Monday, March 05, 2007

Monday morning

Welcome to all who have visited from The Ultimate Blog Party. I was quite late in joining the party but it is loads of fun already. Thanks to 5 Minutes For Mom for coming up with the idea. I thought my usual Sunday Afternoon Tea party would work just fine!

I was out early this morning, soon after Goodwill opened its' doors for the day. There have been two place settings of a Noritake china on the shelf for awhile which would look great with my wedding china (of which I only have five place settings). Today they would go to half price and YES, they were still there. I purchased only the two available dinner plates and two salad plates for that is all I normally use of my wedding china, anyway. I'm so pleased with them. I don't purchase much china (except tea cups!) as I have plenty right now but these has been on my "look for" list a long time. Sigh...as I've said before, you know you've been married awhile when your wedding china has been discontinued. :)

I was up until Midnight last night, reading through The Simple Home by Sharon Hanby-Robie. What a wonderful "decorating" book. There aren't a lot of pictures but it is full of information for designing a house, decorating a house, and living in a house....for simplicity and to make your home a refuge. I thoroughly enjoyed that book. I was going to send it to my daughter when I finished but instead, put it on my own bookshelf to review later. (Okay, so she won't have time to read with a new baby, anyway!).

The book reminded me of how we purchased our two formal living room sofas. At our former house, I'd decorated all in shades of reds and greens (mostly hunter green and burgundy) so when I was purchasing a sofa and love seats, I'd intended to stick with that color. After my husband and I spending a long time looking at furniture, we both fell in love with a set that had softer greens, blues and mauve in a pattern that looked like plaid. It was much more feminine looking than we'd planned to purchase but it was complimentary to the remainder of the house because it had lighter shades of the colors we already were using.

When I was looking for a living room sofa last year, I had planned to purchase a more feminine look once more. After looking again for weeks (and consulting with my daughter on the cell phone since she WAS an interior designer), we ended up with a very masculine looking "tweedy" sofa which looked like it belonged in Hemingway's parlor. I am so glad we kept looking until we both felt at peace about the decision for it is perfect in this living room. It gives the look of an English Gentleman's library which complements the very vintage feminine look of the dining room niche.

If you saw the number of decorating and design books I have on my shelves, you'll know why I have just spent part of a blog talking about a sofa, hehehe.

Now...we're off to the library to "work" the library sale this afternoon. It's the $2.00 a bag day so it is very easy to be the cashier today. My son is always scheduled for Monday afternoons since his big job is to help them break down everything from the sale. Will be back to chat tomorrow!

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

Brenda,
Saturday was the Grand Opening of the new library in my county. It began several years ago and I remember thinking "Boy, that sounds like a LONG time from now."
Well, where did the years go?
I was going to attend the opening but spent all of Saturday doing yardwork since it was such a beautiful day.
Anyway, here is the interesting part-they had a long line of people from the old library to the new...I can't remember now how far the distance is but it must be at least 2 miles.
The people passed books from hand to hand all the way to the new library-isn't that clever? I wanted to drive by and see but again, I got involved in what I was doing and didn't leave like I had planned.
The new library is much closer to my house, which is the main thing I'm excited about. I could actually ride my bike and the back way is through old neighborhoods-no busy streets.
Well, there is something else I'm excited about. The library was given a grant and so was able to purchase many, many new books. I'm hoping new books on cd and tape and new videos, as those are the main things I check out.
I hope to go see everything this Saturday with the family.
Anyway, I thought you would appreciate hearing about our new library. It was a long time coming and was much needed. Yippeee!!!!
joanna :)

Heather Anne said...

I'm so glad you got your china Brenda! You'll have to have company right away to 'break them in' - not literally, I hope! I love love love dishes! I didn't get to pick my china when we married - I had service for 14 in my hopeless chest. I love it now, but it is still not my taste. Now it just holds so many sweet memories.

I think for our 20th anniversary in 4 years I'll splurge and get the china I love - or at least 4 place settings to get me started! My trouble will be deciding on one pattern - I know it will be something old! Maybe we'll find something at an estate sale! We still are on the lookout for Bavaria's Margareta for our daughter - I keep hoping they turn up at Goodwill where my BIL dropped them off!

Brenda@CoffeeTeaBooks said...

I remember when our library was going to do some remodeling and it seemed like it would be ages before it was finished. Now an entire year has gone since the completion! Tempus does fugit.

I washed the two china dinner plates and salad plates and they look great with my other Noritake pattern. I like the mix and match look, anyway. I still love my wedding china, I wish I could find more of it cheap but once Noritake (or any other china brand) is discontinued, it automatically becomes quite expensive.

Linda said...

Thanks so much for coming to my party Brenda. I'm enjoying this partying!!
Sounds like you had a busy weekend. I love it when I find something wonderful at a bargain price. Glad you got your china.

Anonymous said...

I'm so glad that the china was still there when the big sale day arrived! God is so good!

Jenn said...

I was just stopping by for a brief visit and find that I have inadevertendly stumbled into a wonderful place! I love books as well. Old ones, new ones, children's, grown-up ones, I love the way they smell, I love getting lost in them. I love collecting them. I am definitely coming back to explore around here some more. For now, good-bye, thanks for having me! Party on!

Betty said...

Isn't it so gratifying to find just what you are looking for and then on sale! How much better can it get.......

Books seem to be taking over in our home. I probably need to discard some but they are like old friends and how do you decide which ones you can do without?