Forget-Me-Not Blue

These pretty hydrangea-print napkins and table runner caught my eye in a Sur la Table store, so when they went on sale, I ordered them.  (They also carry melamine dinnerware in this print, in both blue and green, if you're interested!)

When the order arrived, I decided the linens would be pretty with my Sophie Conran dishes in forget-me-not blue.  Villeroy and Boch's My Garden glasses added more blue, and the delphiniums my husband brought home from HEB last week were the perfect blue, even a few days past their prime.

 A diner's view. . .

 Closeup of one of the Arthur Court grape candlesticks, a long-ago gift from my in-laws

Closeup of the etched vase that my mother gave me from her collection.  Mama also has a tall pitcher in this pattern.  Please let me know if you know the name of the pattern!

View from the entryway

Delphiniums!

A simple summer table, but I do love the colors!

Thanks for stopping by!  I will be linking to Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch.

Wedding China

I've been looking forward to seeing all the links at Cuisine Kathleen this week, because she challenged us to show our wedding china.  I decided to show you ALL the wedding china chosen or inherited by my grandmothers, mother, mother-in-law, daughter, daughter-in-law -- and, of course, MY wedding china! 

My very first tablescape post four years ago featured my Grandma Rachel's wedding china, Heinrich H&C's Admiral pattern, which I have inherited.  Grandma married in 1927 and was given 24 placesettings of this pretty pattern by her family and friends.  I treasure her handwritten list of all the pieces she owned and keep it in a locked box along with our marriage certificate and birth certificates.  Here's a closeup of the pattern from my recent Touch of Pink post.  I have found this pattern to be very versatile, using it with greens and golds, as well as pink.

My maternal grandmother did not have wedding china, to my knowledge.  She and my grandfather eloped!  I do remember her colorful everyday Fiestaware and wish I had inherited some of it.  I have fond memories of hearty breakfasts served on those dishes at her kitchen table.

My mother, who married in 1951 (and who with my dad will celebrate their 63rd anniversary this month!) has two pretty wedding china patterns, both from Castleton.  I've had fun playing with her dishes when I visit, going so far as to bring table linens with me on the plane!  I think both of her patterns look very fresh and modern.  Here is her Ma Lin pattern:

 And here is her Mayfair pattern:

My mother-in-law chose Haviland's Rosalinde as her wedding china, and now our daughter has inherited it.  We have enjoyed setting modern tables with this beautiful traditional pattern.

I married in 1972, and I chose a "good" china pattern, Lenox Windsong, along with crystal (Lenox Moonspun) and silver (Lunt Belvedere).  I still love this pattern and set my Easter table with it this year.  Below is an earlier table set with my wedding china, crystal, and silver.

I also chose an everyday pattern, Royal Doulton Fireglow.  I still own these dishes, but we no longer use them every day.  I do enjoy pulling them out occasionally, though!

As I mentioned earlier, our daughter inherited her grandmother's Rosalinde, but she chose an everyday pattern when she married in 2000.  I really love her Villeroy and Boch Switch 3 pattern.

Our daughter-in-law, who married our son in 2010, inherited a large collection of Johnson Brothers' Friendly Village from her grandmother.  When I went to help out after our granddaughter's birth, I enjoyed setting a Christmas table with this delightful pattern.

And there you have it -- four generations of wedding china!  It will be fun to see the china patterns my young granddaughters choose when they grow up!

Planning for Easter

This table is something of a dry run for Easter.  We may have as many as ten around the table this year, as our son and his family are moving to the Austin area the week before Easter.  I will finally have all my chicks in one state -- yay!

I knew I wanted to use the pretty Castleton Gloria china that my mother surprised me with two years ago.  You can read the story of that surprise here.  Gloria has a thin robin's egg blue band around the rim, so I pulled out these coordinating placemats, which were a gift from my sister.

I also wanted to use these cute dessert plates, as well as some pastel gingham napkins, all from Pier 1 this year. I added egg cups in colors to match the napkins and some paper mache eggs I've had for years.  Here's the pink version . . .

the lavender version . . .

the green version . . .

and the yellow version.  I was pleased with how well all the different pastels worked with the robin's egg blue. 

 For a simple centerpiece, I pulled out two nests and added robin's egg blue eggs.  (Is that redundant?)

For Easter dinner, I will remove the candles and add fresh flowers, more placesettings and real eggs in the egg cups as placecards.  And the grands might "need" a chocolate bunny at their places, don't you agree?

Thanks for stopping by!  I will be linking to the party at Cuisine Kathleen, so hop on over to see other tables featuring eggs, birds, and/or nests!

Thinking Green

I wanted to join the fifth annual St. Patrick's Day Blog Crawl at Cuisine Kathleen this year, so I started by pulling out my vintage green glassware.  The water glasses originally belonged to my husband's grandparents, and for Christmas this year, my mother surprised me with the little "liquor cocktails" to match.  The pattern is by Anchor Hocking and is called either "Burple" or "Inspiration."  I love the deep emerald green.

