Cinco de Mayo (May 5) is only a few days away, and it’s time to get ready for your parties or special events to celebrate. There are plenty of ways to use your colorful dinnerware to help serve corn chips, salsa, tacos, guacamole or many, many other foods you might be eating to mark this […]
Easter colors of yellow and green, pink and blue are enough to get your table setting ideas flowing. Add in the motifs, such as baby chicks and eggs, bunnies and spring flowers, and you can get your Easter tabletop and entertaining plan off to a great start. And then there’s the food. Since I met […]
When my sister visited recently from the UK, I made several of our old family favorite foods, including orange gelatin dessert. Some products that we take for granted here, like fruit flavored gelatin, are difficult to obtain in other countries. And it’s the food that sometimes makes a place feel like home. Of course, we […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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 […]
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, […]
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 […]
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 […]
Finding special vintage dishes is fun! See what I brought home with me in recent weeks, including some extra special items.
My dishie antennae perk up when I see pieces of Mikasa’s Mediterrania line in my shopping travels. The patterns are so retro. Many of them show the best of modern style from the 1970s. The shapes are simple and sleek. The colors and motifs just work for me. I think Blue Bird is probably my […]