From my Downeast Maine mom. Never swore. Did notice that when folks had lots to do in a short time they’d be ‘Flying around like a faht in a skillet’.

Thanks for everyone’s posts. Be fun to see Don’s illustrated interpretations.

In answer to Mo. LAYROLLS (LAYOVER) TO CATCH MEDDLERS –"A layover is a trap for bears or other unwary animals, made of a pit covered with boughs. And a meddler, of course, is a person who interferes in other people’s business. The phrase was recorded in Eastern and Southern states as long ago as 1890. It also appears as larovers for meddlers, layos to catch meddlers and even as a single word, larofamedlers." From the “Morris Dictionary of Word and Phrase Origins” by William and Mary Morris.

My father-in-law used to shrug and say “six of one, half dozen of another” to express apathy when faced with two unappealing choices.

He also used to say “God never gave anyone a nose they couldn’t fit their pinky into”, which meant we shouldn’t worry about whether or not we could do something because God had it all taken care of already. : )

My dad would always say, “A fox smells his own hole first”, which meant that whatever you were accusing someone else of doing was already in your head first. I don’t know how to explain it any better but it was never a kind statement about someone.

When my mom would, say, draw a lucky card in a game, she’d exclaim, “Hot Dog!” (grew up in rural Maryland in 1930s)

My mom was born in 1921, in NYC, as a child of Greek immigrants. She died in 1985, just as I finished nursing school. She didn’t curse often but I remember the phrase “You don’t shit where you eat”. This was her way of saying that you shouldn’t mix business with pleasure, know when you have a good thing & don’t mess it up. I also remember “it’s like digging holes in water”, which meant you worked hard but didn’t see fruits of your labor. I miss her terribly. Thanks for sharing this great mom-wisdom!

My husband’s grandmother, Mabel, b. 1891, on a farm in Ontario, Canada used to say:
“He’s tighter than a bull’s a$$ at fly time” [someone cheap]
“A blind man on a fast horse wouldn’t notice” [don’t worry about how you look]
“Let’s go out for a clean bite” [going to a restaurant]
His other grandmother, Katherine, b. 1882, in India during the British Raj, would call rancid oil or butter “reesty”. This was apparently a corruption of a Hindi word that she learned as a young girl and used even after she moved to Canada.

Mom was born in 1921, and would sometimes tell me, “If you can’t be good, be careful”. I think this was an excellent piece of New York style advice!

My mom had SO many sayings which I totally enjoy telling . . . well . . . anyone who will listen (but mostly my family). “We’re off like a herd of turtles,” was a favorite in our family with 5 kids. She was from Worcester, MA, but I’ve learned that lots of her sayings are ones my Southern friends grew up with. No clue how that happened!

My northeastern Pennsylvania grandmother gifted our family with “redd” for tidying things up when I grew up in Pittsburgh. I don’t think I’ve met any non-native PA folk in Tucson who have a clue what it means. BTW, I was taught the origin was PA Dutch/German—Middle English sounds logical, too! From Mom— “Oh, pull in your (bottom) lip, or you’re gonna step on it” for a pouting child.

My mom always used the phrase “oh, for cryin’ in the beer” instead of swearing. She was from Minnesota – always makes me smile remembering this.

My mother-in-law is well into her nineties and still fiercely independent and sharp as a tack. When seeing a new fashion or the latest colors or something new and creative she famously pauses and says “I suppose some people might like that” which means she clearly doesn’t but also does not want to be completely dismissive or judging something to be ridiculous or worse yet, a total fashion faux pas. Even in her nineties, she’s still a very sharp dresser and is always very well put together. Since my own mom has now been gone for several years, she’s the one that gets all the attention and affection even though memories of my own mom are always present.

Forgot one in the list I submitted,;Mom used to say, “Go play outside, blow the stink off!” Pretty sure she meant our stinky attitudes would be improved by burning off some energy outside.

My Auntie would tell people to mind their business by saying, “Go sweep your own front porch.” Also; who hasn’t heard, “How do you like them apples?” There was a slightly more pithy way of saying that too, “Tough titty said the kitty, but the milks still good.,” meaning “Too bad, stop whining, you’re fine,” usually shortened to just “tough titty.” My best friend says, “You’ll get glad in the same pants you’re mad in.” That cracked me up completely the first time I heard it and still does. Good times, even if we didn’t always appreciate it back then.

