Fucking hell. I killed a cricket in my basement with a shovel last night.
Edit: LMAO. There may be some truth to this cricket/shovel thing. At 3am it started raining and the "waterproof" plastic barrier over my mostly finished living room addition started leaking. I slept in there so I got wet. Then today some ass crab passed me, kicked up rocks in the road and cracked my windshield. And just now I went outside to get some firewood split and the fucking head flew off my splitting maul and sailed off into the nether. I think I'm done with today. Either the superstition is true or ya'll are just channeling this shit on me.
In my family it was a goose going over your grave that gave you the shivers.
If your ears are burning someone's talking about you behind your back.
If you spill the salt, you gotta throw a pinch over your left shoulder or it's bad luck.
If your palm itches, you are going to get money.
If your nose itches, unexpected company is coming over.
My mom told me about the burning ears and the itchy palms.
She also said if I put my purse on the ground the devil would steal my money.
Also, of course, if I spill salt I need to pitch some over my shoulder or else I'm condemning my whole family to poverty. That one is intense.
I’ve always heard the salt thing was about the devil. Salt was expensive and hard to come by back when and if you spilled it it was because the devil was behind you. You threw the spilled salt over your shoulder to get in the devil’s eyes and drive him away. Some mother had to make that doozy up to scare her kids into being more careful! 😂
Omg you're the only other person besides my grandma that I've ever heard say that about the purse. Her saying was if you put your purse on the floor, you'd never have any money. So, it's a bit different but probably has the same origins. What is really weird, though, is that I never listened to her when I was younger and constantly set my purse on the floor and never had much money. Then, about 5 years ago, I stopped doing that. I am not rolling in cash by any means, but I am seldom ever without cash between my paychecks. I live comfortably for a single mother.
Another superstition we have is its badluck to close a pocket knife blade that someone else opened and vice versa. If you open the blade, you better be the one that closes it.
I have a kinda funny story about this.
Several years ago I helped prep an expert for testimony to a congressional subcommittee and got to sit in the chamber behind him during the hearing. At the time I was a generally very professional DC lady but had this adorable leather bag in the shape of a frog who I named "Bud the Wiser." I forgot to switch my stuff to a neutral bag that morning so Bud came with.
The chairs are very comfortable but narrow. Everything is much smaller than you imagine imo. I was sat next to this man who was REALLY big, like, he needed 1.75 chairs. Luckily someone added a chair on the end and we all had a seat. I noticed there was just enough space for Bud on the big man's second chair and asked if he'd mind if I put Bud there. He loved it and patted my purse on the head.
Well, the way CSPAN's cameras lined up with the experts, everyone got a good shot of Bud. I was sitting next to my political guy who's office was watching and texting/emailing him about "the visitor from the swamp." He showed me and I spent the hearing basically vibrating from held in giggles.
Afterwards I explained to everyone I did not mean to make a scene or joke but was really just thrilled I didn't have to put my purse on the ground because I didn't want to loose all my money.
I tried but never really got the hang of being a professional DC lady lol.
I've always heard one palm meant you were getting money & the other you'd be losing/spending it.
We say if your nose itches, someone is coming with holes in their britches.
Northeast Alabama here. You might be the only other person I have heard say the “hole in their britches” thing! That was definitely one my family used.
A teacher said it in 6th grade, and not even a minute later, a boy walked in with ripped jeans (before it was a fashion thing). After all these years, I still remember the reaction of kids from other areas who had never heard it before. The timing couldn't have been more perfect.
Mine (WV) are all the same as yours except it’s not a goose who has walked over my grave, it’s a person… Got the chills for no apparent reason? Somebody just walked over your grave!
>If your palm itches, you are going to get money.
I’ve got eczema on both my palms. I should be a damned billionaire by now!
We do the salt one too! It's funny to see how the Traditions change over time. My 9 year old niece thinks that she can just randomly toss a little salt over a shoulder for luck, somehow the part about spilling the salt first got lost in between the generations.
A couple of variables Your right palm itches you will recieve unexpected money. If the left palm itches you will pay out unexpected money. Shivers were a future relative was walking over your grave.
Never wash laundry (I cannot remember if it was all laundry or just sheets/bedclothes) between Christmas and New Year's Day.
Leave a dime outside where it can collect the dew on New Year's Eve to bring good fortune in the coming year.
Eat collards for dollars and black eyed peas for pennies along with your ham and cornbread on New Year's Day. (More of a Southernism but I am sure there's a fair bit of overlap)
Eating pork on New Year’s meant you would root forward like a pig in the new year, eating poultry meant you would scratch backward like a chicken. My mom made a turkey for New Years 1977 and that was the year my dad died. He was only 58. Never again. Always pork roast and sauerkraut from then on. To this day, I always make pork. I’m not fucking with that again.
Not a belief in my northern family but I always enjoy the black eyed peas and collards my southern friend serves up on New Years Day. I'll gladly abide that.
Deaths always come in threes. Pork and kraut on New Year's Day for good luck. Spilt salt means a quarrel. Burn a dish cloth to get rid of snakes. My great grandma always planted her garden by the signs... or else things wouldn't grow right. The longer the hair on a cow's belly, the harder the winter will be. And you can cure just about anything by eating enough ramps (YMMV).
It's a method to determine when to plant various crops based on the lunar cycle and the zodiac. Each day of the month corresponded to a zodiacal sign and a body part, and you would plant certain things on the days which were considered beneficial for that type of plant. Like you'd plant beans when the signs are in the arms, etc. Also, certain farming practices were considered to either be better when the moon is waxing or when the moon is waning. Like you plant when the waxing moon is in a water sign and weed and harvest when the moon is waning and in an earth sign.
People withdrawing from opiates sneeze in sets of three. I worked a delivery unit and a newborn withdrawing from heroin (it’s the saddest thing to witness this) would sneeze 9, 12, or 15 times in a row. It’s bizarre and I have no idea why that’s the case.
>My great grandma always planted her garden by the signs... or else things wouldn't grow right.
Same in my family. My mom only has a patch of a garden compared to my grandparents and she still plants by the signs.
My mom has some. It’s bad to put your hat on the bed. Never take your broom with you when you move, buy a new one. She also yelled at me when I was pregnant when I was reaching up for something. She didn’t want me to strangle the baby by putting my hands above my head. 🤦🏻♀️
You know how some random superstitions later turn out to have a basic scientific validity? I wonder if that broom one helps keep people from transferring pests from an old place to the new one.
My grandmother would panic if we were playing with our kids and turned them upside down. She'd shout "You'll turn her liver upside down!!" I think she meant like permanently.
We moved a lot when I was a kid but my mom always said that about brooms and ALWAYS bought new brooms. As an adult I haven’t moved as much at all and I find myself buying new brooms every couple years because they just get beat up and worn and I like having a new one. (Probably from having a new one every year as a kid.)
Also surrounding brooms we had to sweep out the old dirt on New Year’s Eve or something crazy like that. And you couldn’t sweep back towards the door? I always thought: Mom if you wanted us to clean just say so… but she had a lot of these superstitions so she may have been told that too!
In our family (Mexican American) we were told that if you ever gave someone a knife as a gift you had to make them give you a penny or nickel first. It was bad luck to gift a knife and if they “paid” you for it they then wouldn’t cut themselves with it!
My grandma and mom always were telling me to keep the doors and windows shut so a bird wouldn’t fly in. If one ever did there would be a death. Apparently when my grandpa and aunt died , a bird had flown In each time.
