Sheila

seasider. I immediately thought of a lobster creel! What was the device your auntie had?

I remember my auntie having a creel in her kitchen

I too remember everything you have all been saying about wash days years ago but did anyone else have a hand operated washing machine? It was a tub with a hinged lid and paddles which were attached to the lid. When the lid was lowered the paddles went into the washer and were operated by a handle which had to be turned first in one direction and then the other. It was considered a crime of the highest order to turn it in only one direction (easier option) as the clothes just got in a knot around the paddles. I think there was a mangle attached too.
We also had a gas iron which was attached to a gas pipe from the gas bottles. One up from flat irons !
Sometimes I see the washer and iron in museums but I think they must have been a bit of a rarity or put on the dump at the earliest opportunity as there do not seem many about.

It was a very good day when electricity finally came to our outpost in Teesdale !

What a frightening experience Elegran. Thank goodness it changed direction.

DD1 now sees the benefit of having a washing line in the garage, especially for bath sheets and bed linen. Sometimes, Mother's advice is listened to

In Yorkshire the drying pulley is called a creel - my MIL had a huge one in the kitchen and never seemed to have any problems with damp or smelly washing etc, but I would worry about that. My tumble dryer gets well-used too, though I'm saving it quite a lot of work now I've retired and can usually manage to get the washing dry outside.

My DD2 has one of the Lakeland tower airers, Ariadne and loves it.

Same here Ariadne.My tumble dryer gets lots of use.

But, to this day, I cannot bear to see washing hanging around the house. On a hidden radiator maybe, or in a spare bedroom (anyone else got a Lakeland Hangaway?)

My mum had a gas boiler for years and years. The sheets and towels were boiled and after being wrung out were so white and soft. Monday was wash day and the kitchen where the boiler was, was always steamy. My mum used to push the sheets down with a big wooden spoon.

We had one of these when I was a lot younger. My name is Sheila and I would have seen it as a compliment if I thought our 'pully' had been named after me!

If there is nowhere in your kitchen for a pulley, have you considered the garage? I used to hang nappies and sheets and towels and other larger things in there, where they dried wonderfully.

Then about fifteen years ago, in a big storm, I was standing at the kitchen window watching the trees bend when the garage roof reared up in one piece and flew off towards me. It changed direction at the last minute (while I stood transfixed) and cartwheeled off into a neighbour's garden, destroying my conservatory on the way, but not touching the ground or the fence. The pulley has never been re-attached to the new roof.

When my first child was born nearly 50 years ago I had a Baby Burco mainly for nappies which always had to be spotless.When nappy days were over I advertised it for sale along with other bits in the local paper. Some one rang and said he would buy it if we would deliver and gave us an address in N.Manchester. When we arrived it was a Butcher's shop and the owner explained it was for rendering the fat to make dripping.I was very pleased I wasn't a customer, but what the eye doesn't see....!

I rather miss that 'washing' smell.......

And yes, it IS called a Sheila.

I remember my Mum putting the washing through a mangle. It was clamped to the draining board which was wooden and full of germs no doubt! She progressed to a twin tub thankfully. We also had a pulley in the kitchen; I'm sure the drying clothes took on the aroma of whatever was cooking on the stove that day!
When DH and I first met, he was the proud owner of a Baby Burco in which he seemd to boil wash evrything from socks to handkerchiefs - I soon replaced it with an all singing, all dancing Indesit washing machine

We lived in a tied house on a farm in the fifties and sixties and it had a wash house. Sadly our boiler had been taken out but our neighbour still had hers and produced the whitest sheets ever. It had a fire underneath it, designed to burn coal to heat the water. Oddly we used to give our neighbour our old shoes to burn as they gave the best heat apparently

I didn't mean old fashioned in a derogatory way as I wish I had somewhere I could have a pulley. I think it would save electricity by reducing time spent using the tumbler drier.
As a child I hated wash days because we couldn't get near the fire on cold days. All the wet washing was draped on the clothes horse around the fire and steam everywhere. And baked potatoes for tea because the washing had taken all day.
And it was always on a Monday wasn't it?

I remember my friend's mum using the little bluebag to put on wasp stings.

As well as dolly blue, there was a biscuit coloured one for the creamy coloured net curtains.

Yes, I mentioned the dolly-blue in an earlier post, Marelli! Magic, those little blue things in their cotton jackets...

I remember my Mother having a huge copper boiling tub and a wringer at the sink. The only soap I loved the smell of was coal tar.

Would hate to think what the clothes would have smelled like if say bed sheets were hanging above where kippers were cooking Marelli

I loved swirling the blue bag in a bowl of cold water when I was a child.

And the Dolly-blue bag, Ana? To make the boiled white sheets even whiter-looking...

DD has a sheila in her kitchen.

I've only ever had a susan.

Oh yes, the big block of Fairy soap! Rubbed onto the shirt collars first, then onto the rest of the washing before it was plunged into the dolly tub...

My childhood was spent in a village not far out of Nottingham, Agus and Ariadne. Washing was done in dolly-tub, with puncher smacking the suds through the clothes, also the mangling (all done in back yard, so the water could run down into the drain at the bottom of the sloped yard) with the clothes being boiled in the kitchen. Can still remember the smell of the green Fairy soap being used on the rubbing board....aah, memories! We didn't have a pulley (Sheila Maid), as my mother thought the cooking smells would get into the drying clothes . We did used to have half a pig hanging from a hook there, but that was a different story......!

I lived just a few miles from Nottingham for the first 30 years of my life and it has changed almost out or recognition. I was told last week the trams are being extended and Canning Circus and it's environs are chaotic.