I’m a person who enjoys a challenge, so it doesn’t take much for me to pick up the proverbial glove when it comes to a tablescaping dare. Cuisine Kathleen and friends, here’s my take on the All-White Tablescape Challenge — the Falling in Love with White and Gold Tablescape!
The rules were pretty simple. The challenge was to use ONLY WHITE dishes, and ONE other color for linens , silverware or whatever. The charger could be in the accent color. Continue reading
I thought this was pretty funny when I saw it at Target.
What person wants to fill a vase with corks from wine they didn’t actually drink? It doesn’t make any sense to me.
This is a new low in our immediate gratification society.
I think this is worthy of a bless my heart, and I’m not even southern.
The Eiffel Tower is lit up at night on the hour and twinkles merrily for about five minutes. It’s worth the wait.
I’m linking up with Travel Photo Monday” at Travel Photo Discovery, Wordless Wednesday at Moving Through Life, and “Travel Photo Thursday” at Budget Travelers Sandbox, so stop by and get some more inspiration for your travel bucket list!
Got my bags, got my reservations,
Spent each dime I could afford.
Like a child in wild anticipation,
I long to hear that, “All aboard!”
Music and lyrics by Bud Green, Les Brown and Ben Homer (1944)
Nestled on a busy corner in downtown Des Plaines, Illinois, Dotombori Sushi Bar’s meek exterior does not match the very good food being served inside. With an average 4 out of 5 star review and a personal recommendation from my daughter, my friends and I decided to try out lunch at Dotombori.
We chose the lunch special, a good buy at $7.95, and ordered a couple of the rolls as well. The tempura vegetables were crisp and the rolls were well-seasoned and well-made. The only mistake was the deep-fried pork; I didn’t look carefully on the dinner menu to see what the different entrees were before I made my bento box choice. The pork was overdone and I only ate a small portion of it.
Bento Box Lunch Special includes Chicken Teriyaki, vegetable tempura, California roll, shrimp tempura, and fried rice
Bento Box Lunch Special includes Pork Tonkatsu, Vegetable Tempura, California Roll, Shrimp Tempura, and steamed rice.
Shrimp Crunch and California Rolls
Spider Roll — Soft Shell Crab and Avocado
We live in an area with good sushi bars just around lots of corners. Dotombori Sushi was a good choice for lunch, and if we went again, I would choose a different entree. My dining partners were happy with their meals and it was a good experience. I would encourage you to visit Dotombori if you are in Des Plaines. It can also be easily reached from the Des Plaines Metra station.
Got my bags, got my reservations,
Spent each dime I could afford.
Like a child in wild anticipation,
I long to hear that, “All aboard!”
Music and lyrics by Bud Green, Les Brown and Ben Homer (1944)
Convito Cafe and Market in Wilmette, Illinois
Convito Cafe and Market in Wilmette’s Plaza del Lago shopping district is a long-time favorite on Chicago’s north shore. Under the direction of Nancy Brussat Barocci since its inception in 1980, the Convito brand has grown and changed with the years under Brussat’s capable leadership. Now partnered with her daughter, Candace Barocci Warner, the Convito Cafe and Market continues to offer a warm welcome to diners and shoppers looking for regional European specialties with a focus on French and Italian cuisines. In addition to its traditional restaurant, the Wilmette location also offers a market featured prepared foods for take-out and fresh pastas, breads, cheeses, wines, and sauces.
On a recent visit to the Convito Cafe, my friend and I ordered four items from the appetizer menu for our lunch.
Fried calamari – crispy, tender squid with zesty cocktail sauce
Bruschetta – mozzarella fresca, fresh tomatoes & basil warmly sautéed in extra virgin olive oil
Onion soup gratin française – rich broth baked in a crock with gruyere & parmigiano reggiano topped with crispy onions
Summer crab cake with a corn-radish-lime relish & roasted red pepper coulis
We accompanied our meal with a nice rose and a light white; the wine list was appropriate for the summer season and individual glasses of wine were priced reasonably. All of our meal items were perfectly prepared and served with lovely garnishes and presentation. Convito Cafe and Market offers a refreshing and satisfying visit to the countryside cuisines of Italy and France and is highly recommended.
Got my bags, got my reservations,
Spent each dime I could afford.
Like a child in wild anticipation,
I long to hear that, “All aboard!”
Music and lyrics by Bud Green, Les Brown and Ben Homer (1944)
Sticks and stones may break my bones, but names will never hurt me. Such a ridiculous saying, as we all know that words and name-calling can hurt very much. Today, however, is about a happier set of sticks and stones — the Sticks and Stones Tablescape.
Mixing the colors and textures of wood and stone in a tablescape brings the harmony of nature to your table.
Every year about this time, I pull out the beautiful crocheted tablecloth that transitions my table between summer and fall. The muted grey-brown of the cloth reminds me of summer vacations in Michigan, collecting Petosky stones on a sandy beach.
The pull of autumn brings with it the sturdier browns of fall campfires and walks in the woods. The crocheted tablecloth plays peek-a-boo with the bare wood of the table, and the wooden tray anchors the centerpiece.
The items in the centerpiece echo the colors — grey stones, an amber glass cruet, an olive wood grinder from Provence, and creamy candles that reflect the soft white of the hydrangeas.
It’s not a tablescape in my house without some bargain treasure hunting, so these Waverly napkins from Tuesday Morning were the perfect find to complement my sticks and stones colors. The flowers have more “sticks” on them!
Needless to say, these napkin rings from a local thrift shop jumped into my cart.