My mom would say, “we’re gonna do it up brown”, meaning going all out for something. And she was known for, “I’m all stove up” when her body was aching.
The funniest one is “stone gullion” describing a gentleman having sexual frustration or unfulfillment. My sweet mom was a funny lady! Miss her so

“Do you feel it coming?” “He’d starve to death with a ham on his back.” “Fall in!” “Keep your eyes peeled for deer” “Tap ‘er light”. “Don’t take any wooden nickels”.

My grandmother used the expression “and that will run like tickety-boo”, meaning the plan would go off like clockwork. When my college roommate heard the phrase from one of her Canadian professors she couldn’t stop saying it, and remarking on how hilarious us Canadians are.

My mother grew up in Louisiana, to Texan parents. She would exclaim, after not finding a sought object, that she had looked “all over hell and creation”. If one of us kids said or did something mildly unacceptable, she would exclaim, “I don’t THINK so!” Like others on this marvelous thread, she would sometimes remark about someone who appeared to be living an unhealthy lifestyle, that s/he “looks like s/he’s been rode hard and put up wet.” Great fun reading everyone’s responses.

My grandmother used to say “it’ll all come out in the warsh (Pittsburghese for wash)” which meant no matter what happened, it’ll all work itself out. I used to think she was nuts saying that all the time and now I find myself saying it more and more… ❤️

When I was little, and wanted to know what something my mom or grandma were hiding or talking about, and it was a secret (at least from me) they would say

Lay overs to catch meddlers, and you’re the first one caught!

A few years ago I asked my mom where that expression came from…or even means, and she had no idea.

My gram and dad had these: epizoodic meant a sickness, tighter than a well diggers butt was stingy, cackle berries were eggs and moo juice milk, a phizzic would help a sore tummy, and a bread and milk poultice fixed everything else:)

from my mom born in indiana in 1908.
she doesn’t know her head from a hole in the ground.
might as well talk to a fence post.
goodness gracious mercy agnes
he’s got his balls twisted
she’s nervous as a long tail cat in a room full of rocking chairs
he’s sitting in the cat bird seat

My mother was a professional dressmaker, born in 1896, so these days, she has set up shop elsewhere. The family sat together for dinner each night & the meals were substantial & nutritious if not always to my particular childish liking. When I did not want to finish my meal, my mother would say to me “Clean up your plate. There are children starving in China!” This always confused me. If I did as she instructed & finished my meal, wouldn’t the children in China still be starving? Or, if I didn’t clean up my plate, would my mother package up my remaining food & send it to China for the starving children? It seemed to me it would be better NOT to clean up my plate! Daddy had a different approach & it had absolutely nothing to do w/ other children in other parts of the world.

My mother used to say, “I’ll get this done if it hairlips Margaret Truman!” No idea where that came from! She also used the word “traipse” a lot. Love that word. “Just drink out of the hose! I don’t want you kids traipsing around on my clean floors!”

My mom is 96 and she has always used the phrase “Well I’ll be a blue nosed gopher!” to express her astonishment at whatever the circumstance is that seems baffling. Lol
Another old phrase of hers is: “That’s enough food to feed Coxey’s army!”
Wanna know more about Coxey’s army? Look here:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coxey’s_Army

When my mom was in need of a restroom for #1 she would say “My back teeth are floating.” Yuck!

When my stepmother got a new outfit or handbag, to show it off, she would walk into the room we were in, pose with a hand in the air and say “anyone seen pa’s cow?”

My grandmother, a Norwegian immigrant, would respond to any complaint, “The Lord suffered more upon the cross.”

My mother, having learned English as a second language, was a grammar freak. If you asked for a hot cup of coffee, she would run hot water into the cup to heat it up, and then put cold coffee into it. In her house, you had better ask for a cup of hot coffee.

My mother would also tell me to “skedaddle” if she wanted me to get out from underfoot.

My dad was a very patient man and would encourage us to be the same by saying something solemn like “this too shall pass.” But I liked his less formal and more often heard “don’t fuss it!“

I was blessed to have my mom around until last year. Born in 1917, the closest she would get to cursing was using the expression “hell’s bells.” I’m attempting to revive it .

