In Every Grandmother's House Ever

holy shit, is your grandma my grandma?

23a. Personal Computer purchased by children, used for e-mails to family and occasional crossword puzzles.

24. Crossword Puzzles.

30. Immaculate front garden, 95% of the time with massive roses as the central feature.

my (urban) parents had a full set of these for years and years (and threw them out when they moved)

37. Heating that's on waaaay too high. In June.

38. draught excluders with comedy snake eyes

44. A real teapot

46. tv guide

47. afghan blankets

50. Tinned evaporated milk

51. Multi-coloured knitted tea cosy

52. Aprons

Her previous cockatiel would eat Garpe Nuts out of her mouth, it was gross.

ctrl+f "quilt"

wtf

http://www.newsbiscuit.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/jesus.jpg or its equiv. for other religions. I'm curious about what that'd be, actually!

200. A saucer of used teabags, awaiting re-use.

grease drippings jar

85.

A heartache.

i don't know if you're being sincere or paraphrasing roxy music.

11. large color television on top of large color television that does not work

My grandmother threw out the telly about 30 years ago?

a VCR that is still used

204. calamine lotion
205. a coat rack that tips over
206. whatever the hell those things are called that hang on the door and have strings like a mandolin and little wooden balls that dangle down and hit the strings. Why do I think they're called Swedes? (Southern United States only)
207. Box of stale swiss roles on top of the fridge for when the grandkids come
208. family Bible with incomplete entries for deaths, marriages & family tree, in faded cursive

Products labelled with dying or forgotten brand names.

Hmmm could it be a lot of this is found in White grandmother's houses?

Mexican-American grandma's have houses filled with different stuff. Virgen de Guadalupe alters with a photo card of every Saint there is, palm Sunday crosses and a photo card or something with Pope John but never Jesus...unless it's a baby Jesus from a nativity scene, rosary, clay bean pot, molcajete, Pine-o-Pine and sheets that smell faintly of bleach, box of variety cookies, Mexican bread in a small paper bag, Sprite in the fridge, lots of chicken themed knick knacks in the kitchen....lots of blankets and towels covering the "good" furniture, neatly placed, Tres Flores hair oil in the bathroom...lots of plastic doilies on furniture, lots of plants, smell of cumin and coffee....

I know two white British non-Catholic grandmothers who do the Palm Sunday cross thing (one Church of England, one Scottish Presbyterian).

Personally, as a white guy raised in a stereotypically white environment, I love these glimpses into other people's backgrounds/cultures by way of the overlooked banalities of grandmother's houses, dens, dorm rooms, and other "in every"s. Not to say that *tera has the responsibility of informing me or w/e, just it's cool to read.

Large collection of medication that you're tempted to eat a few pills at random because you're bored after only being there for a day

Hmmm could it be a lot of this is found in White grandmother's houses?

Mexican-American grandma's have houses filled with different stuff. Virgen de Guadalupe alters with a photo card of every Saint there is, palm Sunday crosses and a photo card or something with Pope John but never Jesus...unless it's a baby Jesus from a nativity scene, rosary, clay bean pot, molcajete, Pine-o-Pine and sheets that smell faintly of bleach, box of variety cookies, Mexican bread in a small paper bag, Sprite in the fridge, lots of chicken themed knick knacks in the kitchen....lots of blankets and towels covering the "good" furniture, neatly placed, Tres Flores hair oil in the bathroom...lots of plastic doilies on furniture, lots of plants, smell of cumin and coffee....

― *tera, Sunday, June 30, 2013 6:14 PM (Yesterday) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Pretty darn close to Italian American grandma houses I've witnessed.

Maybe just the photo card of Pope John but never Jesus part, mostly.

Lots of little figurines sitting by the window or on tables. Some of these will seem garish or even a bit racist according to modern sensibilities.

Some form of rabbit ears or antenna.

fridge in laundry room for bulk veggies, arcane meats
IN ADDITION TO freezer for arcane meat overspill

So otm. Can't have enough freezers.

Can't speak to white grandmothers' houses, but in nursing homes I've seen (presumed) white Catholic women with bedside pictures of the Pope, and black women with bedside pictures of Martin Luther King Jr.

fridge in laundry room for bulk veggies, arcane meats
IN ADDITION TO freezer for arcane meat overspill

So otm. Can't have enough freezers.