For last year's St. Patrick's Day table I used the same glasses with my grandmother's wedding china, so I wanted to do something different this year.  I remembered some Williams-Sonoma salad plates with a green and gold pattern, so pulled those out.  I layered them on top of a plain white dinner plate and a larger gold ceramic plate.  I used plain white placemats and white napkins with a simple cutwork design and added our silver flatware.

For a little more green, I added a gold-trimmed green glass piece from my in-laws' collection.

For flowers, I found two small pots of yellow kalanchoes at HEB and decided they could be "pots of gold."  They were just starting to bloom in this photo.

Here's a "diner's view" across the table:

 Here's a view of the table set for four:

As the week went on, the kalanchoes opened up a bit more.

No shamrocks, leprechauns, or other traditional St. Patrick's Day elements on this table, but I hope all the green plus the pots of gold will qualify it for Kathleen's party!  Thank you for visiting my table this week!

Happy Texas Independence Day!

There's a lot going on this week -- our son's birthday, Mardi Gras, and Ash Wednesday, but we can't forget Texas Independence Day on March 2nd.  What?  You don't celebrate that holiday?!  Well, I must confess that we didn't either until a few years ago.  As transplanted Texans, we didn't learn Texas history in school, so we were woefully ignorant of the fact that March 2nd marks both Texas' declaration of independence from Mexico (178 years ago) and Sam Houston's birthday.

But now we know, and so it was time to set a table honoring Texas.  This year I paired my Texas salad plates with some blue and white bordered plates in my collection.  

The little red star dishes and the Texas plates are from HEB, our grocery store, and the blue bandanna napkins were a gift from my Nashville sister.  The blue ribbed glasses were a gift from Marigene who blogs "In the Middle of Nowhere".  Aren't tablescaping friends the best?

For a centerpiece, I needed more red, so I bought some red gerbera daisies (again at HEB) and cut the stems short so I could use them in my pansy ring.

In the following photo, you can see over on the baker's rack the two Texas flags that my friend Michele, who blogs at Adventures in Thrifting, surprised me with this week. 

Here's a better view of the daisies.

I like the way the napkin's design goes with the blue bordered plate.

The daisies close up. . .

One more!

Thanks for stopping by!  I will be linking to Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch, so stop by to see other tablescapes.  I wonder if anyone else is celebrating Texas Independence Day!

A Touch of Pink

Again this week, my table began with a glass -- pink this time.  I had admired these at Pottery Barn, so when they put them on sale in December, I ordered them.  At the time, I had no idea how I'd use them to set a table, as I have no pink dishes or table linens.  I just bought them because they were pretty!

I looked for pink placemats and napkins online, but apparently pink is out of vogue, because I didn't find any I liked. I decided to bring in more pink using flowers instead.  Here's a "diner's view" across the table -- white placemats and napkins, pink and white alstroemeria in short glass vases, Grandma Rachel's china, and our wedding silver.

I use these bud vase napkin rings, a gift from my daughter, all the time.  They are wonderful for bringing a little more color to the table.  Oops, that napkin could have used ironing!

Here's a view of the table, set for a lunch with friends.  Just enough pink for me!

Here's a closeup of Grandma Rachel's china -- it's the Admiral pattern by Heinrich H&C.  The little cluster of pink flowers is the only pink on any of my china patterns.  (I'm more of a blue girl.)  I think Grandma Rachel would be tickled to see me pairing her pretty vintage china with glasses from Pottery Barn!

The alstroemeria included the perfect shade of pink!  And 15 stems were just $7 at Sam's Club.

Another view. . .

Couldn't resist this closeup.  Those two central striped petals form a heart!

One more look at the placesetting.

Thank you for visiting!  I will be linking to Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch.

Start with a Purple Glass

It all started when I saw some pretty purple glasses in the clearance pages of a Ballard Design catalog.  They were marked way down, plus I had a coupon, so I ordered them.  They arrived in just a few days, and they were even prettier in person.  If you look closely, you can see the pattern includes a crown. 

I asked my husband to bring home some purple flowers from the grocery store, and he obliged, selecting these lovely Dutch iris.

I tried several combinations of china patterns and placemats and even briefly considered ironing a giant white tablecloth before I came to my senses.  I only have one set of napkins in my stash that includes a little purple, and no other linens in the "right" purple, so I finally settled on using the plain white backside of some placemats.

I used plain white plates set on silver chargers -- really silver trays we received as wedding gifts.  Each one is a little different.

 Silver was apparently a LOT less expensive way back in 1972, because we received a lot of it!  Over the years my trays have played a role in many receptions, bridal and baby showers, etc.

Once I settled on using the silver trays as chargers, I pulled out more silver to continue the theme.  The silver goblets were also wedding gifts.

The tiny salt and pepper shakers belonged to my in-laws.  Aren't they sweet?

I happened to remember some purple candles, left from our Advent wreath, so after a quick polish of the candelabra, the centerpiece was complete.

Here's a placesetting. 

And here are a few views of the table.

Thank you for visiting! I will be linking to Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch later this week.