My dad carried an eighty pound radio for the 181 Artillary in WWll and also learned to survey since they would set the Howitzers precisely. If one of us was standing between him and the TV he would say " line of sight!" because that’s what they’d say if someone was standing between the surveying instrument and the elevation marker stick.

Early in the morning he would wake me up with “can you roll out?” if he needed help on the ranch. I think it was a bunk house or cow puncher term from sleeping on the ground in a bedroll.

He was a “hell of a hand.” Miss him.

“If it was a snake, it woulda bit ya,” (when you are searching for something that is right in front of you) and “You’d forget your head if it wasn’t screwed on” (for whatever crime of omission had just occurred).

My grandma used to say, “I feel like the last rose of summer hit by a brick” when she was tired. And “September morn” when one of the great grand babies was running around naked after a bath. My husband discovered that it was the name of a scandalous painting of a nude woman shown in NYC in 1911.

My dad had so many . . . “Pain in the grommet “ for pain in the $&@. When things were easy he’d say, “chicken pie!”. And when he wanted a favor he’d say, “get me a cup of coffee – since I’ve given you the gift of life”.

“They don’t call this cold in Quebec” (Quit complaining)
“Chop Chop!” (Hurry up)
“And then his hat blew off” It seems that in some ancient conversations amongst the adults, someone (my Grandpa?) would realize there were children present, and the story was getting inappropriate, so they would end the story prematurely with this statement.
My hubby’s family had one similar to one above, but: “Busier than a one-armed paper-hanger with an itch!” The itch makes it a little better :D

I used to work in Wyoming and one of my (native) co-workers was always using expressions he learned from his mom, a pioneer.

- “I’m so hungry I could eat the north end of a skunk walking south.”
- “I’m as nervous as a sinner in church.” (Depending on the audience, there was also an alternative version.)
- “You look like you was rode hard and put away wet.”

My own mother was a big Laurel and Hardy fan, so of course:
“Here’s another fine mess…”

My grandmother arrived in the US in 1913, at age 13. She travelled in steerage from the Ukraine, left in charge of her younger sisters, ages 10 and 5. She became a Union organizer and a shop owner. She read voraciously. But despite learning to master the English language she still had some “Greenhorn Speak” as I loved to call it. My favorite was when she would ask us to “make the light” which meant to turn on the lamp. She also pronounced many things as she read them When pointing to her cousin in the photograph she described her as “deef” rather than “deaf”.

My grandmother’s expression of surprise was “Goodness gracious godness Agnes!” or “Heavens to Murgatroyd!” To my mom we were all “You wretched children” which we understood as a term of endearment. We could “spit in one hand and wish in the other and see which filled up first” when we were longing for something.

Oh my, these are hilarious! My favorite retort was from my Grandmother from Olympia, Washington. If you admired something such as a car, she would say, " Too bad it’s tainted. Taint yours, taint mine." Still cracks me up!

My mom (also born 1918) never said anything straight or simply. It was “dark as a stack of black cats” outside, or a high quality thing was “all wool and a yard wide”. If you had to get up early, you were “getting up before breakfast”. No one was merely stingy, they were " so tight they squeaked", or held onto a nickle “so hard you could hear it squeal”. If someone got into a bad situation but things ended up OK, they “came out smelling like a rose”. She’d exclaim “My cow!”, and also, in case of something gone seriously wrong, “Balls on a goose!”. And so many more—she was a character! Wonder what my kids will remember about my little oddities, which are, of course, perfectly normal and sensible.

I’m really enjoying these expressions, particularly seeing which ones folks in different parts of the US have in common with us in the Canadian Maritimes. My mom was borne in 1918 and had a variety of good ones, but my favourite was an original which my cousin first uttered when he was a boy. He and his little brother were out and about one day and the younger chap peed his pants. He was so embarrassed he began to cry, and that was when his older brother told him to “Never mind. It will all dry up when the sun comes out.” Mom used it as an expression until she passed in her mid-90s.

My favorite saying of all time was one used by my Grandmother from Alabama. When she was feeling lazy (not often), she would say, “I haven’t done a bus-eyed thing all day.” What the heck is a “bus-eye”? Or is it Buseye? I dunno, but I always laughed when she said it.

