I enjoyed my chores. I had to keep my room clean and there days a week, after school, I dusted and vaccuumed the living room and dining room. For one dollar a week! And Mom would give me another dollar if I washed the kitchen floor (on my hands and knees). But I pretty much enjoyed the work and the opportunity to make some spending cash. Back in those days, I was quite a fan of 1960's rock and roll. I could ride my bike to the store and buy 45RPM singles for 88 cents and 33RPM albums for $2.97. I never did laundry (Mom's domain). And Dad maintained the house and outdoor work and kept cars running. ou know, man's work.

We never got paid anything for work around the house and outside. We never had money until one day I decided to catch night crawlers and sell them to fishermen and also charge them for fishing. Yea, finally a way to earn some money. We also earned money setting tomato plants for a neighbor. Hard work riding a tomato setter all day.

Sue

My mother had psychiatric problems (and she was abusive) and my father worked a lot of overtime, so starting before the age of 10 I did all the work in the house. There were 3 younger brothers in the house at that time. I did dishes, laundry, cooking, dusting, vacuuming, washed floors (hands and knees) and on Saturdays my father drove me to the grocery store for me to buy the groceries. I remember when I was older I couldn't go to a school dance once until the floors were washed. For all this I got to keep the baby bonus the government was giving out at that time, which was $8.00 a month. However, I had to buy my own clothes so I had to babysit for people in order to have enough money to shop. Reading this back, it sounds like I'm complaining, but I'm just stating the facts.

Marilyn Sue would you mind explaining "setting tomato plants and riding a setter" I've never heard that term. Is it for huge "fields" of plants? We just had 6-8 plants in Mom's garden.

Diane

Chore? What's a chore? LOL

I was never asked to do chores--which could possibly explain why I find housekeeping such a struggle!

The only chore I had to do was help hang clothes on the clothesline on Saturdays. And you can't imagine how I whined about it! I'm domestically challenged to this day because of not learning to do housework.

I grew up with 5 brothers and no sisters. All the household chores were mine and moms. The only one I dreaded was doing the dishes on Sunday afternoon when we all had dinner together. All 8 of us. Mom would make a very large dinner with lots of pots and pans. Dad would check my work and if there was one dirty spot left, I had to wash all of the dishes over again. Now today, I love doing dishes, go figure. I don't use my dishwasher, can't anymore even if I wanted to. The gaskets dried up from non-use. That and cleaning the bathrooms, I hated that as well.

I was the youngest and the spoiled one. The only thing I had to do was clean out my closet. I had a desk and boxes in a big closet which was like a room I had the old fashioned orange cratesl lined up and kept my collection of comic books and Playmate magazines in them

Rosepetal, it was for doing fields of tomatoes. I think about four of us sat on it , behind the tractor and we had bundles of tomato plants. You sat low to the ground and every other time you would slide your hand down with a plant and it would get water and the roots be covered. Then your partner would plant their plant. This was in the 1940's. Usually the pay was $10.00 for 3 or four days of work.

Sue

I never had to do chores when I was growing up. Grandma lived with us and always said I would break something. So when I married at 18, I didn't know anything about keeping house....and cooking! Hubs asked what was for breakfast the morning after our wedding, (we didn't have a honeymoon) I told him we didn't have any Wheaties! Then I was preggers soon after we were married, and when Scott was born. (11mo & 10 days after the I do's) Then I had to learn to be a Mother besides a wife and homemaker. Talk about on-the-job training. I vowed if I ever had a daughter, I would start teaching her the basics early, which I did.

My most hated chores were cleaning baseboards (why Mom had us do that every few weeks is beyond me) and pulling weeds in the garden. My brother and I had to wax cabinets too. I think Mom gave us all the jobs she hated to do. lol

Ironing! When I was about 8 or 9 mother taught me to iron. Man, I was so proud to do a "grown up" job. Well, that lasted about two weeks. To this day, I dread ironing. Thank heavens for the minds that created polyester.

First we had to wet them down. We used a pepsi bottle with a sprinkler type top. Then they had to be rolled up in a certain way and laid in a big bushel basket. The basket as lined and you could cover the damp clothes so they'd stay that way until their turn on the board. Sometimes that basket seemed like a bottomless pit.

