Sundays in the "olden days"

I was born in the mid 60s. Sundays were so dull, chapel morning and evening, best dress and a hat, roast for lunch which was nice then possibly a walk out across the fields with Dad and the dog. We were not allowed to play with toys, play in the garden or read any books other than 'Sunday' books, didn't have a TV and the radio was restricted to news and Sunday half hour on radio 2 in the evening unless it came from a Catholic church when it was quickly switched off. No wonder I married a Catholic, my bit of rebellion.
My parents were loving and kind just totally stuck in pre war times, they were both in their 40s when we were born and my great Aunt lived with us and was probably stuck in pre 1st WW times!

Chocolatelovinggran

There's a theory that in large families/small houses in the past all children were conceived on Sundays when other siblings were at Sunday School.

HI, yes I've heard that too!

I used to love walking home from church, 11.00 am service which lasted a good hour if not more if the sermon went on, and smelling the Sunday dinners cooking in the houses yes even the cabbage, which at that time I hated to eat ? and I can remember going to the beach for the afternoon in the summer and taking sandwiches and pop to eat with my mum with a visit to the fair on the way home I loved the penny push machine although I was only given one of two pennies to have a go very occasionally I would be able to have an ice cream or hotdog to eat. When we were new parents in the early 80s we used to visit the inlaws for tea on a Sunday my MiL always baked cakes and tarts for our visit.

I hated Sundays as a child, I did not like roast dinner, which we had every Sunday. We had an afternoon drive when I always suffered from travel sickness so saw the roast again. Then my hair was washed and my mother was very rough getting tangles out of my hair. Bed was after Sing Something Simple, earlier than other days, I loathed that theme tune. Thinking about it is making me feel awful.

I am ok with Sundays now, to me they are no different from the rest of the week.

When was Children’s Favourites? On a Saturday? I do remember enjoying that. Some years ago, when we still had a cassette player, I found a cassette of CFs - Nellie the Elephant, I’m a pink toothbrush, Little White Bull, the Typewriter tune - I’m now tempted to go and find some of them on YouTube - instead of the batch-cooking session I’d intended.

In the 50's we listened to "Two-way family favourites", to see if anyone was mentioned that we knew, they never were. Somehow it never occurred to anyone to send in a request.
Dinner at 12 , beef that you could not chew dad's rant about it. "Chines Wedding cake", with jam.
Best clothes on for two hours of Fire and Brimstone at chapel with cousins, not parents.
The big treat, we caught a bus{Until we had a car} to my grandparents in the country.
Shear bliss mischievous gran who bought you cheap tat from Woolworths, a half-pound bag of Dolly mixtures and Princess comic. Grandads stories about WW1.
On lucky days an uncle with a car took us to the seaside, we sat and ate ice cream and listened to "Sing something simple".
Back at home happy after playing in his garden and being in what we called the pigeon hull[shed].
Then I went to Grammar school and Sundays were spoiled with homework.

In my teens, with a couple of other friends, I joined the Ramblers Association and rarely spent a Sunday at home after that. Train from our pre-Beeching functioning local station out into the Peak District, plenty of company and free as a bird.

Such fond memories biglouis!

I’m in the US, and on Sundays it was always up early for breakfast and church when we visited my Grandparents in Kansas for the summer. Then home for dinner which was usually excitement for all the female relatives in the kitchen. Or, our dinner was often served in my grandparents “garden”. I remember the good food and playing games with my cousins while the adults visited. Usually my Grandfather would saddle up the Shetland ponies or hook them up to the pony cart after dinner and we would go for a ride. My cousins and I, and often other children that were guests, would tear around and play games, there might be a bond fire later. I wasn’t raised on a Kansas farm so exploration to the hen house or the barn was very entertaining! Finding kittens -

We moved to Denver and our Sundays changed to church on Sunday, dinner and a drive to the mountains or visiting with the neighbors. I do remember homemade ice cream on occasion :-)

Napping in the afternoon -

The neighborhood quick shop, 7-11 was open, nothing else!

I well recall the restrictions regarding which toys we could play with and which were banned and really there was no logic to it. Books were allowed and so were jigsaws and colouring books, but no board games or mechanical toys. No playing outside. The worst time was when Christmas Day was a Sunday as some of our presents could not be played with.