Similar to the one legged man, my mother (at 96) says “busier than a one armed wallpaper hanger”.
Another one when we were getting unruly would be, “don’t get rumpacasideous” (rump-a-ca-sid-e-us) which I think was a made up a word but it sounded like how we were acting at the moment.

My favorite one my grandmother used to say “It’ll all come out in the wash” meaning, don’t worry about it…it’ll work itself out. I didn’t understand it much when I was little, but use it ALL the time now!

My mom would always say “be home before the street lights come on”…another one that kids today wouldn’t understand.

Thanks for sharing your mom with us, she sounds like she was a wonderful woman. I can see that your wit and demeanor comes from her.

In response to whatever any child was ever whinging about:
“Worse things happen at sea.”

Mom expressions in our house….
Good Grief Charlie Brown

Oh For Pete’s sake

The Cartwright’s mount up! This was when we were about to go somewhere…with 5 kids spread over 13 years it was always a feat…it came from the fact that on the first day of filming Bonanza the first line in the script was ‘the Cartwright’s mount up’ turns out none of them knew how to ride….

Ginger Peachy Keen….something particularly good and nifty. Sometimes shortened to GPK

I miss my mom.

I grew up in the suburbs near Philly. Dad would compliment a job well done with, “My man, pots and pans!”

If we kids wouldn’t stop going on about some imagined slight, Mom would tell us, “Oh, dry up!”

Any word uttered by a child that was deemed to be a fancy, learned, adult word was “a fifty cent word.”

And if the adult word was unfit for company, we would be reprimanded, “Watch your mouth!” At this, being a smartass, I would cross my eyes and look down.

“What are you doing?” my mother asked.

“Watching my mouth!” I would reply.

We had to redd up the table for supper.

And no one knew what that was outside or our house in Ohio.

Are you familiar with the saying, “6 of one, half a dozen of the other?”
A friend’s mother-in-law says, “Six and a half dozen of one or the other.”
No amount of patient explanation can convince her that these two phrases do not mean the same thing.

My mom had SO many marvelous sayings it’s hard to choose just a few. One of my favorites has always been, “All her taste is in her mouth,” used to describe someone who has no taste in any other area.
“Aging is not for the faint of heart,” is another favorite. Predictably, I appreciate this one more and more as time goes by.

You gave me a blast from the past. I grew up being sent to redd up my room. It was well after college that I figured out no one knew what the heck I was doing to redd up my room.

You gave me a blast from the past. I grew up being sent to redd up my room. It was well after college that I figured out no one knew what the heck I was doing to redd up my room.

My Momo (grandma) of TX-Czech descent called a suspicious looking character a “Judas” … irksome people were “chicken-shit SOB’s.” Makes me smile!

I was always being threatened with “I’m going to jerk a knot in your tail” or she was going to “tan my hide” when I was “on her last nerve”. If someone was drunk they were “three sheets to the wind”. This would be North Carolina, by the by.

I was always being threatened with “I’m going to jerk a knot in your tail” or she was going to “tan my hide” when I was “on her last nerve”. If someone was drunk they were “three sheets to the wind”. This would be North Carolina, by the by.

My Dad was a pilot in WW2 and would often tell me to “straighten up and fly right!”
He was also a sailor and when my room needed cleaning I was told to “Stow your gear” And to get my room “ship shape”
When he was startled by a loud noise he liked to shout "Shoot him in the pants! The vest and coat are mine!

When my brother and I set the haystack on fire Christmas Eve day, my mom said “you cooked your goose” and “you made your bed, now you have to lay in it”.
I was worried that I wouldn’t get anything from Santa that night. Santa stopped.

My mom used to say, “Cheese my beads!!!”, I assume to avoid swearing in front of the kids. One I find useful to this day is, “This too shall pass,” along with its equivalent, “In 100 years, no one will remember.” (Very like Julie’s “You’ll never see them again.”)

Another of my favorites is, when she couldn’t find something, “Wo ist mine unterhosen?” (She studied a little German in college.) She would continue, “In der washer.” Still makes me smile.

Thanks for starting this conversation! Your illustrations of your mom’s bon mots are wonderful, if a bit disturbing.