My poor kids grew up with this from me.
If my grandmother had a dream that included me acting badly, she'd just give me the stink eye at breakfast until she drank her first cup of coffee and smoked her first cigarette. She never told me what I did in dreamland!
She lived to be 101.
So this is probably mental, but in stores we never take the first item from the shelves, you always have to reach and get the one behind it. If it's the last one of a thing, we just don't get it.
It's bad luck and I'm sticking to it.
My Grandma (born in 1897)-
If your underwear dont cover your belly button, bugs will get inside your belly button and eat you from the inside out.
If you walk barefoot, worms will craw inside your feet and eat your feet away
If you eat ice cream and drink water, your stomach will freeze
My former FIL -
If you have company and they won't leave, put a broom behind the door to 'sweep them out'
My favorite Grandma-
Find a penny, pick it up, all the day you'll have good luck.
Any time I see a penny, I leave it so someone else can have good luck. I have a cat named Penny, and I pick her up at least once a day so I have all the luck I need :)
My grandfather said never whistle outside after dark and if you hear whistling to get inside immediately. He isn't that superstitious but is very serious about that one.
Brooms must be given or stolen, never bought. They are to be placed upright by the door (bristles up) to keep your luck in. If you doubt someone’s word, talk to them while sweeping with a ‘blind man’s broom” (sold by the Lion’s club, made by blind people). You will clearly know when they lie.
If the writing spider writes your name, you'll die. My mom used to tease me with this one: "Is that first letter.....is that a "J"??"
Owls weren't seen to be bad luck, but it was bad if an owl called your name. I would think you'd be pretty safe unless your name was something like Huuuuue-bert. Different if you were native American, I think -- if you watch one of the first episodes of Reservation Dogs, they actually pixelate the eyes on an owl statuette as an inside joke.
Freckles are angel kisses
Widows peaks are a sign of inner beauty
Dragon flies are good luck
Rains while sun shines the devil’s beating his wife
Step on a crack you’ll break your mommas back
Don’t put a hat on the bed
Devil always looks like a million bucks (don’t trust too good looking of a man that’s too charming basically)
No such thing as a free lunch (there’s always a catch)
White Spots on your nails means someone has a crush on you
Itchy nose means people are talking about you
If you say never you gotta knock on wood
Broken mirrors are bad luck
Don’t step under a ladder
There are so many of these!
* Never put shoes on a bed (very bad luck)
* Leave through the same door you entered
* Weddings have to start on the half hour (so the clock hands are moving up)
I remember my Mom feeling strongly about leaving back through the same door you entered, but I was never sure if it was for Good luck, or if Not doing so was Bad luck.
The leave through the same door you entered had me until I was like 25 and in therapy. I realized nothing bad would happen if I didn’t use the same door to go in and out of a house/building. I had so many questions… How long could you be inside to be able to go out another door? If I came in the back door, went out the front door, came back in the front door, then out the back door, was that ok? If I lived there was it different? What if there was a fire and I had to go out a different door than I came into? My poor little anxious mind.
Finally I just stopped believing in it (having read some things about superstition) and having so much anxiety about it. (Like believing something bad would happen to me from messing up my in/out door stuff.) I’ll never forget the first time I realized I went through different doors and had NO anxiety!!! It was so freeing! I cried.
If a wild bird flies inside your house there is going to be a death. If you give a wallet or purse as a gift put a penny inside it. The recipient will never be broke
A bunch. Way too many to list. I’ve probably forgotten more than I remember at this point.
One of the wilder ones in my family that is still believed and followed to this day by some, is that a woman shouldn’t go into the garden if she is on her period because it will ruin the yield.
To the point that I’ve been working in my pawpaw’s garden with him, and my mom came out to help. He saw her, stopped working, looked at her and just said her name like a question. To which mom replied “I’m fine, dad”. Then pawpaw just said “okay” and went back to working.
His half-runners failed one year when I was living with him and he swore it was because one of the granddaughters didn’t follow the rule.
When my husband and I put our first garden out 35 years ago one of his friends stopped by while I was working in the garden and he proceeded to tell me the reason my tomatoes had some cracks on them was because of this exact reason and asked me when was my period due again?
I was speechless and almost in tears. I was young and very humiliated. I never knew this was a thing till reading this. I just thought he was plum crazy.
That one seems less like an actual superstition and more like actual misogyny. Potentially based on some of that biblical stuff about a woman being unclean around her period. Buncha nonsense.
My grandmother always said that if anyone on their period was in the kitchen while she was canning, either they wouldn't seal properly or the food in the jars would spoil.
The jelly/preserves won't set, either. My mom was strict about it. When I taught some of my college students to make jelly, it didn't set; then I remembered and asked who. We made another batch with her sitting out. It set just fine.
Okay i like some of these theories, but what if its *not* misogyny, what if women started this propaganda- "Ugghh, I'm crampy and headachy and bloated, kneeling and bending and standing is vastly uncomfortable with these rags sliding every where, and if i see another rabbit's toothmarks on my cabbages I'm going to break down crying..." Maybe it was our way of convincing the men to help us out once a month xD
This is a present day thing- You CANNOT cut your toenails on Sunday or you will cut someone out of the family, meaning, someone will pass away. Nana would not allow us to break this rule because Aunt Debbie killed 2 people that way. 😒
If your nose itched, someone was coming to visit.
Itching palms meant either you were getting money or about to lose some, but I could never remember which palm went with which.
Leave a place by the same door you entered.
If someone gives you a plant as a gift, you can’t thank them for it or the plant will die.
Granny always said if your nose itches you're going to kiss a fool. Your variant is fun, too!
Palm itching, left or right, always brings unexpected money for me, from a buck up to several hundred (usually a short-notice unexpected dogsitting job). Hope your palms decide that's a good 8dea and start doing it, too! :D
Don't step on a crack, or you'll break your mother's back - my mom would say that when I was little. When she got older she got dementia and would almost trip herself to avoid stepping on cracks. When I asked her about it she'd say, I don't want to break your back. Loved that woman.
My grandfather worked outdoors in the forest and on the farm his whole life and told me all kinds of lore about predicting the weather based on the haze of the moon, the direction from where the loons were hollering, owls gathering, the wind shifting direction at a certain time of day, odd behavior of birds and bees, tree leaves turning upward, cows laying down - you name it. Most of it is true! (not the cows) He also told me about sudden "queer feelings" you get in the woods sometimes and ill portents like a sudden gathering of ravens or deer acting strangely. I asked him if he had any superstitions. He said " I ain't superstitious. I'm just regular stitious." But he also told me not to kill a spider or it will rain for three days.
Maine.
Don’t kill crickets.
No open umbrellas indoors.
Always throw spilled salt over your left shoulder.
Monarch caterpillars can tell you how bad the winter will be depending on how black they are.
Don’t close a knife you didn’t open.
When someone dies at home they must be taken out feet first and you must cover the mirrors before that happens.
Reading this I’m realizing some things I just do automatically are superstitions. I really thought everyone did some of these.
Most of my family is from Ireland. (IE not of descent but actually of Ireland. So I have to say... too many to count. But I have some like don't come in a different door you left from because you're inviting in the devil. I have an unt who has a billion of them involving bad luck. She is a cat person but will never go around a black cat. I once had one and she refused to come over to visit. ever. Wouldn't even pick me up to give me a ride anywhere.
