Spring Table Scape for March

The Spring Flowers Setting for March

It is the very best to think about spring.
Here in Utah, it isn't quite spring yet, but the snow is
melting fast, and up close to the house it is all gone.

I love to play with dishes.  Many of my dishes come from my mother
who also loved dishes!  My grandmother loved dishes too!
Much of my collection comes from them, but from time to time
I add to this collection from our modern world.

I have loved to set the table with pretty dishes since
 I was a child.

I know that I have learned this from my mother, who
always made the dinner table something special.

She was a woman of culture, she grew up in Germany, and
 her mother was from a Royal German line.  I think that at her home 

there always was coffee set out in beautiful china, with silverware,

and awesome food.

Over the years this art really has been lost. We go out to eat,
or we bring home take out food, and who would think of setting

 out the china for such a meal.

Well, probably my mother. 

But for the rest of us, we just don't think in 

those terms.

I have over the years collected dishes, not china, I have some,
but mostly different sets of dishes.  My mother somewhat looked
down on the dishes I started to collect, as they are heavy and
thick.  She always loved the thin-ness of fine china.
She never liked to drink out of a coffee cup with a
thick rim.  It was important to her that the rim was thin.

I on the other hand love dishes.  It doesn't matter to me if they are
thick or thin.  I just simply love them.

I love to mix and match them, and set the table with some sort
of elegance to the setting.

I love the ambiance of it,  Dana teases me, that the food doesn't taste

any different when you eat off a paper plate or off nice dishes.
But, somehow in my silly mind,  the food does taste better!

So....
I continue to set the table with nice dishes, just for myself!

I love to share the colors of one plate with another,

and then layer my plates on top of all these fun colors.

Here we are setting the table with pastels,

but with a bright place mat.

The floral dishes I just brought home,

they were my mothers, she passed away

just a year ago.

I used a white on white dinner plate,

pink on white salad bowl,

and the spring flowers dishes.

Pink goblets, and just my nicer

flat ware, the ones I purchased after

the kids left home.

(no more digging in the dirt outside to lose the matches)

My sister wanted the same set of dishes,

but it was my turn to choose, so I shared the set with her.

She got the dinner plates, demi tea cups, and a serving platter,

I took the salad plates and the covered casserole dish.

I thought how fun,

we can both have spring dishes

and a part of mom in our homes this spring and all the

springs to come.

I was with my mom when she purchased these dishes.

At the same time, we were newly wed, I bought

strawberry dishes, and I eventually gave them to her

when she wallpapered her kitchen with strawberries.

My dad still to this day uses them

as his everyday dishes.

It is just so fun to put a table out on the porch,

cover the table with white lace linens,

and then add layers of table cloths until you achieve the 

look you are wanting.

I have a stash of table cloths,

that I pull out all year long.

They are used over and over again,

with covering the kitchen table to setting these

fun breakfast or lunch settings for

Dana and I.

The spring bulb arrangement is one of my fav's.

I pull it out every spring.  As March comes a part of our lives
I bring it out because soon these same bulbs will start to
pop out of the ground and bring happy smiles to my yard.

I am starting a series of table setting posts to inspire
you to bring spring to your everyday table.

As a newly married couple, we would watch my mom
set the table for my dad for lunch.  Just her and dad would sit down
together and eat off beautiful dishes enjoying their lunch.

Dad was always dressed in his work clothes from the fish farm,
but that never stopped mom from making life beautiful.

Thank you Mom for teaching me this.
It is a great legacy to continue as Dana and I are
both retired and we too enjoy lunch and dinner from a
beautifully set table.

Ciao,

Robin