Do you still follow old routines your parents did years ago ??

Siope

I suspect my mother had routines - although she worked outside the home as well as in it - but I’ve no idea what they were, and I wouldn’t copy them anyway.

Same here.
I do things when and if ( I feel like it)

God No, Only kept a few Christmas traditions but that's all, my life is very different to my mums.

If you are north of England, Booth's still sell blancmange. I got some only last week to make an old fashioned trifle like my mum used to make. If not have you looked at amazon?

Sunday was always a roast and eaten at lunchtime. Monday morning was washing and then monday afternoon was baking. Thursday was cleaning upstairs and Friday was cleaning downstairs. I grew up in the north east and this happened while growing up with mam and dad. All of this was dropped by me once I got married as I used to work and it was all totally impractical except for the sunday roast. Years later we sometimes have a sunday roast but around 6pm and not 1pm. We also used to have supper back then with something light to eat around 6pm, after my dad had finished work. That might have been beans on toast, bacon sandwich or crumpets. Ah life was so blissful then and how I miss my parents.

My Mum didn't do routines; you were lucky to get breakfast in the morning unless you did it yourself. I used to really resent this but as time as gone on and we are more aware, I realised that she probably suffered from ADHD. As she got older and needed caring for, it became a standing joke that if anyone could scupper a routine, it would be her. She didn't even realise she did it.
As teenagers, the three of us had instructions to do the housework on Saturday mornings. We had a room each to do plus our own bedrooms and we'd take turns in doing the bathroom, mopping the kitchen floor, hall stairs and landing, etc. Every night we took turns in washing up, drying up and cleaning all the sides in the kitchen. She had a very understand lady in during the week who would also do the ironing but sometimes she had to do the washing instead! We had a routine or risk her wrath, she didn't.
I have turned into her!

I can't remember any routines, apart from the dreaded Saturday bed changing, but mum must have had some.

my mum had her routines.
every monday (until she got her electric washing machine complete with mangle) she would drag her old gas boiler into the kitchen from where it was kept at the back of the house.
she would take the stove gas pipe off the pipe and attach the boiler instead - i hated the smell of coal gas!
then she'd fill the boiler with water and light it up to heat.
the sheets and pillow cases would be put in - poked with a wooden stick - soap added and the sheets boiled.
after the boiling the sheets were transferred to the sink and rinsed a couple of times (with a blue bag added to the last rinse). manually wrung out the sheets would be hung up outside to dry.
i remember the sheets froze in the winter and we got so cold bringing them in but wet or dry the washing never stayed out at night.
and i remember the high teas we had with bread and butter to be eaten before cake.
and always jelly and blancmange for birthday parties.
thanks to google i've found a source for blancmange as no supermarkets sell it these days.
if you shop online go to www.greenscakes.co.uk and you'll find not only their lemon meringue pie mix (and a few other things) but also blancmanges sold individually. they do raspberry, strawberry, chocolate and vanilla and, i recently found, caramel.
so every now and again i make myself jelly and blancmange for my tea.

When I was a child, living in a tenement, the washing was done on set days because the tenants shared a wash house, and had an allocated day. There would be trouble if anyone deviated from their day! Once my mum went out to work, there was absolutely no routine. We had a twin tub washing machine soon after, so the wash house was seldom used. I too have very little routine.

My mother was a stay at home mother. As far as I know she didn’t have any routines, she washed when the laundry basket was full, I can remember her ironing in the evenings.
We had potatoes with everything, she called pasta - foreign muck, had fish on a Friday - yes she was RC.
My father had an allotment where he planted all the veg that we used. We had a small garden and initially an outside loo, I was so grateful when my father installed an inside bathroom. We used to get a lot of snow in the winter and going outside to the loo was a nightmare, I still loathe snow to this day.
Mt grammar school was 4 miles away and I had to go to school on a public, service bus. There were hills both sides of my commute, another reason why I dislike snow as I walked to school in 1963, bad snow year and got absolutely soaked in 6 foot drifts.
My mother taught me how to iron and I then had to take over the ironing. I was cooking family meals at 10 years of age. I now make a list of meals for the coming week and only go shopping once a week. My mother was up and down to town virtually every day. My mother lived to 88 and my dad was 90 when he died, I think they would have said that they had a good life but they didn’t travel much and see other cultures like I had had the opportunity to do.
Both good and bad memories. So no I don’t follow my mothers routines, I worked and had to fit things in.