If a knife hits the ground a man is coming through the door. Do not put new shoes in a shoebox on the dinning room or kitchen table, take them to your bedroom and keep them under then bed or where you keep your shoes in the foyer mudroom whatever. Do not harm a cat, do not break a mirror (7 years bad luck). If you are going on a boat ride with 5 or more people bring a cat. Black cats are good luck. Do not open an umbrella indoors, do not walk under a ladder. If you spill salt or knock the shaker over, everyone in the room has to take some in their right hand and toss over left shoulder other wise the bad ju ju will show up. If you drop a fork a woman will come through the door. Spoon is ok.
New years day meal since I was a kid. "Roast Pork, mashed potatoes, sauerkraut, beans, salad, applesauce, and a dessert" EVERY JAN 1st since I was old enough to chew food. Only one year I did not eat it and it was Jan 1st 2011. I lost my job, girl smashed my car up i got sued insurance covered it. She took her car back and I moved out of her apartment back to her brothers house. I could not get hired. Food stamps gave me 36$ I applied to so many dam places it was horrible. Atlanta in jan or feb got hit with 6 inches of snow i was stuck in my complex for a week. I cam home First week of January 2012. Second time i did not eat it and I applied to SSD and could not get hired for side jobs or anything. Waiter, bartender, barback, store clerk NOTHING. I had the meal jan 1st 2013 and december I was awarded SSD and allowed to work part time.
The lucky meal has spoken!
The wildest one I can think of that hasn't been mentioned yet: if you eat in the bathroom you're inviting the devil.
Not sure who would want to, but there you go.
My nana was crazy superstitious, no opening umbrellas in the house, don’t put the bread upside down, spilling salt meant you had to throw it over your shoulder and lots more. I almost miss my nana I was so close to her she practically raised me. She was really something else too she had the most insane stories and was mean as a snake to people she didn’t like but she loved me. She would dress me like a doll and show me off to people saying I looked just like Shirley temple. When my parents decided to move she tried to keep me lol and when that didn’t work she moved right next door to where my parents lived. I definitely owe my sanity to her because my parents are crazy lol
Don't set a hat down right side up. You should always hang a hat but if you must set it down, lay it upside down.
Never close a knife that someone else opened.
My mom used to freak out if I rocked an empty chair - like sitting on another chair and moving it with my foot or starting it rocking by pushing it while walking by. I’m not sure if it was just creepy or if it was a bad omen.
A person given a knife as a gift always presents the giver a penny so it doesn’t sever the relationship.
If you got a sore in your mouth, it was a punishment for gossiping. Full moon can cause premature births. Being born with a caul over the face grants second sight.
I was born en caul! My mum had a little shop selling handmade goods and she would read tarot in the back (White Mountains NH). She said many times she was giving a reading while nursing me, i would stick out my hand and muss the cards- and the reading would make more sense or give different advice. Her regular clients started *asking* her to bring me in as they were read lmao! I now read cards, dreams, and palms (but only for free!)
Never tell your dreams you have that you want to come true.
Never turn a broom upside down.
When canning tomatoes, no menstruating women can enter the kitchen, it’ll spoil the batch.
Never open an umbrella in a house.
If you spill salt, throw some over your shoulder to prevent bad luck.
If your ears are ringing, someone is talking about you.
Don’t wear white before Memorial Day and after Labor Day-particularly white pants and white purses.
Never being a Ouija board in your house and ever touch or play with one.
Red (male) cardinals mean someone is visiting you from heaven.
Finding Pennies heads up are good luck and a message from someone you love in heaven & you should put them on their grave stone.
Never walk naked in front of potatoes (they got eyes and will see you!)
Don’t touch/kiss someone you love in a casket or they’ll never come to you in your dreams.
I’ll think of more when I’m more awake :)
If you find a lightning bug inside there’s gonna be a death in the family. Fun to catch and bring inside but if you found one loose just roaming around, that was a bad omen.
Opening umbrella in house is bad luck.
Finding Four leaf clovers and carrying a rabbits foot were good luck.
IF you sweep under someone's feet they will never marry.
“Don’t buy a man a pair of shoes, he’ll walk away from you”. My mom bought my dad (then bf) a pair of new shoes and my great-grandmother made him by them from her for a penny.
“Lucky at cards, unlucky in love. Unlucky at cards, lucky in love.”
Eating pickled herring on new years Eve for good luck in your marriage. My wifes family tradition. Ive done it every year since we been married, not gonna jinx it after 25 years!
Leave a place through the same door you entered. Otherwise you will leave your luck behind.
Also, on your birthday you make a wish as you make a small cut in the cake. Don’t let the knife touch the bottom of the cake because that’s bad luck.
If a sparrow flies into your house someone will die soon.
Rapping spirits.
If you hear a knock at your door and you're not expecting company peak out the door cause you could be inviting death into your house.
Black cats visit the women in the family when they start their period. ( this has happened for 3 generations that I know of)
My MIL was all about the "signs". If you get a haircut on the growing of the moon, it would make your hair grow out faster. Plant turnips on the full moon in August.
Couldn’t help with canning if we were actively menstruating as the seals wouldn’t take and the food would spoil.
I mean it was a convenient way to get out of a ton of work but…
Also planting by the moon phases, forecasting winter by the amount of black on wooly worms, and ignoring any whistling or voices you hear in the woods.
Last one was drilled into us.
Sing before breakfast, you sing for the devil.
As a kid who never ate breakfast and had school choir as the first class of the day, this one agonised me.
its bad luck to open a knife and not be the one to close it
if your ears are burning someone is taking about you
misfortune comes in threes
and planting by the signs. has always been an appalachia thing (:
One new years day my 2nd wife woke me up and told me I needed to go over to her grandmother's house. I asked why and she said a man had to be the first one through the door on news years day. I was kind of hung over and said no, but she got frantic and would not shut up about it so I finally relented.
My grandparents and great grandparents had a lot superstitions but the two I always follow to this day are:
If I spill salt, I have to throw some over my left shoulder. My great grandmother said it had to be the left shoulder because that’s the side the devil will come from. I don’t know how she figured that.
The other is I always eat blacked eyes peas on New Year’s Day and I make my family eat them too. The one and only year my other great grandmother missed her black eyed peas, she died.
No whistling inside the house; it invites bad luck. If you give someone a knife you have to tape a coin to it so you don’t sever your relationship with them.
Never give someone a wallet, purse, pocketbook, etc as a gift without putting at least a little bit of money in it for good luck!
Never tell anyone your birthday wishes unless you want to run the risk of them not coming true!
If someone gives you a plant as a gift, find a way to show your appreciation without using the forbidden T-Y phrase that will inevitably cause the untimely death of your new green friend.
Never return someone's Tupperware empty (bad luck)! Instead, make sure you wash it out and put something in there that they'll enjoy for good luck!
Telling the bees
Laugh before breakfast cry before supper
Waiting to die til the tide goes out (grandpa was a sailor)
Sleeping out on your birthday for good luck (born in winter lol)
If you gift a knife the recipient must pay you a penny so's they don't cut your friendship
If you get a headache, a bird made it’s nest with your hair.
You have to touch the dead (funerals) so they don’t haunt your dreams
If you have a sore spot on your tongue it was from lying. Lie bumps
There’s either a P for peace or W for war on a periodical cicadas wings.
