Dishing

Incase you are wondering, my obsession with dinnerware/plates continues or more accurately has resurfaced. I am a possessed person.  I am having so much fun being back home and starting over.  Although, sometimes I’m pissed about all the stuff that I used to have, between my stuff and my mom’s house that now I have to rebuy, like an ironing board.  When I think about the things we left in mom’s house I just lose my mind.  She had a GREAT ironing board.  I’m glad when I stopped by her house on my way up from Florida last year with the packed Penske truck, that I at least grabbed what I did – the box of dishes we had from my childhood was all I could fit in the packed truck.  I salvaged three dinner plates from my mom’s old set, a lot of salad plates, small appetizer plates and cups and saucers!!  Nobody uses small cups like that anymore.  We are such a supersized society and only drink out of 24 oz size mugs.  Anyway anyway, so back to plates.  In Florida right before I moved (or knew I was moving) I bought dinner plates from Pier One – 4 of them – coastal themed.  Not those melamine plates mind you, the real china ones.  They were on sale (of course) and, well, I thought back then I would start rebuilding in Florida, but noooo.   Anyway, I have the plates up here and they are lovely and they are currently in a box with the rest of my summer melamine (pool) dishes in a closet. 

My first family get together after moving into my current residence when there was 4 of us, well I needed new plates didn’t I?  I am trying to remember why I didn’t think those coastal beachy plates were good enough.  Because at the time there were only 4 of us – and I have glasses to match – oh wait I remember, there are FIVE of us.  That’s right – that’s why I needed to buy more dishes.  Jimmy now has a lovely girlfriend and so there are now five of us.  That’s when I ended up at Walmart and decided to go for the shabby chic look with their Pioneer Woman design and got six plates and none of them match, but they are the same designer, so you know kinda the same.  I had visions of us all claiming our dish and then always using that one.  Wouldn’t you know the next time everyone is over isn’t until Thanksgiving.  Could I use the same plates?  Of course not!  It’s a holiday.  I need holiday plates.  Guess who had a sale on plates? Wayfair. Their ads that pop up on every blessed site I look at are very effective and I’m weak and I bought 6 orange (excuse me, pumpkin color) plates for Thanksgiving.  I thought well this is perfect.  They are a fall color and I can use them all fall.  I had a very lovely Thanksgiving table although I didn’t like my placemats this year, so I was also looking at new placemats today for next year.  But then decided I have a year to get new ones. I have showed great restraint by waiting.

My next rebuilding involves Christmas dishes.  Last year Donna Cooper asked me about all my dishes.  I had to remind her they are all gone.  But sad as that is…how fun is it now?  Fun and expensive but holy moly I get lost in a rabbit hole looking at patterns.

Back in the day I had everyday Christmas plates that were a wedding gift from my mom in 1982.  I used them as my everyday plates every year.  They are now gone. It makes me sad as they were really good every day plates and probably the start of my plate obsession.   I also had a very nice china set that I collected over many years and would display in my china cabinet and actually used a few times and I had almost every piece to match it.  They were very pretty.  They are gone now.  Collecting all of those pieces was a labor of love and patience.  Gone. 

I also have a set of plates that I ONLY use on Christmas morning.  The idea at the time was they were from Santa and so to make them special I only use them on Christmas morning.  I have placemats and napkin holders and napkins that I use with that set. When the kids were little they just loved coming down Christmas morning and seeing that table set with those dishes (mostly the napkin holders)  And guess what?  I still have them!!  I know, right?  Of all the things I have lugged around the country I managed to hang on to them and there are 8 plates!!  Now we can all have a plus 1 and invite two more.  Although we’ve been having Christmas morning at Zach and Rachel’s the past couple of years I think it’s time for me to resume my official duties as matriarch and Christmas morning hostess of the family.

Well anyway, I am now lusting after an everyday Christmas plate set.  Yes of course I could use the Pioneer Woman plates (although I think they have a much more springy and summer feel) or maybe I could use the pumpkin color plates that I bought for Thanksgiving and pair them with red/cranberry placemats – throw in some green and well that just still sounds like Thanksgiving doesn’t it? And no I am not using the Christmas morning plates because they are Christmas morning plates!  You see why I need these new everyday Christmas plates don’t you?  Meanwhile, only Jimmy and Emily come for dinners every once in awhile and I always use my mom’s 3 plates that I rescued from Opus BUT if I had every day Christmas plates I’d use them right?  Or, if I buy these 8 dinner plates (planning for plus 3 in the future) would I then want to save those plates for only a dinner with us all?  Which may or may not ever happen because I think I’m only relegated to the Christmas breakfast and I have those dishes already.  Getting everyone together TWICE in a season may be a little too much to expect.  I could have friends and other family members over and then use the new dinner plates.  That might be a good excuse to have a get together, although not more than 8 at a time.  But, do I also need a new fancy-pants china set too?  In addition to everyday Christmas dishes?  I could have Christmas Teas again but that would involve a heck of a lot of more dishes and a bigger house. And me moving back to Sewickley area because no one is going to make the trip into the city.  Unless I provided shuttle service.  Otherwise I have to make all new friends up on that mount (Mount Washington) and well I would love to see my old friends again, at my house, with my dishes at Christmas time.  But new friends are nice too!

You see this problem don’t you? It starts with dishes and then I realize I need a bigger house so I can invite friends over to use the dishes.  Not to mention storing the dishes in closets that I don’t currently have. So I go from looking at dishes to looking at houses.  Then I can’t decide do I want to stay on Mount Washington where the kids will stop by on occasion because it’s convenient and also I do love it here?  OR do I need to move back home-ish so I can have Christmas Teas again?  And buy MORE dishes? But wouldn’t it be great to have a great big farmhouse country home? Like the featured photo at the top of this blog? Where all the dishes would look so perfect?  This is how it starts, the dreaming, the living in my head.  It starts with dishes.

At one point in my life I remember collecting a lot of broken plates. I was going to make some sort of mosaic tabletop with them so we could always remember the different dishes but dishes are curved and don’t lay flat and I couldn’t figure out how to make something that wouldn’t cut our wrists everytime we sat down. Honestly I’m just not that crafty.  Instead of looking through Wayfair and Pier One (and then Trulia and Zillow) lusting after new dishes and new homes maybe I should be looking at craft sites instead.

Perhaps it will be added to my legacy and on my tombstone, next to what the kids say they’re going to put “known for her chocolate chip cookies…they were o.k.” (that was Zach’s comical addition) but next to that they can say.. she had a lot of dishes.

PS – my new everyday Christmas dishes will be arriving December 12. Thank you Wayfair, you have just what I need.

xoxox