As I was growing up, my grandmother was always coming out with sayings that I later learnt were considered “old wives tales” and there are some that were just plain ridiculous but then occasionally I catch myself saying them and my Mum will just look at me and smile.
Here are some of my favourites, especially in relation to babies …..
Heartburn in pregnancy means a full head of hair for baby – I did personally suffer with heartburn and my daughter was born with a full head of hair but heartburn is actually a common side effect of pregnancy, usually from changing hormone levels, so co-incidence maybe?
If you tickle babies feet, it will make them stutter – This one is definitely an old wives tale as many midwives will tickle a babies feet to slowly wake them up.
Carry at the front and you will have a boy – I carried at the front with both of my girls and really how you carry has just as much to do with your body type as anything else.
You Give Your Child a Birthmark With Your Cravings – This one is definitely superstitious, and the way that women for generations have attempted to explain why some children have birthmarks and others don’t!
New House, new baby – I have found myself being told this one, as everyone seems to think when you are selling your house that you need more space for a new baby ….. they don’t seem to appreciate I need somewhere to house all the shoes!
Giving a silver coin to a baby brings good luck – Although I suppose that really only works if everyone does it and it gives them a healthy bank account!
Don’t bring the pram / pushchair into the house until after the baby is born – I have no idea why but in all honesty, I didn’t do it until the little one arrived. So maybe I am a little superstitious after all!
Have you heard any others?
I hadn’t heard some of those ones. I do think a lot have other reasons as you say. We had our buggy in the house from about 24 weeks when I bought it – we had no problems at all.
ooh look at those baby feet! This reminds me of the newborn moments with my child!
I enjoyed your post. Some of these old wives tales cracked me up!
Angela x
I have head of most of these. I don’t necessarily believe them but found myself saying things or going along with them at the same time. Haha the house one makes me laugh, everyone automatically thinks its because your growing your family when in actual fact a lot of women just have a shoe addiction
I haven’t heard of any of them. I was v grouchy pregnant though so maybe no one dared utter them!
I’ve heard that if you have lots of morning sickness that it is a girl. This was true for me, but who knows?!!
I love old wives tales and like you I often find myself using them and my children look at me as though I am mad. I hadn’t heard of many of these though.
The heartburn one is fact I tell you fact! I had very long haired babies and had heartburn constantly! Also the new house thing – yeh I moved each time I was pregnant too!
I love reading about old wives tales, I’ve been reading up about all the ones in pregnancy and there are some strange ones out there
It always made me laugh when someone said any of these to me when I was pregnant although I’d never heard of the tickling feet leading to a stutter one x x
I’ve not heard the one about tickling feet before. It’s crazy what people used to believe. Mich x
I suffered from awful heartburn with all my 3 and they were all born bald.I was told not to tickle baby’s feet under 3 months old as they could have a heart attack.Seriously, I didn’t believe of course.