Most of these posts reflect a time when women were housewives. Mine returned to teaching when I was about 6. She loved her career and her children. Housework and washing was done on a Saturday morning. She often baked cakes and biscuits in the afternoon. We four children had allocated tasks to do after school and on Saturdays.
So often it's assumed that ALL women were housewives in the 1950s and 1960s. They weren't. My Mother was an excellent role model for me.

midgey

I remember my dad taking us to the sweet shop with our ration cards, buying our sweets in triangle bags. Saturday treat with dad!

I'd forgotten all about those triangular sweet bags, nice memory!

No. I do my own thing, as and when suits me.

My sister can rembered eating different things on different days of the week. And my mum used to wash on a Monday iron on a Tuesday strip the beds on a weekend. Some I do without thinking it was a routine. Definitely follow Christmas routines though even polish my apples so they look rosy like my mum did!

We set up a new routine (timetable) during the first lockdown. What survives of it is home-made curry on Sundays, with the leftovers on Tuesdays, Saturday night watching a drama or film on TV Sunday nights an opera (we have a subscription to the Met), Tuesday nights a crime series. And we have always done the weekly accounts on a Saturday morning. I don't think my parents did any of these things. Husband does the washes on Saturday and cleaner does the ironing on Wednesdays. We have our own things we do routinely, like my Nordic walks on a Tuesday morning and his zoom classes on a Monday afternoon. We both do the supermarket shop on a Wednesday afternoon. So plenty of routine but our parents would not recognise our lives!

The only routine (or maybe I should say ritual?) that has stuck for me is the making of tea. Boil the kettle warm the pot with a little of the hot water, add the tea, pour on the boiling water taking the teapot to the kettle. Brew for three minutes. I still have to have my tea made in a teapot. Really don't like teabag in a mug style. The only concessions to this is I use teabags now and don't bother with a teacosy. My mother worked from when I was 2 years old which was almost unheard of back in 1954. My father always helped with cooking etc.

Only routine I can recall was the washing was done on a Monday. Due to the amount of labour and time involved (old fashioned boiler, double washing sink and wringer) we always just had a really thick broth for our dinner. Suppose the pot was put on the stove and cooked away with little atrention needed. I don't follow tgat. A really big tradition was the cleaning of the house from top to bottom, everything inside out for New Year. All tge dirt of the old year had to be cleared out for the New Year's dirt to be allowed in. I did follow this for a few years once married but as I moved house quite a bit I gave up in the 70s. Or, I realised how stupid that tradition was.

I didn't think I did, but then realised that I always put water in the kettle last thing before bed, for the morning cuppa.

My mother had a routine ( not in the war years) Monday was washing day and the back kitchen floor was always awash from lifting the washing out of the boiler with two big sticks. When I was around I had to mop the floor ( I was hopeless) On Tuesday mum did the ironing and in Wednesday she covered the dining table in our only living room which had a black stove fire . First she woukd clean that stove until it shined with a poypt of something shich she called “blacking” and after that all the brasses she had.were on that table to be cleaned with brasso. Thursday was my favourite day as dad had half a day holiday (he worked at the co-op) This was after the war and mum sand dad took me into Liverpool city centre and we went to the pictures or if something was on that they fancied we would go to live theatre at the Empire. On Sundays we went to Knotty Ash to grandmas house where all my mums siblings, husbands abd children would gather for tea. In the summer we would meet at Lime Street station to catch the train to nearby beach resorts for the day. I loved thise weekends. I can talk as much as my mum and still use a lot of her sayings. I have quite a few of her brasses which are kept shining. But sadly she died in Australia at 50: of a chronic heart disease which I inherited but I was lucky and had a metal valve inserted for which I am very grateful. I loved my mum and think about her often. I think I am like her and as my sister always said “ you have a big mouth just like mum”

