Many vintage china patterns are based on the perennial garden favorite flower, roses. No surprise, roses are romantic and feminine. Many of the dinnerware designs that use this motif have a soft, pastel color scheme.
Make roses your theme for mix and match table setting and the possibilities are enormous. Whether you are planning an intimate [...]

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Dinnerware sets include various plate sizes for various uses, taking their names from the foods they are commonly used to serve. Bread, salad or dinner plates are just some of the possibilities.
Names for different sizes vary between manufacturers, or even within the product lines of a single manufacturer over time. Diameter alone will not tell [...]

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When the weather turns colder, I get a hankering for ice cream. Go figure. Then I found a funky, 1970s soup mug and inspiration arrived.
The dish is probably USA or Japan made, but there is no maker’s mark. It just screams retro, both from the motif and the colors. I was in a home just [...]

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The popular Royal Albert china pattern Old Country Roses came up, on a conference call with some Internet colleagues.
It is a classic pattern, made since 1962 in numerous versions, that is still going strong today. Old Country Roses has a fluted and non-fluted version, the holiday version, the garden and damask versions. And that’s not [...]

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Cool summer salads can hit the spot on these hot, dog days, and all year round. And it’s especially fun to eat from a charming vintage bowl — in this case, a macaroni salad in a cereal bowl by Mikasa, Sumay pattern, Eclipse line.
This ware looks like it’s from the 1960s or 1970s. The colors [...]

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Pie, the most comforting of the comfort foods that we remember from childhood. At our house, cherry and pumpkin were often on the menu for family gatherings. My mother made her crust with lard, and it was very tender.
There’s a cute song about pie in the movie Michael. Part of it goes like this, “Apple, [...]

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Blue and white china. Crisp and clean, great for summer table settings.
Around our house, you can have any color, especially blue. It’s easy to mix and match with other blue and white wares, especially those with simple bands of color.
Blue and white reminds me of the salty sea shore or a breezy summer sky.
Some of [...]

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Can you really use your vintage china — or find vintage china — for a special Father’s Day dinner? Oh yes, you can! There’s still time to tweak your table setting for Father’s Day, coming the third Sunday in June.
Fathers don’t usually have the same interest in dishes that mothers do. Even so, adding some [...]

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A while back, I posted a recipe for Hamburger Noodle Corn casserole that Mom used to make on another one of my web ventures. As we did at home, I baked in a big, yellow Pyrex bowl. It feeds a crowd.
My colleague Lynette - shyflea to all fellow Queen’s Court members - made a vegetarian [...]

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Cinco de Mayo, May 5, is a holiday to celebrate the history and culture of Mexico. It’s a great time to have a lively party. How can you use your vintage dishes for this celebration?

Fiesta! This colorful Homer Laughlin china is tailor-made for Cinco de Mayo with its bold colors and heavier weight.
Play up the [...]

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