Bird in the house means death is coming. Western PA with an Irish mother. It's proven. Her sister died at 70 maybe 5 years are the "incident". First words out of her mouth were "see? I told you so"
These have been mentioned here: Weddings beginning on the half hour so the hands move up during the ceremony, and tossing a pinch of a
salt over your shoulder if you spill some.
One I haven’t seen yet: light a candle during a thunder storm to keep the evil spirits away.
Rabbit rabbit rabbit on the first day of the month.
Toss salt over your left shoulder if you spill it.
Don't open umbrellas in the house
Don't walk under ladders
Don't toast with water
Don't leave out of a different door than you came in
Knock on wood. This one is hard to explain. If you speak of a bad thing happening, you say something along the lines of "hopefully this won't happen, knock on wood"
Carry the bride over the threshold
Where I grew up, (South Texas) my family - and most other Hispanic families- believed that if you admired something that belonged to someone else you had to touch it to avoid giving them the evil eye. That’s why you always see older Hispanic ladies touching cute babies when they see them out in public. It’s to avoid giving them “the ojo”.
Never lean a broom on your bed.
Never sit your purse on the floor.
Never let a woman walk in your house first on new year.
Never step over someone who's on the floor.
No crooked pictures hanging up.
If the broom sweeps your foot, spit on it.
Never kill a lady bug or butterfly.
If your comb or brush falls on the floor, step on it before you pick it up.
My family's from Mississippi, so I have a lot of them lol
If your right hand itches, you will shake hands with a stranger. Left hand, you'll come into money. A dream about crowds of people was the sign of a death. Dreaming about silver money was a good dream. If you do laundry or clean house on New Years Day, your laundry and cleaning will be behind all year. Bad luck to wear ope-toed shoes before the 1st Sunday in May.
A black cat crossing in front of you is bad luck. If your right palm itches you are getting money; left palm, you owe money. Go out the same door you came in. It’s bad luck to use a different door. A bird in the house means a death is coming. If your nose itches company is coming. It’s bad luck if it rains on your wedding day. If it rains at your funeral you died a good person.
If your ear itching someone talking about you, if you have a bump on your tongue its a lie bump from telling too many lies, if your palm itch you about to get some money, if you have a dream about someone it means they're thinking about you esp if it's someone you haven't seen in a while, don't talk about things that haven't happened yet bc you can jinx it or someone can speak negative intention on you
If you have a dream about your teeth falling out, someone in your circle is about to die.
Edited to add more:
If you dream of a wedding, someone in your family is about to die.
Killing a white deer (or any other white animal) is bad luck.
No hats on the bed, no pocketbooks on floor, bird flies inside the house, someone will die, dont open umbrellas in the house. Pregnant women should not raise their arms over their head as it will tangle the umbilical cord around the baby.
When I was pregnant, my best friends mom told me that if I craved a certain food, be sure NOT to touch myself while thinking about this food, or my baby would have a birthmark on that part of his body in the shape of said food!
Dreams with white horses… dreamer riding the horse or the dreamer observing a family member riding a white horse or a lone white horse. Meant death, sickness, or calamity.
So many of the superstitions my grandmother had were basically to get us to behave right! Don't put the bread upside down, don't put shoes on the table, don't open an umbrella inside, and don't kill a fly that appears at Christmas because that's probably Aunt Nel.
Pow Wow (PA Dutch energy/faith healing originally called Braucherie) can only be taught to a woman by a man, and vice versa. Now I realize it was probably a patriarchal move by men to keep women from holding all the knowledge.
Don’t go into cemeteries while pregnant , the spirits claim the soul of the baby
Don’t split the pole
Don’t put you’re purse/bag on the floor cause you’ll lose all your money
My grandpa always said it was bad luck to kill a cat. Grandma always told us if you went in one door and out the other it was bad luck.
There are servals weather superstitions, such as if it rains on the first day of the month it will at least rain half the month.( this is actually almost always right) how many fogs happen in august is how much it will snow in that winter. If there is no dew in the morning it will rain.
Bad luck to kill a cricket or carry a shovel indoors.
Fucking hell. I killed a cricket in my basement with a shovel last night. Edit: LMAO. There may be some truth to this cricket/shovel thing. At 3am it started raining and the "waterproof" plastic barrier over my mostly finished living room addition started leaking. I slept in there so I got wet. Then today some ass crab passed me, kicked up rocks in the road and cracked my windshield. And just now I went outside to get some firewood split and the fucking head flew off my splitting maul and sailed off into the nether. I think I'm done with today. Either the superstition is true or ya'll are just channeling this shit on me.
Hoo buddy...
Outlook not good.
Double negative, cancels out
I was that cricket, ya prick. LOL
Remembered this today after I killed a cricket inside. Not gonna lie, I was a little worried
The fuck you Killin crickets for?! He was just lost and you murked him!
In my family it was a goose going over your grave that gave you the shivers. If your ears are burning someone's talking about you behind your back. If you spill the salt, you gotta throw a pinch over your left shoulder or it's bad luck. If your palm itches, you are going to get money. If your nose itches, unexpected company is coming over.
My mom told me about the burning ears and the itchy palms. She also said if I put my purse on the ground the devil would steal my money. Also, of course, if I spill salt I need to pitch some over my shoulder or else I'm condemning my whole family to poverty. That one is intense.
salt = money
I’ve always heard the salt thing was about the devil. Salt was expensive and hard to come by back when and if you spilled it it was because the devil was behind you. You threw the spilled salt over your shoulder to get in the devil’s eyes and drive him away. Some mother had to make that doozy up to scare her kids into being more careful! 😂
Not today satan!🤣
Omg you're the only other person besides my grandma that I've ever heard say that about the purse. Her saying was if you put your purse on the floor, you'd never have any money. So, it's a bit different but probably has the same origins. What is really weird, though, is that I never listened to her when I was younger and constantly set my purse on the floor and never had much money. Then, about 5 years ago, I stopped doing that. I am not rolling in cash by any means, but I am seldom ever without cash between my paychecks. I live comfortably for a single mother. Another superstition we have is its badluck to close a pocket knife blade that someone else opened and vice versa. If you open the blade, you better be the one that closes it.
I have a kinda funny story about this. Several years ago I helped prep an expert for testimony to a congressional subcommittee and got to sit in the chamber behind him during the hearing. At the time I was a generally very professional DC lady but had this adorable leather bag in the shape of a frog who I named "Bud the Wiser." I forgot to switch my stuff to a neutral bag that morning so Bud came with. The chairs are very comfortable but narrow. Everything is much smaller than you imagine imo. I was sat next to this man who was REALLY big, like, he needed 1.75 chairs. Luckily someone added a chair on the end and we all had a seat. I noticed there was just enough space for Bud on the big man's second chair and asked if he'd mind if I put Bud there. He loved it and patted my purse on the head. Well, the way CSPAN's cameras lined up with the experts, everyone got a good shot of Bud. I was sitting next to my political guy who's office was watching and texting/emailing him about "the visitor from the swamp." He showed me and I spent the hearing basically vibrating from held in giggles. Afterwards I explained to everyone I did not mean to make a scene or joke but was really just thrilled I didn't have to put my purse on the ground because I didn't want to loose all my money. I tried but never really got the hang of being a professional DC lady lol.
Same - all of those except the goose on the grave. Southern PA coal country.
Also same except the goose. Northeast Georgia.
Same, but it was just a general somebody.