“Busy as a one legged man at a butt kicking contest” has always been one of my personal faves from my childhood.

“I’m serious as a heart attack!”
“A stranger should be a little strange.”
“It doesn’t amount to a bucket of warm spit.”
“You kiss your mother with that mouth?”
“With that and 50 cents I could take the subway!”
"I wouldn’t trust_________(name of your friend) as far as I could
throw_______(name of your other friend)!

When it was raining: “you’re not sugar; you won’t melt!” The word in Yiddish for someone whose head is in the clouds is Luftmensch, literally Air-man, and the standard definition is, “someone whose name, if half the things he says about himself were true, would be a household word, and it isn’t.”

Great drawings and an opportunity to remember our loved ones. We shared the “don’t be a pill” saying. Here are some from my childhood in New England: “Now we’re cooking with gas!” – for something exciting and new. “Winner winner chicken dinner!” – for any little victory. “The pickle in the middle and the mustard on top” (from the Jack Benny show) for getting something just the way you want it.

From my Kentucky raised mom the one I remember best is “She looks like she was rode hard and put away wet.”

Hi Don, what expression did your mom use when referring to you in particular? Based on your drawings I am thinking you couldn’t have been the most normal kid on the block.

Anyway, my favorite mom expression is “if you break your leg, don’t come running to me”. In other words: “I told you not to do that, and you keep doing it you are on your own.” But that’s not as funny.

My dad who was a very California kind of guy would say stuff like “don’t forget to count your chews” when we sat down to eat. This being a questionable intervention to help one not bolt one’s food, and even meditate on the goodness of it. A few minutes later my brother would look at me with a straight face and say “don’t forget to count your shoes”.

Thanks for sharing your Mom and your drawings!
My Dad’s guidance for accomplishing anything was “NO excuses”.
I was grown up before I realized I could use that for enjoyable things, too!

“So, I just added a quart of water and percolated right on down the road.” My Mom used this saying she received from her Mom concerning an action to be taken after a set back of some sort. I’m assuming this came from the early teens or twenties in the days of Model “T” or Model “A” Ford cars and trucks.

“This family doesn’t make ugly nor stupid, so you’d knock it off and ask your sibling’s forgiveness”.
“If you were sorry you’d quit it”
“I’ll be dipped” I honestly suspect the part she kept to herself was “in sh!t”.

I’ll use “Jesus, God, and all the little fishes” and when mine get mouthy, I’ll ask “do you want to try saying that again?”

“Some people would complain if you hung ’em with a new rope!”
Mother was from SE Ohio.

Tough German mother: “where there’s a will, there’s a way!” And, “whatever doesn’t kill you will make you stronger.” And one that I think she got from Ben Franklin: “a job worth doing is worth doing well,” which was usually introduced to let us know we were screening up. And finally, “give ‘em a finger and they’ll take the whole hand.”

Great story!

My mom had a few unique sayings that I miss these days:
Auch du Lieben Gut! [German: Oh for the love of God!] – for when we were being especially trying.

Fix your face – for when we were making faces, rolling our eyes or giving very inappropriate looks toward others.

I’m gonna snatch you baldheaded – for when we were being very bad and needed to be brought in line.

Sometimes these were combined into:
Auch du Lieben Gut! You better fix your face or I’m gonna snatch you baldheaded!!!

We had 5 very rambunctious kids in my family, so my mom was on top of our behavior quickly if we started to get out of hand.

Not my mom’s sayings, but awesome indeed: “Throw your mother down the stairs her purse.” A family friend yelled this up the stairs to his kids when he wanted them to find their mom’s purse (that was somewhere upstairs) and throw it down to her.

Love your story – your mom sounds amazing!

I Live by the rule “There’s more than one way to skin a cat”. Called thinking outside the box nowadays.

“Don’t worry, you’ll never see these people again.”

For use in any public circumstance that is mortally embarrassing. And it is true. Most stupid stuff I do, like falling down, spilling, etc. is witnessed by people I never see again. And if you do see them again, you’ll have something to talk about. lol.

My mom says, “she’s a corker!” (Or “he’s a corker) about someone who gets into trouble or causes undue mischief.