Loading the dishwasher. My parents had (and Dad still does) have one of those dishwashers that are mobile. You have to hook it up to the spigot on the sink. I hated hooking that thing up because it always came off when I wouldn't get it on right, spraying water everywhere.

Clipping the grass along the fences by hand in the hot Texas sun with gnats swarming. I hate yard work to this day!

I, too, did not have to do chores. I was an only child and my mom stayed at home. She wouldn't let me cook or do any chores because she said I wouldn't be able to do them like her. I watched her and learned how to do them. I always kept my room immaculate. When I got my own apartment, I knew just how to clean it and keep it nice. Now that I am retired and living alone, housework seems like a waste of time.

As a young child it was cleaning the steps at Grandmas. There was a flap/tread on each one that was rubber, it was held down with a brass strip. (To prevent a person from slipping on the steps) I had to lift each of the flaps, scrub under it then dry it well and had to scour out the ridges on the rubber and on the brass. Then dry it all down, we had a couple sets of the steps and I cleaned them weekly.

Once mom remarried and we moved in with my stepfamily it was anything to do with the mink. Feeding, cleaning.....YUCK!

I hated to wash dishes. My Mom knew this so she usually found other things for me to do instead. And she did the dishes.

I hated mowing our lawn. Our house was on two lots and we had a tiny electric mower. It took *forever* to mow that extra side lot -- in the heat, with the mosquitos and wasps. I also hated doing it because I was the only GIRL in our neighborhood who mowed her family's lawn. (Only child; parents divorced.) When I got older I had another reason to dislike it: The neighborhood boys and men enjoyed watching me!

I didn't have housework chores. In fact, I was totally *shocked* one day when I was about ten and my mother told me I'd be in charge of starting dinner from then on. Moi? Cook? (My mother was a Realtor and my grandmother had always lived with us.) Things change!

I didn't have many chores. I dried the dishes, but my mother never liked the way I did things so I didn't do much more than that. . She could have used some parenting classes.

I had to think long and hard to come up with a chore I hated as a child. Finally, I remembered that it was weeding the garden.

I don't remember disliking cleaning, ironing, household chores. I was always wanting to move up to the next level though......you know, I nagged till Mom let me iron. When she let me iron pillowcases, I'd then start nagging to get to iron clothes, etc.

One job I always wanted to do was stretch curtains, but she never would let me. It just looked neat how she'd wash the curtains, then put them on the curtain stretchers to dry.

Shirley

Probably wrapping garbage in newspapers and scrubbing the old, splintery basement stairs with a rag. Ugh - I can still feel that!

Weeding the garden (heat, sun, and wasps), washing the pots and pans, and anything to do with laundry.

Today?

Laundry, and cleaning the bathtub.

Dances.

Gadgets, I used to help stretch the curtains. Meaning that I held the curtain up off the ground while mother stuck them to those little tacks. I liked helping with the wash, too. It was fascinating to watch the clothes come through the wringer and then I got to "dash" them up and down before they went through the final rinse. Liked hanging clothes on the line, too.

Things are a lot easier now, and I'm thankful for that. But it sure was fun doing it the old way.

As a boy I grew up on a dairy farm where we had 40 milk cows and 15 huge belgian draft horses. Cleaning the stabless was just an everyday routine that we took in stride, but we also had two chicken coops about 30'x 30' and they generally only got cleaned about twice a year. By the time we got around to cleaning a chicken house the chicken droppings were about 2ft deep, and the moment you stabbed a pitch fork in and pried back that heavy thick cloud of amonia gas would fill the air, not to mention that the chickens were still in the coop and every time you moved they would all fly and flap their wings stirring up a cloud of the most awfull smelling dust in the world.

To this day just the mere thought of cleaning a chicken house makes me want to vomit.

LOL at Eva tx. I don't remember ever doing any chores. I do as little housework as I can get by with. That dust just comes back. My friend says she has to "do laundry". Well, heck, my washer does the laundry. LOL I'm domestically challenged also. And electronically challenged, and cooking challenged, but I sure can have a good time and spend my time in better ways than the dreaded housework. That should be a curse word.LOL

I didn't have assigned chores. I did help my mother with things now and then but I thought it was fun. My favorite was washing the patio door with Glass Wax or Bonami in a bar. I liked the way it dried and you wiped it off.

