother of ah but?”

“You’ll get a chill on your kidneys!”

Asking “ where are you going?’ - “there and back again to see how far it is” or “going to see a man about a dog”

“have you lost your appetite and found a horses?” - which I heard as “ annorses”

“I know, said the blind man to the deaf dog”

“You look like the wreck of the Hesperus!”

My favourite - as a warning to be careful - “you don’t want to end up as a cabbage in a wheelchair! “

"Where are you going mum?"
"There and back to see how far it is"

I noticed that quite a few characterful sayings were from people of Scots, Irish, Northern Englih backgtounds. I hope that some have survived. Rural English patois further south had many pithy expressions but seem, alas, to have largely died out. I blame education a couple of generations back which insisted on " proper" English. In Scotland there is a strong movement now to encourage the use of traditional Scots in schools and not to be ashamed of it.

Well, if you fall off and break both your legs, don't come running to me.

I'm going to Nana's are you coming?
(after my dad had come home drunk and punched her)

Hellogirl1

All fur coat and no knickers, my grandma`s way of describing someone who thought they were better than us.

Was she a Brummie by any chance?

A face only a mother could love.....on payday

Apologies if this has been mentioned already but I’ve always loved... “That’s dangerous, don’t come running to me if you break your leg” I’ve got loads like that from my Mum ?

This makes me smile because only yesterday DD told her DD to “pick her feet up” when she was upstairs at my house. My Mum used to say it to me all the time.... I obviously morphed into my mother at some point years ago! ?

'Cry and you'll cry alone'

"You'd laugh to see a pudding crawl" to myself and sister when we were particularly giggly and no doubt irritating teenagers. We never understood it - how can a pudding crawl?

"He/she looks as if they've been dragged through a hedge backwards" when someone looked a bit unkempt.

A lot of these plus: "It'll all end in tears" and "She's/he's as common as muck". My father's: "Ne'er cast a clout 'til May is out". Never did discover whether it was the blossom or the month.

Many sayings and I use them myself sometimes.

Bad workmen always blame their tools.

If anyone kidnapped you they would drop you at the first lamp-post. (I thought she meant I was heavy but I was as thin as a rake)

We went all round the Wrekin. (I don't know where that is)

Tell the truth and shame the devil.

Honi soit qui mal y pense, My father's saying when Mum accused him of drinking.

Oh that if this too solid flesh would melt. (When Mum was dieting)

Out, Out, damned spot! When she was doing the washing.

"You look like you've been dragged through a hedge backwards" when I hadn't combed my hair .

"Take your coat off, or you'll not get the benefit..." (Meaning: take your coat off when indoors, because otherwise you won't feel the warmth of it, when you go outside.)
And: "There's nowt so queer as folk..." (Very true, IMO!)

My mother would say 'Be sure your sins will find you out'. I was always worried about doing anything wrong while growing up as this saying was often true!
I also remember an aunt's friends description of large ladies. 'She has a bow window at the front and a washing bine (wash tub) at the back'.

'When the wind blows your face will stay like that' if she caught you pulling a face.
'Eat your crusts and you will have curly hair'.

She would steal your eyes and come back for your eyelashes.
If the wind changes your face will stay like that.
It's not eating any corn ( if you had more of something stored than needed at the time )
If you dont stop crying I will give you something to cry about.
What's for you wont go bye you

If your arse was made of glass , it would of been broken ages ago .
I'm fed up not hard up .
She thinks her shit doesn't stink that one .
I would rather been blown up than shown up .
I suppose her poo smells like roses .
Fur coat and no knickers that one is .

‘That hair!’
My mother had a real thing about long, curly-messy hair just hanging, like that of Rebekah Whatshername around the time of the News of the World scandal.
She’d say it wherever she saw it - in the street, on TV, or in a photo. Even, once, about a close friend’s hair in her wedding photo, which did upset me a bit. I felt like coming out with the time-worn, ‘If you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all,’ which, funnily enough, she never used.

However it still turned into a family joke - between me and dds, anyway.

Her other oft-repeated was, ‘We were damned hard up!’
Which to be fair they were in the earlier years, but we really didn’t need telling time and time again.

"If I'm spared. " and "I'm hingin thegether." were two of my mum's favourites.

I’ve just remembered another: Better a drunkard than a gambler, and better a gambler than a man who chases other women. Unfortunately my father fell into the third category.

It’ll come to you all.
A man on a galloping horse wouldn’t notice that.
A good soldier never looks behind.
Cry more you’ll pee less.
He/ she is pure veg.
A nod’s as good as a wink to a blind donkey.
It’s only one after her death I realise what a wise old owl she was; if only I could tell her.

She’s not just straight hair and curly teeth. Work that one out!! Also an elderly relative that used to refer to sex (very rarely mentioned) as ‘all that funny business down below’. Love it - hilarious!!!