She also called someone who is constantly taking a contrary view a “contrary Woodrow,” based on an old book she used to read us as kids.

“It takes two to tango.”

My mother was full of weird expressions. My favorite is “It’s a criminal crime” which we could say a lot nowadays. Also, “crimanetics” (for whatever reason she liked the word crime, I guess). Hell’s Bells when I was younger. When she became elderly she had a bunch of them—“Ach du lieber!” (although she was not German, but lived in a PA Dutch area) “Heavens!” and frequently wrote on gift tags “merry merry” or “happy happy.”
My favorite of my dad’s, also applicable often today was “You’re right, the rest of the world’s wrong.”

My mom was big on people being pills. But classic mom would be “if everybody else jumps off the Brooklyn Bridge are you going to jump off too?” In response to “but everybody else is __-“

To my Pittsburgh grandma, a nosy person was a nebby nose or a neb-sh*t.

If asked to do one more thing, my mom might also ask if I had a soft-handled broom.

My mom used to say some of these too. But also: I was “the cow’s tail” if I was the last one to get up in the morning. To shut me down if I was pestering her with questions about things that might happen, she would respond with “Well, that’d just be what if.” When I lost interest in something after awhile, she would say that “the new must have worn off”. And if I got up in the morning looking disheveled, she would say: “You look like you slept HARD!” I miss her everyday.

My Dad used to say “Dumber than a box of rocks”.

My mom would use expressions that my grandmother had used. So if someone commented on an odd coupling (people who didn’t seem to match up) they would say “every pot has its lid”. If we wanted something but were being ornery they would say “mean never got you anything”.
And when mom taught home ec. she would tell her students “eat your greens, they’ll keep you regular.”

“Don’t believe anything you read, and only half of what you see.” Thanks Dad, prepared me for a life in show business.

Your Mom sounds wonderful, Don. Mine was, too. An expression that my wife’s Mom used is: “Poor children must learn to suffer.” Not a sympathetic bone in her body.

My Mom was raised in nearby Youngstown so I wonder if any of these ring a bell.
“Now you’re cookin’ with gas”…as if this wonder of modernization circa mid 1800’s had just made its way to the banks of the Mahoning .
“What do want? Egg in your beer?” This was often said to me when I asked for the purchase of some sugary cereal at the A&P. Very strange thing to say to a 10 year old. It’s like the most disgusting thing I could have imagined. Imagine my shock when, later in life, I would see cartons of eggs on the counter in bars near the auto plants in Hamtramck.

Don’t fall down till you’re shot!

“What in the H-E-Double Hockey sticks was that?”; “Mrs. Got Rocks” to refer to a rich woman; and of course, the classic, “Don’t get too big for your britches” when I thought I knew better.

If you couldn’t find something, her response was “is it hanging off my arse”? Which meant go look for it yourself and stop following me around because she wasn’t going to look for it. And popular in the catholic neighborhood I grew up in – “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph…..”
Cheers

My mom said: “LIFE…is NOT a BOWL OF ROSES.” :-)

Mom used to say “my stars!” when something caught her by surprise. “Irregardless,” with elongated emphasis and a high-pitched voice on the first syllable, was Mom’s answer to other people’s logic. And there was always “cripes,” which still cracks me up, although Dad’s “criminetly” was more ominous. Thanks for your story; your mom sounds like a gem.

My birthday is November 20th, too! I loved reading about your mom and here is something mine would say up here in northern Minnesota; she was born in Illinois and I’ve never heard anyone else say it up here.

“It’s colder than Ol’ Billy Hell outside!”

From Mom (who was a big believer in physical punishment):
“I’ll smack some sense into you.”
“I’ll knock you into next week if you don’t behave.”
and
“You two are making enough noise to wake the dead.”

From Grandma:
“You can catch more flies with honey than vinegar.”
“You’ll put up with it until you don’t.” (As a lesson in why people put up with silly or abusive behavior from others. No deep conversation about the whys; she saw things as a “you do A or you do B” situation.)

“Are you being BOLD?” As a good Anglican Wasp, my mother regarded contrary children as a social sin.

“Don’t you get fresh with me!”

Don these are so great! Coming as prints? I love these Pretty Little Monsters. Love your stuff….keep going :)