By the time I was 11 or 12 I took it upon myself to clean my own room and do my own laundry.

The only chore I hated was having to get up in the morning to go to school I liked school, just didn't like the getting up part. I was born a night owl and still am to this day.

Been hesitant to post, but I read alisande's reply and I Have to say Ditto for me:

alisande

Chore? What's a chore? LOL
I was never asked to do chores--which could possibly explain why I find housekeeping such a struggle!

Weeding....to this day I will do anything else but weeding.

My Mom went back to work when I was 12. From that day on I was responsible for my little sister and brother everyday after school and during summers(Mom worked 3-11 during school, Dad got home at 6)Cooking dinner and cleaning.No wonder I got married at 17 and had my first child at 18.If I was going to take care of a house and kids it might as well be my own where I could do what I wanted!The thinking of a child!'However my husband and I are still happily married almost 42 years later and the kids well raised and on their own. Whew! I still harbor some resentment for all the things I didn't get to do in high school and not being able to get a job and earn money. I vowed not to do that to my kids and I never did.

My mom worked outside the home, so I had to clean the house from top to bottom once a week. I think started around 6 years of age. We also had a family business so I worked there as well. Most of my childhood and teen memories are centered around work.

I hated doing dishes and still do to this day.
Thankfully DH does the dishes.
I hated vacuuming, too. I just don't like the noise.
I didn't mind helping in the yard or cleaning the bathroom or babysitting my little brother or cooking.

World War II began in '39 when I was 10, the hired farmhand went into the army and what farm work Dad and this lad and a couple of younger brothers got done, got done: the rest ... just didn't. Mom had got sick a few years earlier and was in psych. hosp., and we had a housekeeper, with help from 80-year-old Grandma, after Grandpa died.

We had cows to feed and milk and horses and pigs to feed ... and to clean up the residue that they provided, both behind the tied ones and in the box stalls where some of the young cattle, and pigs, ran free ... so two-feet deep manure was part of the game, and, though it was smelly, I don't remember being seriously repelled by it ... so getting some manure on hands, or even face, didn't bother me too much. Once or twice a year we had to pitch the manure from the pile behind the barn into the manure spreader, to have a team of horses pull to the field and spread.

I've heard said that (certain) clergymen and a manure pile have something in common - get a bunch of them together and they can raise a lot of stink ... but spread them out over the land and they do a lot of good.

We had land to cultivate and seed, then harvest hay (pitching the clumps by hand) and grain, first with a binder that made sheaves that were carried by teams and wagons, with a group of neighbours changing works to a threshing machine beside the barn, later with a combine harvester.

We cut wood (from dying trees) from our woodlot in winter, cut it into short lengths and hauled it to a woodshed at the back of our house, or into a room in the basement next to the furnace, then split the chunks into smaller pieces with an axe.

When I wondered what chore got my goat the worst, I had to think a bit ... then decided that it was carrying armsful of wood from the woodshed at the back of the house through the summer kitchen into the regular kitchen, where we dumped it into a wooden box behind the kitchen range. Seemed to take a lot of nagging on the part of the female components of the household to get the job done. Year-round, but especially in winter, when the range provided heat for much of the house as well as for cooking. And heating wash-water, to carry by bucket to the (wringer) washer in the back kitchen: bath-water as well - we boys had our weekly bath in a round, galvanized tub behind the stove ... and when one took water from the reservoir at the back of the stove to put into the tub, if one forgot to add some more cold water to the reservoir for heating ...

... one heard about it from the one(s) who were to take a bath later (and, if I recall correctly, we didn't throw all of the water down the kitchen sink after each one bathed). Three brothers, no sister, so there wasn't the business of being exiled from the kitchen for a period on Saturday nights.

ole joyfuelled ... who bathes a bit more frequently, these days ... and washes undies, occasionally

P.S. Which is smarter - a pig? Or a cow?

When I was young, Dad built platforms of planks in the corner of several pig pens, and we'd throw a forkful of straw into that platform ... and when we were running around, playing, we could run into the pig pen and lay down on that platform, as the pigs kept it clean.

Pigs'll keep the place where they sleep clean ... and do their dirty job elsewhere, and eat in a different location, given the opportunity. While a cow ... will shi! in it's own bed ... manger ... or anywhere.

