My March Table

Look familiar? I am still in love with my new table! And since everyone seemed to like the February table so much, I thought I would do something similar for March.

We were all in love with the beautiful wood of the table top, but I finally allowed my family to come over for dinner and use the table. As a group we are entirely too sloppy and uncouth to allow this to continue. The table top is now protected with the table pads I saved from my grandmother's dining room table. The pads are covered with a dark green table cloth and then topped with a white lace table top. Don't worry about the tablecloths - both came from Dollar General and I can spray them liberally with Shout and run them through the washer.

I am economizing after this major purchase, and I am mixing and matching to come up with eight place settings! Four of the guests will have this white Pfaltzgraff dinner plate with green border, topped with a green Pfaltzgraff salad plate and shamrock napkin. This place settings have a secret!

The bottom plate is from my Christmas dishes! (Don't tell)

The other four guests have the dinner plates that match the salad plates. Instead of a salad plate, they get a Leprechaun's hat!

The tea cup and saucer come from a set purchased piece by piece by piece with stamps at a local grocery store in 1995. My oldest daughter had just graduated from high school in June and with four still at home, I bought a lot of groceries. There was some sort of a deal with place settings and then I started on the serving pieces. She used these in her first and several more apartments and then began passing it down the line. When her youngest brother got married last summer - it arrived back at my house. The dinner plates joined about 200 other mis-matched china plates that were used for the reception. I kept the tea cups, saucers and a small platter and the rest went to Goodwill.

And I made another banner! Actually my Valentine's banner was so popular that both of my daughter-in-laws and one of my daughters requested one for March, too. - Here is the dining room table (with pads) doing double duty as a work table.

As you can tell from the back of the table, this is not my only project for the month. I am in the midst of organizing my 4-H activities for the year, planning a baby shower for about 40 guests and working on some projects for my church. And . . .

No, I didn't move. But my oldest son purchased his first home. We were busy moving everything out of his apartment at the last minute when the closing was delayed twice by the owners. Now I am scouring my closets, porches, storage and garage for any items he owns or I want to dump on him! He has purchased an adorable little ranch and was already painting the ceilings the first night he moved in. My favorite feature of the home is this adorable range located in his basement. The former owner used it for canning.

LOVE!!!! Doesn't it remind you of this one I painted while my husband was remodeling our own kitchen? 

There has already been some discussion about moving it from the basement (by me) and some discussion on how heavy it is and how it is going to stay put (by the rest of the family). If he had only bought this house about four years ago - I would have designed my kitchen around it!

I will be linking with Susan and all those much more creative tablescapes at : http://betweennapsontheporch.net/st-patricks-day-spring-table-setting/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+BetweenNapsOnThePorch+%28BETWEEN+NAPS+ON+THE+PORCH%29

A Table for A Tablescape

 One of the main reasons I haven't been around to show a tablescape? NO TABLE! 

 

Around and about 1989, we purchased a new table and chairs. A scant few weeks after they arrived, I had a pot that caught on fire on my stove. Thinking quickly - I grabbed the pot off the stove and placed it on my brand new table - thereby marking it forever with a nice round hole. Not  a deep hole; it only burned about half way through the table top before I grabbed it again and placed it in the sink. We had five children aged 5-12 at the time and the chairs held up remarkably well with the climbing, tipping, and foot resting . But eventually they had to be replaced and I managed to purchase some lovely vintage ones at an auction.

 

Meanwhile my grandmother's mahogany table and chairs rotated into my possession. Unfortunately they had traveled a hard route and needed numerous repairs. The veneer needed replaced, the leaves were warped, the joints need glued and on and on. As much as restoring the table was my dream, I do not have the talent to do the work and the estimates I was getting exceeded the price of a new table and chairs. I had already given my original table away and sold the chairs at a yard sale, so a decision needed to be made.   