We were a church going family, which was fine as there was always something special for the children.
When I left home to go to university, church was a place to meet people and then go for coffee afterwards in large groups. Hundreds of students went to the same big church. There I heard a great sermon about Sunday. The vicar said, make Sunday a special day when you do something different, more relaxing than the busy week days. No rules or restrictions, as long as it was different.

Esspee mentioning television reminded me of the Forsyte Saga which we never missed, always sat down to watch it together. Every Sunday evening for what seemed like years!

In the 50s, liverpool anfield, all the family to church in our sunday best, bath night was saturday. I had 2 dresses. Then out to spend the afternoon in stanley park or rarely on the bus to otterspool and even rarer, across the mersey to new brighton. Poor but united, all nine of us

I too was born in Liverpool and can rmember all those places. We used to call Otterspool the "cast iron shore" because it was just rocks, no sand. It was a big day when we went to Southport and around the fun fair. As a child I loved fairs - what child doesnt?

My family were not in the least religious. My mother was C of E and my father came from a Catholic family so they married (during the war) in a registry office. I went to sunday school with my friend because it was the only day she was allowed any freedom from helecopter parents. It was a mile walk there and back and of course we dawdled and played in the park. Every so often we skipped going and just played.

I never had an real religious feelings. I enjoyed the hymns, the stories and collecting text cards.

biglouis, everton valley grammar, paddys market, fishing for tiddlers at newsham park. Holiday work at British american tobacco. I loved coopers. Went to st johns market on the bus to buy salt herrings which were wrapped in newpaper and stunk out the bus. Astoria pictures on saturday 6d, full of smoke. Studying at the picton library.

I never knew any rich people but was so lucky, and what a fulfilling time that was, surrounded by people who really were and are, the salt of the earth

I can remember all of these thing described by previous posters about childhood Sundays.
After we had been to church on Sunday mornings (my parents never went to church but insisted we did) we would take turns to go to our grandparents' which was only a short walk away.
This often consisted of being taken with them to visit relatives of which my grandparents had loads, or relatives visiting them.We had to be on our best behaviour always.If not visiting or being visited, our grandfather would go to bed after Sunday dinner for a couple of hours while grandmother took us into ''the room''.This was her front room which was always kept immaculate and only used on Sundays or special occasions.She would sit by the window with a cup of tea and watch her neighbours walking past dressed in their best clothes having their Sunday stroll.We would sit on the floor playing games until tea time
When we got home it was hair wash and bath night ready for school in the morning. I hated this Sunday hair wash ritual because our mother would always inspect our hair for head lice, putting on the nit lotion before the bath then after rinsing it off would use the fine tooth comb while we had to bend over a sheet of white paper so she could see if all the nits were combed out.I can still feel that comb being scraped on my scalp now and I am 78.
Sundays ae certainly different now for my children grandchildren and great grandchildren.Thank goodness.

I used to love paddys market when I grew older and was well into antiques and vintage. As a child I was not so fond.

When I began secondary school age 11 my mother took me down there and bought me 2 skirts from an army and navy surplus stall. They were almost down to my ankles and I felt ashamed. Instead of going to school I went around to my grandmother who agreed that the other children would laugh at me. She took me into the Walton Vale shopping center and bought me two school skirts, two blouses and six pairs of white ankle socks. It was not the first time my gran had stepped in to equip me with clothes.

By the time my sister was ready for school I was working and I swore at the time that every pound I tipped up for my keep went straight onto my sisters back. She had everything new and it was a subject of great resentment with me.

I hated Sundays too. Usually spent doing homework, I used to get five or six subject for the weekend and they had to be handed in on Monday morning. I went to a strict Catholic convent, but wasn’t catholic so no church for me fortunately.

I remember Sing Something Simple with The Swingle Singers while my mum ironed school clothes, made me depressed too thinking of school next day

Neither were we. If any of us dared to say it our mother would find a job for us to do, like cleaning silver (which I found much more boring than being bored!)