My mother's routine was geared to the fact that the shirts my father wore in his practice and the towels and white coats from his consulting-room were picked up by the laundry on Tuesdays and returned on Thursdays. So laundry was sorted on Mondays, and the clothes that were washed at home were washed on Mondays. Bed linen and bath towels were changed then too.

The consulting-room and waiting-room were cleaned daily, hall and front door-step on Mondays and if needed on Wednesdays.

Our rooms were cleaned on Fridays, shopping done when my mother was out picking us up from school.

When I moved away from home I established my own routine, washing on the week-day when I had fewest classes to attend, shopping done on the way home from the Academy of Music, or while waiting for a practice room to be free (we booked them in advance), cleaning on Thursday evenings in the week where there were not concerts I either took part in or attended to hear my class-mates play in.

I stuck to the Thursday evening cleaning routine when I started working full-time and did washing either before going to work, or after I came home. Ironing whenever the washing was dry.

gillyjp

The only routine (or maybe I should say ritual?) that has stuck for me is the making of tea. Boil the kettle warm the pot with a little of the hot water, add the tea, pour on the boiling water taking the teapot to the kettle. Brew for three minutes. I still have to have my tea made in a teapot. Really don't like teabag in a mug style. The only concessions to this is I use teabags now and don't bother with a teacosy. My mother worked from when I was 2 years old which was almost unheard of back in 1954. My father always helped with cooking etc.

You have reminded me of my oldest sister who still does that.
Shes in her 80's and refuses point blank to use tea bags, it has to be loose tea.
She always uses a tea pot and it has to be warmed first, then l teaspoon tea per person and one for the pot lol.
it has to be fresh boiled water. she still only uses china cups and sauces. Its a real tea drinking ritual when any one visits her.
Her last visit to me, l got out my tea service, just for her, but no teapot or loose tea. She wrote to say thank me for not serving her tea in a coffee mug, which she said her friends always do lol.
l have elderly 2 sisters and 4 brothers... l will have to ask if they follow our parents routines still. l know my oldest sister did, the 80 yrs, as l used to stay weekends when l stayed over night as a teenager l used to as baby sit her 2 children. l also remember l often visited her when she had her new baby and l remember she had wash on Mondays etc. l remember walking with her to the baby clinic on Tuesdays to get baby weighed on a large metal bucket scales after baby was striped down to his flannel nappy. It was like something out of 'call the midwife' lol.

I was only talking about this to my husband yesterday. I told him that when my mum was young, all the neighbours followed the same routines. There was a day for washing windows, a day for scrubbing doorsteps (and woe betide any that left theirs looking mucky 😆) days for laundry and shopping. My mum sounded nostalgic talking about it. I think routines are a positive thing. I try to follow a routine at home - not quite the same as in my mum's day. I don't scrub the doorstep - not yet, anyway 😆 but I follow a system of cleaning (Flylady) which is fun and gives a feeling of community. I wonder if it gave the housewives of old a feeling of community when they all did the same chores on the same day.

My mother always washed on a Monday and ironed on Tuesday; apart from that I don't really know what she did the other days, as I was at school. She always baked on a Saturday morning, as I remember Saturday Club on the radio as I watched her. Always a fruit pie for Sunday, jam tarts, a treacle tart, sometimes a meat pie for Saturday lunch; and then she would make a chocolate cake for Sunday tea.

I used to have routines when I worked, but now retired I just do stuff as and when. She would think I was very slapdash!.