My dear sweet husband is a Union Man and refuses to make a large purchase unless the goods are Made In America. Preferably Union Made in America.  After several weeks of searching, we found this very difficult. The lovely furniture that was originally made in the Carolinas is now imported from overseas and sold from there. We found one furniture company that imports the wood from Russia, the furniture is made in China and the furniture is sold from North Carolina.  And the quality does suffer. After many road trips to many furniture stores, we eventually decided to have the set we wanted made by the Amish.  We were told it would take four to eight weeks; we actually received the furniture in ten weeks and it is everything we ever dreamed of! Gorgeous and sturdy enough, not only for our children, but for our grandchildren, too! The pedestal design allows for three leaves when the occasion warrants. I was pleased to find that the table with two leaves fits nicely in the dining room and allows all eight chairs to fit easily around the table. The Weaver family did a remarkable job!

The table and chairs arrived just in time for a February tablescape! Since I just spent all that money on the table set, I was glad to find all eight placemats at the Dollar Tree! The green matches the walls in my adjoining living room and ties the rooms together. The bottom red plate is Pfaltzgraff, purchased when the outlet stores were still open. The adorable scallop edged pink granite -look plates were a Pfaltzgraff find, too - along with the cupcake custard cups. The mittens were from Hallmark years ago and the adorable bowls from former co-workers. The clear glass heart shaped candy bowls were my grandmothers.

By the way, do you like the color of the dining room? Since we had All That Time to wait for the dining room table and chairs to be crafted, I managed to talk my dear sweet husband into a new paint job! Sparkling white ceiling and trim, and I am calling this shade Geranium Pink. I am totally in love with it!

 

To fancy up the room, I stayed up late one night and hand stitched up this felt Valentine Banner.

 

My daughter-in-law was so taken by it she asked me to make one for her, too.  (The darker splotch on the wall is a test for a new dining room color - I think it will look terrific).

Thanks for stopping by! I am going to try to visit all the other tablescapes at http://betweennapsontheporch.net/whimsical-valentines-day-tablescape-alice-in-wonderland-style/   It has been a very long time since I have been around to see you all and I am really looking forward to seeing you all again.

The Picket Fence

Wow, almost a year since I last posted. Too much life still happening, but I do check in at least weekly to go through my blog roll and see what everyone is up to!    

We had a monster wind storm last night and this is what my picket fence looks like this morning. All damage to this section just due to wind. I am grateful I have power (some don't) and grateful no one seems to have been injured (although the buzzing of the chainsaws at houses surrounding me for the last 8 hours may cause me to start banging my head on a hard surface). Lots of trees down, some will be up to 48 hours with no power, children have the day off school, and limbs and wires everywhere, play sets and trampolines crushed. .



The back three side sections were attacked by a flying trampoline. These are not my lawn chairs, either.

 

We had a horrific tragedy in a neighboring community this week. One of those things you think can only happen in big cities or in a movie. Something that the town will never forget and something that families will never recover from. And an innocent person who got up that morning, sent her kids to school and husband to work and then went to work herself, at a business we all frequent without a second thought is lost forever. And a confused and tortured soul, someone she had never met before, gone, too - taking any explanation for this tragedy with him.

No profound thought. No solution. Just life.

I began this blog about three years ago. I loved to collect dishes and was amazed to find a community of "tablescapers" who loved to set a beautiful table as much as I did. (Thank you, Sam, who showed me the world of blogging from her desktop)

I would visit these blogs and find my way to other blogs of moms and grandmothers and wives and widows and women - all with some same and some different interests.

I found blogs with wonderful photography, blogs with amazing writing skills, blogs that shared homemaking, blogs that shared quilting, blogs that shared recipes, blogs that shared struggles, blogs that shared triumphs. Blogs that promote a service (Hi Colorado Lady) that makes me smile.

As with most of us, life started to happen. It was harder to find time to write, hard to find time to decorate and take photographs, hard to join parties and visit each site.

I had decided I would try to take time to begin blogging again. And as I began my post, I discovered I have run out of space in the photo storage.
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I am taking it as a sign. It's time to end.

I am keeping my page. Who knows? I might decide to start blogging again someday.

I also want to keep my blog roll - I love to visit each of you and check in from time to time and see what you are up to.

So I am not saying good-bye - I am saying, "See you later!"

Miss Merry