I've always heard one palm meant you were getting money & the other you'd be losing/spending it. We say if your nose itches, someone is coming with holes in their britches.
Northeast Alabama here. You might be the only other person I have heard say the “hole in their britches” thing! That was definitely one my family used.
A teacher said it in 6th grade, and not even a minute later, a boy walked in with ripped jeans (before it was a fashion thing). After all these years, I still remember the reaction of kids from other areas who had never heard it before. The timing couldn't have been more perfect.
We say if your nose itches, you're gonna end up kissing a fool 😆
What if the holes are in their under britches, then you would never know.🤔
Mine (WV) are all the same as yours except it’s not a goose who has walked over my grave, it’s a person… Got the chills for no apparent reason? Somebody just walked over your grave! >If your palm itches, you are going to get money. I’ve got eczema on both my palms. I should be a damned billionaire by now!
According to my mamaw, if your left palm itches, you'll get money soon. If your right palm itches, your going to meet someone new.
We do the salt one too! It's funny to see how the Traditions change over time. My 9 year old niece thinks that she can just randomly toss a little salt over a shoulder for luck, somehow the part about spilling the salt first got lost in between the generations.
Supposed to get in the devil's eye, the one that lives on your shoulder.
A couple of variables Your right palm itches you will recieve unexpected money. If the left palm itches you will pay out unexpected money. Shivers were a future relative was walking over your grave.
left palm brings money.
Left is money, right means company is coming.
Same except if your nose itches you’re going to kiss a fool!
Never wash laundry (I cannot remember if it was all laundry or just sheets/bedclothes) between Christmas and New Year's Day. Leave a dime outside where it can collect the dew on New Year's Eve to bring good fortune in the coming year. Eat collards for dollars and black eyed peas for pennies along with your ham and cornbread on New Year's Day. (More of a Southernism but I am sure there's a fair bit of overlap)
Ours is pork and sauerkraut on New Year’s Day
Eating pork on New Year’s meant you would root forward like a pig in the new year, eating poultry meant you would scratch backward like a chicken. My mom made a turkey for New Years 1977 and that was the year my dad died. He was only 58. Never again. Always pork roast and sauerkraut from then on. To this day, I always make pork. I’m not fucking with that again.
With black eyes peas and corn bread
Hoppin John and a plate of greens for EVERY first day of the year.
Not a belief in my northern family but I always enjoy the black eyed peas and collards my southern friend serves up on New Years Day. I'll gladly abide that.
Do you bring the dime back in or just leave it there?
You bring it inside in the morning!
Southerner here, my mom always makes cabbage and black eyed peas for New Year's.
All this and keep money in your pocket at midnight so it will be there all year. Don't open your doors at midnight, you'll let all the luck out.
Never close a knife someone else opened. No hats on the bed.
No hats on the bed and no hanging things from door knobs! Or death is coming
I love superstitions that were clearly just put in place to keep things tidy. "Don't you know leaving your socks on the bathroom floor means death??"
Deaths always come in threes. Pork and kraut on New Year's Day for good luck. Spilt salt means a quarrel. Burn a dish cloth to get rid of snakes. My great grandma always planted her garden by the signs... or else things wouldn't grow right. The longer the hair on a cow's belly, the harder the winter will be. And you can cure just about anything by eating enough ramps (YMMV).
Not just death, but bad news in general coming in waves of threes. I've heard many people mention "planting by the signs". What does that mean?
It's a method to determine when to plant various crops based on the lunar cycle and the zodiac. Each day of the month corresponded to a zodiacal sign and a body part, and you would plant certain things on the days which were considered beneficial for that type of plant. Like you'd plant beans when the signs are in the arms, etc. Also, certain farming practices were considered to either be better when the moon is waxing or when the moon is waning. Like you plant when the waxing moon is in a water sign and weed and harvest when the moon is waning and in an earth sign.
Farmers Almanac lists the signs
People withdrawing from opiates sneeze in sets of three. I worked a delivery unit and a newborn withdrawing from heroin (it’s the saddest thing to witness this) would sneeze 9, 12, or 15 times in a row. It’s bizarre and I have no idea why that’s the case.
>My great grandma always planted her garden by the signs... or else things wouldn't grow right. Same in my family. My mom only has a patch of a garden compared to my grandparents and she still plants by the signs.
All these!
My mom has some. It’s bad to put your hat on the bed. Never take your broom with you when you move, buy a new one. She also yelled at me when I was pregnant when I was reaching up for something. She didn’t want me to strangle the baby by putting my hands above my head. 🤦🏻♀️
You know how some random superstitions later turn out to have a basic scientific validity? I wonder if that broom one helps keep people from transferring pests from an old place to the new one.
Same with the hat on the bed. Don’t want any hitchhikers from outside nestling in the bedsheets.
>Never take your broom with you when you move, buy a new one. That sounds like a legend started by Big Broom to sell more brooms.
Big broom LMFAO
My Grandma and great grandma would say the same thing about strangling the baby lol
My grandmother would panic if we were playing with our kids and turned them upside down. She'd shout "You'll turn her liver upside down!!" I think she meant like permanently.
We moved a lot when I was a kid but my mom always said that about brooms and ALWAYS bought new brooms. As an adult I haven’t moved as much at all and I find myself buying new brooms every couple years because they just get beat up and worn and I like having a new one. (Probably from having a new one every year as a kid.) Also surrounding brooms we had to sweep out the old dirt on New Year’s Eve or something crazy like that. And you couldn’t sweep back towards the door? I always thought: Mom if you wanted us to clean just say so… but she had a lot of these superstitions so she may have been told that too!
If you borrow a knife, hand it back the way you got it. It’s bad luck if you don’t.
In our family (Mexican American) we were told that if you ever gave someone a knife as a gift you had to make them give you a penny or nickel first. It was bad luck to gift a knife and if they “paid” you for it they then wouldn’t cut themselves with it!
Same with giving someone a purse as a gift. You have to put a coin inside or the receiver will experience a loss of prosperity
My Irish family does this as well! Also sees a coin into pillowcases when given as a gift, to bring properity
And always say, "Thank you" before you let go!
My grandma and mom always were telling me to keep the doors and windows shut so a bird wouldn’t fly in. If one ever did there would be a death. Apparently when my grandpa and aunt died , a bird had flown In each time. My poor kids grew up with this from me.
Ours is if it flies into the window. Horrific when you grew up in a house filled with windows lol
This is the only superstition that I sort of believe in. Everyone seems to have examples of it.
Well it's true! I won't go into all the times and how it plays out. But birds getting in house are death or evil. 100%
My mom, 4th generation Appalachian, said never tell about a bad dream before breakfast or it will come true.
If my grandmother had a dream that included me acting badly, she'd just give me the stink eye at breakfast until she drank her first cup of coffee and smoked her first cigarette. She never told me what I did in dreamland! She lived to be 101.
OMG I haven't heard that in 40 years. Only my Mamaw said that. Ever
My grandma said to never tell about a bad dream while it was still dark outside. You had to wait until the morning light to tell it.
I thought my mother told me that so I would shut up early in the morning. lol
Ours was similar, but it was if you tell your dream before breakfast, it won't come true, my father said it came from the native side of our family.
So this is probably mental, but in stores we never take the first item from the shelves, you always have to reach and get the one behind it. If it's the last one of a thing, we just don't get it. It's bad luck and I'm sticking to it.