Sundays were a ‘non’ sort of day when I was growing up in the sixties. We didn’t live near any relatives so it was always just Mum, Dad, my sister and myself as we lived deep in the country. My father often worked away from home and when he did, my mother sent us to Sunday school in the morning at the little church nearby, which was ok. Sometimes a roast dinner when we got back. Or a picnic in summer! We would often go for a walk in the afternoon, tea, homework, bath, bed. When Dad was home, my parents always slept in late which I hated as my sister and I were not allowed to get up until they did. I remember the topsy turvy feeling of a late start to the day, especially in lovely weather! I’ve always hated getting up late ever since and have never ‘lain in’ even when a teen! We sometimes drove to the beach or on one of our walks. Always a roast dinner when Dad was home and lots of food generally. Maybe watch an afternoon or early evening film, especially if it was a Western which my parents and sister loved (I have always disliked them and still do as I found them boring!) I read a lot. Living alone, I much prefer Sundays now when the shops and many other things are open; it is more like a normal day, apart from the fact I usually go to church in the morning. Then it’s time for shopping, outings and fun with the grandchildren! Much better!

Getting up late, being with my family, lovely Sunday lunch then visiting grandparents and meeting up with cousins. Getting things ready for Monday and looking forward to going to school.Happy memories ..

I didn't mind Sundays when growing up in the 60s. Radio was good at lunchtime, Round the Horn & the Navy Lark. Later in the afternoon there'd be Pick of the Pops. I used to want to sew (any clothes that didn't come from Biba were made by me) but my mother had this idea that sewing on a Sunday was ungodly and told me I'd be put in the moon, which sounded quite exciting.
When I got to 16, Sunday evenings were The Forsyte Saga quickly followed by the bus to Twickenham to go and see blues bands on Eel Pie Island. I had to absolutely promise I'd done all my homework first, of course.

I was bored rigid on Sundays - the same old ritual of Family Favourites, Billy Cotton, roast dinner, Journey into Space, Hancock's Half Hour - and then having to do homework which invariably meant learning a long poem by heart or working out a geometry theorem.
What I would give now to see the Mother who cooked those excellent lunches, and the Father who whistled along to the radio.

We often went on the steam train to visit grandparents who lived in Peabody Buildings at the Elephant and Castle. I remember the smell of cabbage cooking on the walk from the station. Probably the reason I never eat it now...

There is certainly a lot of us of the baby boom age on this website.
I can well understand that Sundays could be so boring.

For me, in some ways, I was a lucky one as not only was I away at school also my father had a hotel so in the summer it could be busy. I also lived by the sea so lived walking along the coast. However, my mother did go to church on Sundays and would bring me but like others predicted I found the service went on and on.

Sunday for us in the 50s was very much focussed on chapel. We were Methodists and were expected to attend Sunday School in the morning, followed by service in chapel, then more Sunday School in the afternoon, so that mum could go to bed for an hour and have a rest. Dad used to visit his mother in the afternoon. One of us was usually lucky enough to have our Sunday dinner at an aunty's house which was just a five minute walk from chapel, otherwise it was a 20 minute walk four times to and from chapel.

Then home for tea, always bread and butter first followed by fruit and jelly, then mum's overdry chocolate sponge cake. All this to the accompaniment of Welsh hymn singing on the radio, which we hated.

Evenings would be board games (in the days before we had a tv), then Your 100 Best Tunes on the radio. In summer we would have a family evening walk.

We dreaded going to our gran's on a Sunday because she didn't allow us to do anything but read - no games, no playing outside, no knitting/sewing (which I loved).

No shops open, no cinema, no sports. Mother considered the people who didn't attend church or chapel on a Sunday to be heathens and beyond the pale. And she didn't care much for Roman Catholics - imagine her shock when I married one!

The Scottish sabbath. A very depressing day. Church and Sunday school. No playing out on the street for any child, no washing put out in the back greens. Maybe a walk in the afternoon. Dairies and newsagents opened briefly in the morning for milk and newspapers. Extra delivery boys and girls were employed as it was a heavy round with almost every household in Scotland getting the Sunday Post. A very depressing newspaper full of kailyaird homilies. Though it did have a comic section with the Broons and Oor Wullie. We got a TV when I was about twelve. My Dad was always watching the boxing. When I was a teenager it was Sunday Night at the London Palladium. Just the memory of the theme music depresses me. Bruce Forsyth. The awful games with the audience. The acrobats. Cliff Richards was something I suppose.