Pigs are clean - they make good, and intelligent pets.

o j

Hoeing weeds in our large vegtable garden on hot day. being farm folks in the WW2 years, we had a large garden (1/2 acre) that needed a lot of care.

Another equally hated job was cutting weeds in the barnyard with an old fashined sythe. That was a laborious job.

My mother and I usually did chores together. She was an excellant housekeeper and cook. The radio was usually on and we listened to soap operas as we worked - STELLA DALLAS, JUST PLAIN BILL, and also the Art Linkletter show.

There were three children younger than I. I remember liking to take care of them except the diaper changing.

I detested ironing, mowing the grass, sweeping and moping the floors or washing the dishes at my dads and stepmothers house when I visited them on the weekends (and dad would give me an allowance for the help) BUT I LOVED helping my grandmother with dusting, washing her dishes, sweeping off her porch and helping her with anything she asked me to do. She was not able to give me an allowance, but I had rather work for her free, than do anything for my dad and stepmom and get an allowance from them..LOL. What a brat I was.

Mother was the oldest child and only girl with 4 brothers quite close together. She claimed she had to do everything, so therefore would not allow me to do anything, beds, dishes, cooking etc. Found out much later that was not true. When I stayed with grandparents from 10 on during summer vacation, grandparents encouraged (made) me do so much more. Cook, clean, wash, learn to milk, gather eggs etc. I begged parents to live with GP's because I liked the guidance and rules etc. To this day, I hate housework, love bookwork, and gardens etc. But I do have my house cleaned once a week so it is easier to keep clean.

I was a spoiled brat, punishment was weeding the garden, about 2 acres, hated that. Chore was dusting on Saturday, we had a long coffee table in the living room ,I dusted it by lying on it and sliding up and down, while watching Saturday morning cartoons! Problem was, I had on jeans so my snap made a scratch all the way down the table, Mom was not pleased. Took that table to college. Lol

Joyfulguy,,,you mentioned cutting grain with a binder and taking it to the threshing machine, but you left out shocking the grain. I remember many times when we were worried about rain they would cut the whole field with the binder during the day, then at 5pm we had to go in to milk the cows till 9pm..only instead of heading to bed we went back to the field and shocked grain by moonlight to be sure it was up before the rain started.

We had a very large yard, nearly 3 acress, but I didn't mind cutting the grass because I had a simple system....I would open the gate to the pasture and run our flock of sheep onto the lawn,,They would eat all the grass in about 6 hours and I never broke a sweat, and on top of that, the sheep fertilize as they go.

No one picked up potatoes??

We had an acre of ground total, but it seemed the potato patch was 10 acres. To top that off the neighbors had a patch adjoining ours and we helped pick theirs too.

The tractor and plow would come and make one pass. We would pick up a lot of potatoes in the heat and the dirt. Sweaty dirty and buggy. What fun.

The tractor would keep making passes as long as potatoes came up to the top.

I swore when I left the house, I would never pick up another potato as long as I lived and I didn't.

Hi lazypup,

The war started in early fall of '39 and I don't remember helping stook grain in the summer of '40, but there was a lot of rain and many of the stooks/shocks grew green on top as the grain sprouted. When the neighbours came to bring the grain to the threshing machine on their wagons, the pitchers would throw on all of the sheaves, and as the wagon driver threw them one by one into the machine, when one looked to be too green, he'd throw it off of the other side of the wagon, and a fair sized pile grew up there by the time the threshing was finished.

In the fall of '40 they had an international plowing match about 15 miles from our home and while Dad attended he bought a combine harvester, as he said that, our farm being bigger than those of most of the neighbours, that there was no way that he and his 12-year-old son (with a couple of others younger) could consider changing works with the neighbours to get the threshing done.

He bought a milking machine, that travelled along the litter carrier track at that time, as well: we usually milked about a dozen cows, taking the milk to a small cheese factory about a half a mile away.

In '45, Dad had been in bed with bronchitis some, and went west for the summer, having tried it out there for about six weeks the fall before, then selling out in the spring of '45, having decided to move out there.

I went to work for a neighbour who used to do our threshing, whose hired man also rented Dad's farm, and I helped stook the grain that year ... we had some soldiers come to help, I remember, and had a rather good time together. That was the only time that I recall having helped stook grain ... and not by moonlight.

ole joyful