Fairycakes

I was only talking about this to my husband yesterday. I told him that when my mum was young, all the neighbours followed the same routines. There was a day for washing windows, a day for scrubbing doorsteps (and woe betide any that left theirs looking mucky 😆) days for laundry and shopping. My mum sounded nostalgic talking about it. I think routines are a positive thing. I try to follow a routine at home - not quite the same as in my mum's day. I don't scrub the doorstep - not yet, anyway 😆 but I follow a system of cleaning (Flylady) which is fun and gives a feeling of community. I wonder if it gave the housewives of old a feeling of community when they all did the same chores on the same day.

For me, i remember everything was routine in the 1950s, like a schools times table. But everyone who l knew was a housewife and non went out to work. So those who did, life was very different.
Shops closed half day weekends and all day Sundays. Milkman del 5 or 6am, post early morning and twice a day.
Pubs closed at 2 or 3pm Sundays.
Baby clinic's on Tuesdays. Markets on a thurs or Saturday.
Neighbours would pop in for a cuppa for 11's * never afternoons ) but stayed no more the 10 min for a quick gossip. Afternoons baby was wrapped up warm and taken to the shops in large pram or put out side in the garden.
All l remember is that everything had a set time lol.

paris123

All interesting memories, thank you, im enjoying reading them. I also now remember the meals we ate that l still seem to usually still follow. ie sheppard pie on Mondays, stew on Tues, Toad in Hole on Wednesday, Thursday rest of stew made into suet pud, Friday is still fish chips mushy pea for him, salad for me,. Saturday we had and sometimes still do have, is boiled eggs and toast in winter and hm quiche in summer. Sundays l rarely cook a roast, its usually a hotpot, but l still do a old fashions high tea.
l remember when mom shopped for the weekend joint from our local butchers she always came home with a bag full of diff cakes etc week ,ie either custard tarts, or jam doughnuts ect. We never , ever had cake in the week but a few biscuits with a cuppa at bedtime. On Saturday when shopping she always bought her weekly magazine ie womens own, which she read with cuppa after the shopping. There was always a afternoon film on a Saturday (usually a comedy or cowboy film) which we kids watched if we couldnt go out to play in our large back garden.. l seem to have always been playing in that lovely large garden with the old apple tree at the top. l think l rarely stayed inside if the weather was ok. Sundays afternnon film was usually a serious black and white film . Our Sunday roast dinner was always at 2pm on the dot. After his Sunday morning gardening, dad went to the lovely old pub for a pint and would bring back for us kids a pack of sweets each. Saturdays we had our few pence pocket money for a comic and triangle paper bag of 2oz sweets and spent ages trying to decide what we wanted to buy from the jars of sweets in the shop lol. We had a local butcher, fish chip shop, newsagents, tiny supermarket and the chemist which l absolutely loved to go in as it smelled so scented with all the bathsalts, soaps etx on display. The pub was a large manor type building with a rose garden grounds to sit in, So lovely as its was only a 5 min walk from our house . It had an old fashion bowling green attached to the pub and we kids loved to sit in grounds looking though the rose fence watching all the old biddies bowling in their all whites..Mom would rest after the morning housework, Monday her hardest day with all the sheets on the line and do some knitting. or read her mag. Tea was always at 6pm, bedtime at 8pm where we could read our comics or Christmas Annuals or library books etc till about 9pm. Everything was so near to us, ie the schools, buses, shops and 3 lovely parks which had boating lakes and a ice cream cafe on a bank, The centre islands of the lakes were filled with Purple Rhododendrone One of the parks had a small nature area that was called a 'dingle' l wrote poem about it on a poetry forum and our american neighbours were fasinated as new heard of the term dingle.
l seem to still follow all these routines and meal plans without even thinking about it, after all these years.
ps please do forgive my spelling, my eyes are still bad and i' im too tired to look up the corrects...
im looking forward to reading more of eveyones memories.

Just wanted to say I absolutely loved reading your memories, you should write them all down for your grandchildren!

Nope. I just see a need and meet it. I'll never achieve the sparkling home my Mum did. Nor do I want to. However it was a very happy diamond and I always tried/try to emulate that.