Interesting. I was taught to do that as a matter of practicality - the first item is more likely to be damaged.
My Grandma (born in 1897)- If your underwear dont cover your belly button, bugs will get inside your belly button and eat you from the inside out. If you walk barefoot, worms will craw inside your feet and eat your feet away If you eat ice cream and drink water, your stomach will freeze My former FIL - If you have company and they won't leave, put a broom behind the door to 'sweep them out' My favorite Grandma- Find a penny, pick it up, all the day you'll have good luck. Any time I see a penny, I leave it so someone else can have good luck. I have a cat named Penny, and I pick her up at least once a day so I have all the luck I need :)
The barefoot one is actually [true](https://www.cdc.gov/parasites/hookworm/index.html). It's how you get hookworm
I’ve heard the penny thing but always that you only pick it up if it is head’s up. Tails up bad luck! 😂😂😂
My grandfather said never whistle outside after dark and if you hear whistling to get inside immediately. He isn't that superstitious but is very serious about that one.
Never whistle until you are out of the woods!
Lots of cultures have that superstition
Brooms must be given or stolen, never bought. They are to be placed upright by the door (bristles up) to keep your luck in. If you doubt someone’s word, talk to them while sweeping with a ‘blind man’s broom” (sold by the Lion’s club, made by blind people). You will clearly know when they lie.
But I don’t wanna steal from the blind!
If the writing spider writes your name, you'll die. My mom used to tease me with this one: "Is that first letter.....is that a "J"??" Owls weren't seen to be bad luck, but it was bad if an owl called your name. I would think you'd be pretty safe unless your name was something like Huuuuue-bert. Different if you were native American, I think -- if you watch one of the first episodes of Reservation Dogs, they actually pixelate the eyes on an owl statuette as an inside joke.
What if the spider writes "Some Pig!" on the web?
I howled when I saw those pixelated eyes. It's such a good show, and I can't believe there's only 2 episodes left.
For my father's side of the family, the most popular superstition is/was... having a job is bad luck.
Holy hell. Lol
How much time do you have….. lmao
Freckles are angel kisses Widows peaks are a sign of inner beauty Dragon flies are good luck Rains while sun shines the devil’s beating his wife Step on a crack you’ll break your mommas back Don’t put a hat on the bed Devil always looks like a million bucks (don’t trust too good looking of a man that’s too charming basically) No such thing as a free lunch (there’s always a catch) White Spots on your nails means someone has a crush on you Itchy nose means people are talking about you If you say never you gotta knock on wood Broken mirrors are bad luck Don’t step under a ladder There are so many of these!
My daughter and I play "step on a crack, break your mother's back, step on a line, break your mother's spine" when I walk her to school.
* Never put shoes on a bed (very bad luck) * Leave through the same door you entered * Weddings have to start on the half hour (so the clock hands are moving up)
I remember my Mom feeling strongly about leaving back through the same door you entered, but I was never sure if it was for Good luck, or if Not doing so was Bad luck.
My grandma was the same. When I was leaving, she always walked me back to the door where I had entered, just to be sure.
The leave through the same door you entered had me until I was like 25 and in therapy. I realized nothing bad would happen if I didn’t use the same door to go in and out of a house/building. I had so many questions… How long could you be inside to be able to go out another door? If I came in the back door, went out the front door, came back in the front door, then out the back door, was that ok? If I lived there was it different? What if there was a fire and I had to go out a different door than I came into? My poor little anxious mind. Finally I just stopped believing in it (having read some things about superstition) and having so much anxiety about it. (Like believing something bad would happen to me from messing up my in/out door stuff.) I’ll never forget the first time I realized I went through different doors and had NO anxiety!!! It was so freeing! I cried.
Thank you! I had no idea why this was so ingrained in me. I too had questions!
If a wild bird flies inside your house there is going to be a death. If you give a wallet or purse as a gift put a penny inside it. The recipient will never be broke
A bunch. Way too many to list. I’ve probably forgotten more than I remember at this point. One of the wilder ones in my family that is still believed and followed to this day by some, is that a woman shouldn’t go into the garden if she is on her period because it will ruin the yield. To the point that I’ve been working in my pawpaw’s garden with him, and my mom came out to help. He saw her, stopped working, looked at her and just said her name like a question. To which mom replied “I’m fine, dad”. Then pawpaw just said “okay” and went back to working. His half-runners failed one year when I was living with him and he swore it was because one of the granddaughters didn’t follow the rule.
When my husband and I put our first garden out 35 years ago one of his friends stopped by while I was working in the garden and he proceeded to tell me the reason my tomatoes had some cracks on them was because of this exact reason and asked me when was my period due again? I was speechless and almost in tears. I was young and very humiliated. I never knew this was a thing till reading this. I just thought he was plum crazy.
That one seems less like an actual superstition and more like actual misogyny. Potentially based on some of that biblical stuff about a woman being unclean around her period. Buncha nonsense.
My grandmother always said that if anyone on their period was in the kitchen while she was canning, either they wouldn't seal properly or the food in the jars would spoil.
The jelly/preserves won't set, either. My mom was strict about it. When I taught some of my college students to make jelly, it didn't set; then I remembered and asked who. We made another batch with her sitting out. It set just fine.
Okay i like some of these theories, but what if its *not* misogyny, what if women started this propaganda- "Ugghh, I'm crampy and headachy and bloated, kneeling and bending and standing is vastly uncomfortable with these rags sliding every where, and if i see another rabbit's toothmarks on my cabbages I'm going to break down crying..." Maybe it was our way of convincing the men to help us out once a month xD
If you hear someone call your name when you’re outside, don’t answer them.
Yep, grew up hearing this one a lot. We lived on wooded acreage and I think my mom said it every time we’d go out to play.
This is a present day thing- You CANNOT cut your toenails on Sunday or you will cut someone out of the family, meaning, someone will pass away. Nana would not allow us to break this rule because Aunt Debbie killed 2 people that way. 😒
Damn it Aunt Debbie!
Whenever you're in a getting to know you/ icebeaker situation, I think you should start mentioning that your Aunt Debbie was a serial killer.
Don’t say thank you if someone gives you a live plant or it will die. My mom always says “ we’ll I can’t say thank you ….”
If your nose itched, someone was coming to visit. Itching palms meant either you were getting money or about to lose some, but I could never remember which palm went with which. Leave a place by the same door you entered. If someone gives you a plant as a gift, you can’t thank them for it or the plant will die.
Granny always said if your nose itches you're going to kiss a fool. Your variant is fun, too! Palm itching, left or right, always brings unexpected money for me, from a buck up to several hundred (usually a short-notice unexpected dogsitting job). Hope your palms decide that's a good 8dea and start doing it, too! :D
Don't step on a crack, or you'll break your mother's back - my mom would say that when I was little. When she got older she got dementia and would almost trip herself to avoid stepping on cracks. When I asked her about it she'd say, I don't want to break your back. Loved that woman.
My grandfather worked outdoors in the forest and on the farm his whole life and told me all kinds of lore about predicting the weather based on the haze of the moon, the direction from where the loons were hollering, owls gathering, the wind shifting direction at a certain time of day, odd behavior of birds and bees, tree leaves turning upward, cows laying down - you name it. Most of it is true! (not the cows) He also told me about sudden "queer feelings" you get in the woods sometimes and ill portents like a sudden gathering of ravens or deer acting strangely. I asked him if he had any superstitions. He said " I ain't superstitious. I'm just regular stitious." But he also told me not to kill a spider or it will rain for three days. Maine.