― how's life, Monday, July 1, 2013 1:47 PM Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

My grandparents always had STACKS of extra cases of soda and snacks, and this was before costco. And yeah an extra freezer too. And my grandpa also had like 8 extra pairs of the same shoes. I guess he knew his size and knew what he liked.

shit I noticed at my grandparents' house while cleaning tonight:

-a perpetual motion machine that hasn't been in motion since ≈2007
-two bird clocks that tweet every hour and a mantel clock that chimes every 15 minutes
-a blue nun figurine whose head comes off to reveal an empty bottle of 1984 Blue Nun wine
-"my wife ran away with my best friend...and I sure miss him"
-"all men are created equal...poor things"
-at least $350 worth of IHOP, Olive Garden, Outback Steakhouse, and Panera gift cards
-a showbox picture frame stuffed with creased and crumpled photos from 1995-1998. A++, jams up 100% of the time
-hand-painted, disembodied clay heads of dogs and Indians and bonneted ladies, mounted on the wall of my grandpa's office and used to hold his baseball caps
-decorations from every major holiday: pumpkins next to Easter bunnies next to birds in winter hats. you don't care about time when you're 86
-a golf ball hanging from a string mounted on the garage ceiling, used as a parking aid so your car doesn't hit the wall
-knick-knacks from kids' show that haven't aired in liek 20 years (California Raisins figurines, Pee Wee Herman doll, troll heads, plush Barneys)
-lots of free giveaway logoed merch (dancing humanoid Verizon basketballs!)
-a Taco Bell chihuahua bobblehead
-a curio cabinet filled with Snowbabies and snowglobes. no fucking way am I ever going to dust these things
-a rooster toothpick dispenser. when you press on its back it grabs a toothpick with its beak. pretty sick tbph
-a surprisingly small number of owl knick-knacks. they have a giant stoneware owl on their hearth and an owl plaque made of pinecone spines on their laundry room wall, but I swear they had more when I was a kid. I guess these two dudes are the only survivors of a succession of post-'70s domestic owl cullings
-dozens and dozens of non-owl bird knick-knacks. 99% of their house is birds

250.
https://i.imgur.com/VSyRkH4.gif

poetic!

https://i.imgur.com/wwlq8Nj.jpghttps://i.imgur.com/bhpjE7w.jpg

https://i.imgur.com/HiH34Av.jpghttps://i.imgur.com/baU5Ris.jpg

yesss bosson heads! brought those up on the "in every suburban den" thread once.

ah, so that's what they're called! their Indian one is more of a Bosson torso, complete with axe and drum (he looks a lot like https://i.imgur.com/eLDQ4AE.jpg, except he has the same Caucasian skin tone as the couple in my photo)

This might be a little Minnesota-centric but

https://pastorbrett.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/772px-grace1918photographenstrom.jpg

No, my Protestant grandmother also had that one.

I swear to god I found a cat claw behind my grandparents' toilet while I was cleaning their floor. they've lived in the same house for 35 years and have never owned a cat. I wonder if I should take this up with the Fortean Times.

194. carpety looking toilet seat covers

also, cushioned vinyl toilet seats

And Izal toilet paper- the scratchiest, most unforgiving toilet paper known to mankind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BpMGvRWZ4gs

Oh god, my grandparents had Izal when I was small. Literally no absorbency.

I tried to buy Izal as a birthday present for a friend a couple of years ago, you can't get it for love nor money these days. They stopped making it about a decade ago unfortunately.

"An item that has previously been used"
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/Vintage-1960-s-IZAL-MEDICATED-Toilet-Tissue-Roll-Two-Rolls/143008584113

https://www.fhinds.co.uk/Images/Product/Default/xlarge/C1787_L_1.jpg

Keep scrolling down, you'll feel at home as soon as you get there.

wow that's a time capsule!

the wood paneled hallway and bathrooms made my heart race

I can almost taste the jello salad

Beware overuse of wide-angle lenses in home photos trying to make the rooms look bigger, with that in mind, the hallway in photo 21/50 looks crazy narrow.

I like how the old TV serves as a stand for the new TV.

The hallway felt suffocating

The phone mounted on the end of the upper cabinets!

It appears to have an actual garage but no pics... maybe converted to that lower rumpus room?

https://i.ibb.co/d0cW5JC3/eb4f2a26ae4cb0bc2f6613dfb240501d0042dc8c.jpg

air fresheners

i borrowed #2 from my grandpa's wife for apartment furnishing for a few years. the drawer was kind of janky, so i eventually gave it back