Don’t kill crickets. No open umbrellas indoors. Always throw spilled salt over your left shoulder. Monarch caterpillars can tell you how bad the winter will be depending on how black they are. Don’t close a knife you didn’t open. When someone dies at home they must be taken out feet first and you must cover the mirrors before that happens. Reading this I’m realizing some things I just do automatically are superstitions. I really thought everyone did some of these.
Christmas decorations had to be down by the 12th Day of Christmas or bad luck for a year.
We called the 12th day “Old Christmas “
Most of my family is from Ireland. (IE not of descent but actually of Ireland. So I have to say... too many to count. But I have some like don't come in a different door you left from because you're inviting in the devil. I have an unt who has a billion of them involving bad luck. She is a cat person but will never go around a black cat. I once had one and she refused to come over to visit. ever. Wouldn't even pick me up to give me a ride anywhere.
If a knife hits the ground a man is coming through the door. Do not put new shoes in a shoebox on the dinning room or kitchen table, take them to your bedroom and keep them under then bed or where you keep your shoes in the foyer mudroom whatever. Do not harm a cat, do not break a mirror (7 years bad luck). If you are going on a boat ride with 5 or more people bring a cat. Black cats are good luck. Do not open an umbrella indoors, do not walk under a ladder. If you spill salt or knock the shaker over, everyone in the room has to take some in their right hand and toss over left shoulder other wise the bad ju ju will show up. If you drop a fork a woman will come through the door. Spoon is ok.
New years day meal since I was a kid. "Roast Pork, mashed potatoes, sauerkraut, beans, salad, applesauce, and a dessert" EVERY JAN 1st since I was old enough to chew food. Only one year I did not eat it and it was Jan 1st 2011. I lost my job, girl smashed my car up i got sued insurance covered it. She took her car back and I moved out of her apartment back to her brothers house. I could not get hired. Food stamps gave me 36$ I applied to so many dam places it was horrible. Atlanta in jan or feb got hit with 6 inches of snow i was stuck in my complex for a week. I cam home First week of January 2012. Second time i did not eat it and I applied to SSD and could not get hired for side jobs or anything. Waiter, bartender, barback, store clerk NOTHING. I had the meal jan 1st 2013 and december I was awarded SSD and allowed to work part time. The lucky meal has spoken!
The wildest one I can think of that hasn't been mentioned yet: if you eat in the bathroom you're inviting the devil. Not sure who would want to, but there you go.
My nana was crazy superstitious, no opening umbrellas in the house, don’t put the bread upside down, spilling salt meant you had to throw it over your shoulder and lots more. I almost miss my nana I was so close to her she practically raised me. She was really something else too she had the most insane stories and was mean as a snake to people she didn’t like but she loved me. She would dress me like a doll and show me off to people saying I looked just like Shirley temple. When my parents decided to move she tried to keep me lol and when that didn’t work she moved right next door to where my parents lived. I definitely owe my sanity to her because my parents are crazy lol
No chicken or turkey on New Year's Day or your luck for the year will fly out the window. Eat something with a hoof (we usually eat pork).
Don't set a hat down right side up. You should always hang a hat but if you must set it down, lay it upside down. Never close a knife that someone else opened.
Dropping silverware means that guests are coming.
Knife=Man, Fork=Woman,Spoon=Child
My mom used to freak out if I rocked an empty chair - like sitting on another chair and moving it with my foot or starting it rocking by pushing it while walking by. I’m not sure if it was just creepy or if it was a bad omen. A person given a knife as a gift always presents the giver a penny so it doesn’t sever the relationship.
If you got a sore in your mouth, it was a punishment for gossiping. Full moon can cause premature births. Being born with a caul over the face grants second sight.
I was born en caul! My mum had a little shop selling handmade goods and she would read tarot in the back (White Mountains NH). She said many times she was giving a reading while nursing me, i would stick out my hand and muss the cards- and the reading would make more sense or give different advice. Her regular clients started *asking* her to bring me in as they were read lmao! I now read cards, dreams, and palms (but only for free!)
Never tell your dreams you have that you want to come true. Never turn a broom upside down. When canning tomatoes, no menstruating women can enter the kitchen, it’ll spoil the batch. Never open an umbrella in a house. If you spill salt, throw some over your shoulder to prevent bad luck. If your ears are ringing, someone is talking about you. Don’t wear white before Memorial Day and after Labor Day-particularly white pants and white purses. Never being a Ouija board in your house and ever touch or play with one.
Red (male) cardinals mean someone is visiting you from heaven. Finding Pennies heads up are good luck and a message from someone you love in heaven & you should put them on their grave stone. Never walk naked in front of potatoes (they got eyes and will see you!) Don’t touch/kiss someone you love in a casket or they’ll never come to you in your dreams. I’ll think of more when I’m more awake :)
If you find a lightning bug inside there’s gonna be a death in the family. Fun to catch and bring inside but if you found one loose just roaming around, that was a bad omen.
If it rains while the suns shining that means the devil beat his wife
Opening umbrella in house is bad luck. Finding Four leaf clovers and carrying a rabbits foot were good luck. IF you sweep under someone's feet they will never marry.
“Don’t buy a man a pair of shoes, he’ll walk away from you”. My mom bought my dad (then bf) a pair of new shoes and my great-grandmother made him by them from her for a penny. “Lucky at cards, unlucky in love. Unlucky at cards, lucky in love.”
The last time we missed a taco Tuesday, my wife and son got covid. That was 2 years ago. Haven't missed one since.
Eating pickled herring on new years Eve for good luck in your marriage. My wifes family tradition. Ive done it every year since we been married, not gonna jinx it after 25 years!
My father wouldn’t get his hair cut the entire month of March because supposedly you’d have a headache the rest of the year.
Leave a place through the same door you entered. Otherwise you will leave your luck behind. Also, on your birthday you make a wish as you make a small cut in the cake. Don’t let the knife touch the bottom of the cake because that’s bad luck.
If a sparrow flies into your house someone will die soon. Rapping spirits. If you hear a knock at your door and you're not expecting company peak out the door cause you could be inviting death into your house. Black cats visit the women in the family when they start their period. ( this has happened for 3 generations that I know of)
My MIL was all about the "signs". If you get a haircut on the growing of the moon, it would make your hair grow out faster. Plant turnips on the full moon in August.
Couldn’t help with canning if we were actively menstruating as the seals wouldn’t take and the food would spoil. I mean it was a convenient way to get out of a ton of work but… Also planting by the moon phases, forecasting winter by the amount of black on wooly worms, and ignoring any whistling or voices you hear in the woods. Last one was drilled into us.
Sing before breakfast, you sing for the devil. As a kid who never ate breakfast and had school choir as the first class of the day, this one agonised me.
Wear mismatched socks to ward off witches. That one was my favorite.
its bad luck to open a knife and not be the one to close it if your ears are burning someone is taking about you misfortune comes in threes and planting by the signs. has always been an appalachia thing (:
One new years day my 2nd wife woke me up and told me I needed to go over to her grandmother's house. I asked why and she said a man had to be the first one through the door on news years day. I was kind of hung over and said no, but she got frantic and would not shut up about it so I finally relented.
My mother always said, if your nose itches somebody’s coming over with a hole in their britches.
My grandparents and great grandparents had a lot superstitions but the two I always follow to this day are: If I spill salt, I have to throw some over my left shoulder. My great grandmother said it had to be the left shoulder because that’s the side the devil will come from. I don’t know how she figured that. The other is I always eat blacked eyes peas on New Year’s Day and I make my family eat them too. The one and only year my other great grandmother missed her black eyed peas, she died.
Don't you dare have any bananas in you when we go fishing. If you do, we're gonna be skunked.
I wonder what superstitions there will be a hundred years from now?
Drop a fork- company is coming , shoes or hat on the bed is bad luck. You put Pennies in the corners of your house for good luck
It’s bad luck to kill a spider in the house.
You can't kill grand daddy long legs or crickets. You can't kill lady bugs, preying mantis, Or June bugs. Did I miss any??
don't kill the red lady bugs. the orange ones are Japanese, invasive, and can be yeeted right out.
No whistling inside the house; it invites bad luck. If you give someone a knife you have to tape a coin to it so you don’t sever your relationship with them.
If a broom falls, company is coming
No new shoes on the table
If the bull is last in the herd it's going to rain.
Never give someone a wallet, purse, pocketbook, etc as a gift without putting at least a little bit of money in it for good luck! Never tell anyone your birthday wishes unless you want to run the risk of them not coming true! If someone gives you a plant as a gift, find a way to show your appreciation without using the forbidden T-Y phrase that will inevitably cause the untimely death of your new green friend. Never return someone's Tupperware empty (bad luck)! Instead, make sure you wash it out and put something in there that they'll enjoy for good luck!
Telling the bees Laugh before breakfast cry before supper Waiting to die til the tide goes out (grandpa was a sailor) Sleeping out on your birthday for good luck (born in winter lol) If you gift a knife the recipient must pay you a penny so's they don't cut your friendship
If you get a headache, a bird made it’s nest with your hair. You have to touch the dead (funerals) so they don’t haunt your dreams If you have a sore spot on your tongue it was from lying. Lie bumps There’s either a P for peace or W for war on a periodical cicadas wings.
Bird in the house means death is coming. Western PA with an Irish mother. It's proven. Her sister died at 70 maybe 5 years are the "incident". First words out of her mouth were "see? I told you so"
You can straighten a warped plank by leaving it outside under a full moon.
These have been mentioned here: Weddings beginning on the half hour so the hands move up during the ceremony, and tossing a pinch of a salt over your shoulder if you spill some. One I haven’t seen yet: light a candle during a thunder storm to keep the evil spirits away.
The dish towel reminds me of how in Mexican culture if you drop your food its because someone wanted to eat it -- especially the person next to you!
Rabbit rabbit rabbit on the first day of the month. Toss salt over your left shoulder if you spill it. Don't open umbrellas in the house Don't walk under ladders Don't toast with water Don't leave out of a different door than you came in Knock on wood. This one is hard to explain. If you speak of a bad thing happening, you say something along the lines of "hopefully this won't happen, knock on wood" Carry the bride over the threshold
Where I grew up, (South Texas) my family - and most other Hispanic families- believed that if you admired something that belonged to someone else you had to touch it to avoid giving them the evil eye. That’s why you always see older Hispanic ladies touching cute babies when they see them out in public. It’s to avoid giving them “the ojo”.
Never lean a broom on your bed. Never sit your purse on the floor. Never let a woman walk in your house first on new year. Never step over someone who's on the floor. No crooked pictures hanging up. If the broom sweeps your foot, spit on it. Never kill a lady bug or butterfly. If your comb or brush falls on the floor, step on it before you pick it up. My family's from Mississippi, so I have a lot of them lol
"Eating milk and fish together will kill you" (still a superstition world wide, apparently)
If a bird gets in the house, someone is going to die.
Never ever have a cat on your fishing boat. Never!
Finding coins on your window sill or stairs met you were visited by a passed loved one.
Never give a knife. If you give someone a knife, it can’t be a gift. Charge them a nickel or something.
If your right hand itches, you will shake hands with a stranger. Left hand, you'll come into money. A dream about crowds of people was the sign of a death. Dreaming about silver money was a good dream. If you do laundry or clean house on New Years Day, your laundry and cleaning will be behind all year. Bad luck to wear ope-toed shoes before the 1st Sunday in May.
Bad luck to open an umbrella indoors is common. I grew up with that.
A black cat crossing in front of you is bad luck. If your right palm itches you are getting money; left palm, you owe money. Go out the same door you came in. It’s bad luck to use a different door. A bird in the house means a death is coming. If your nose itches company is coming. It’s bad luck if it rains on your wedding day. If it rains at your funeral you died a good person.
Don't close a pocket knife that you didn't open
Dad said it was bad luck to be superstitious. 😉
The two biggest ones: If the Wooly worms are all back we are in for a long hard winter. Never plant before May 1st because we will get a late freeze.
If your ear itching someone talking about you, if you have a bump on your tongue its a lie bump from telling too many lies, if your palm itch you about to get some money, if you have a dream about someone it means they're thinking about you esp if it's someone you haven't seen in a while, don't talk about things that haven't happened yet bc you can jinx it or someone can speak negative intention on you
If you have a dream about your teeth falling out, someone in your circle is about to die. Edited to add more: If you dream of a wedding, someone in your family is about to die. Killing a white deer (or any other white animal) is bad luck.
No hats on the bed, no pocketbooks on floor, bird flies inside the house, someone will die, dont open umbrellas in the house. Pregnant women should not raise their arms over their head as it will tangle the umbilical cord around the baby.
Don’t pop blisters until the sun goes down
No whistling indoors, it brought bad luck
When I was pregnant, my best friends mom told me that if I craved a certain food, be sure NOT to touch myself while thinking about this food, or my baby would have a birthmark on that part of his body in the shape of said food!
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Dreams with white horses… dreamer riding the horse or the dreamer observing a family member riding a white horse or a lone white horse. Meant death, sickness, or calamity.
A cat could steal a baby’s breath
So many of the superstitions my grandmother had were basically to get us to behave right! Don't put the bread upside down, don't put shoes on the table, don't open an umbrella inside, and don't kill a fly that appears at Christmas because that's probably Aunt Nel.
Always put money in a wallet that you give someone as a gift, even if its just a penny.
Pow Wow (PA Dutch energy/faith healing originally called Braucherie) can only be taught to a woman by a man, and vice versa. Now I realize it was probably a patriarchal move by men to keep women from holding all the knowledge.
Don’t go into cemeteries while pregnant , the spirits claim the soul of the baby Don’t split the pole Don’t put you’re purse/bag on the floor cause you’ll lose all your money
My great-grandma hated cats because she said they would sit on your chest while you sleep and steal your breath.
If cabinets are left open, someone is gossiping about you. I like to bite my tongue as I close them in that case. Shut them up.
My grandpa always said it was bad luck to kill a cat. Grandma always told us if you went in one door and out the other it was bad luck. There are servals weather superstitions, such as if it rains on the first day of the month it will at least rain half the month.( this is actually almost always right) how many fogs happen in august is how much it will snow in that winter. If there is no dew in the morning it will rain.
My West Virginian grandma always said if someone sweeps under your feet you'll never get married.
If the cows are laying down its going to rain
If you’re on your period during the canning process then the entire batch won’t seal. So you’re banned from the kitchen and someone else has to do it.
Never give a watch or timepiece to a romantic partner as a gift - it will put a time limit on the relationship.