Pewter chargers and grandma’s silver…
The perfect napkin and napkin ring…
The glint of gold from the fruit bowl…
The amber plates and the Murano glass goblets weave an autumn spell…
Nature’s beauty is repeated in the floral center and design on the rim of the accent plate …
The waves of the lake show up in the Pfaltzgraff Filigree pattern on the plates.
The transition from summer’s light to autumn’s dark builds a comforting tablescape for a beautiful September day. Only happy memories are served up at this Sticks and Stones Tablescape!
I’m taking a break right now for my son’s wedding, but I encourage you to visit my regular linky parties to see some lovely photos and get some creative inspiration for your tables: Let’s Dish with Cuisine Kathleen, Open House Party with No Minimalist Here, Inspire Me Tuesday at A Stroll Thru Life, and Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch. I hope you’ll leave a comment today and let me know you were here!
Got my bags, got my reservations,
Spent each dime I could afford.
Like a child in wild anticipation,
I long to hear that, “All aboard!”
Music and lyrics by Bud Green, Les Brown and Ben Homer (1944)
It’s that time again — school’s back in session and teachers are doing their jobs with skill and love. It’s time to say thank you to the teachers of the world, whether it’s a public school or home school teacher, a religious education teacher, or a sports or music teacher. Every teacher deserves an apple, so today I’m featuring my An Apple for the Teacher Tablescape.
Although I’ve always loved to set my table with pretty things and have fun collections of dishware and linens, until I started tablescaping for Got My Reservations I never really thought about what went into creating the perfect set-up. Why do some settings work and others don’t? I’ve learned that buying strong, versatile basic pieces will take you a long way. It’s like school; if the student understands the basics, he or she can build from there.
This tablescape started with a collection of beaded fruit that I’ve used many times throughout my house. It’s perfect for the transitional time in the fall between Halloween and Christmas because it has some sparkle, but it’s muted. I knew it was also perfect for this table. A friend gave me this red bowl from Crate and Barrel a few years ago, and I’ve used it for every “red” season since. It’s a basic, versatile piece.
I wanted to use these della Robbia-style napkins and grabbed the beaded napkin rings I picked out of the sale bin at World Market last spring. I had decided that I didn’t want to go full-out with the matching tablecloth, so when I saw this table runner at Marshall’s I knew I had a winner. It’s got texture and color while still being subtle. Another basic piece that I can use over and over again.
The people in the store probably thought I was a crazy lady as I stood in front of the clearance items and practically cackled over FINALLY finding the perfect footed cloche on sale. I have been looking for one of these for months since I was featured at Marty’s cloche-fest at A Stroll Thru Life — featured for using a real cloche, which is the French word for bell. The Marshall’s cloche was only two dollars off, but I declared victory. I put the perfect apple in the perfect cloche and now I have another piece to add variety in the heights of my centerpieces — a basic tenet of tablescaping.
Once the theme was in place, the rest of the ‘scape came together quickly. The fall colors in the napkins called for the gold chargers and my mother-in-law’s collection of Murano glass goblets. I pulled the Pfalzgraff Filigree off the shelf again, as the stoneware blends well with the sacking fabric of the runner.
Adding the red sparkly accent plates to my collection has also turned out to be a winning choice. I use them over and over again and the modern circle design adds another texture to the stack with the rectangular design on the chargers, the filigree design on the plates, and the gentle slopes of the lotus bowls. Of course, one can never go wrong with using Grandma’s silver, so out came the Gorham Chantilly. It just sings along with all of the other textures and designs on this table.
For the final accents, I added a cranberry glass decanter that picks up both the red and the gold, and silver candlesticks. Music Man was very distressed last week when he broke one of the red votives for the candlesticks, but I was able to replace it at half price at Hobby Lobby. Another score for me and another basic for the tablescaping closet restored.
After I photographed this table, I realized that I had forgotten a very important apple from my collection — the one I received as a parting gift when I retired from my school district. I put it under the cloche where it belongs and rephotographed with my trusty iPhone. A golden apple for this retired teacher…
I’ve been trying to work ahead on my tablescaping and photography as I will be having a knee replacement in late October and won’t be able to shop from my stash to set up the tables for a while. I’m having a hard time taking down this tablescape, though. It just glimmers in the afternoon sun and sends a very happy message to our empty nest.
I’m linking up this week at Let’s Dish with Cuisine Kathleen, Open House Party with No Minimalist Here, Inspire Me Tuesday at A Stroll Thru Life, and Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch. Be sure to visit these creative bloggers for lovely photos and inspiration.
Got my bags, got my reservations,
Spent each dime I could afford.
Like a child in wild anticipation,
I long to hear that, “All aboard!”
Music and lyrics by Bud Green, Les Brown and Ben Homer (1944)
I had a July birthday this summer. Again. I threw myself a party. Again. Since my birthday is inevitable and I love throwing parties, I decided to create a set of linens that would work with my three outdoor tables and that I would love to use on my birthday and possibly other times throughout the year. The Outside Inside Tablescape idea was born.
As I was thinking about family this week, remembering that August 22 would have been my mother’s 83rd birthday, I decided to memorialize my parents by a trip through our travel memory lane. My father took all of the old slides with pictures of my brothers and me and converted them to photos. He gave us a photo scrapbook of all of these photos and they are a precious treasure trove that chronicles our growing up and our travels.
This is a personal journey that I’m making today, so if you’re not family or a really good friend, you may find you want to skip my grainy photolog. 🙂 Or maybe you have a similar set of photos in your closet that you’re willing to share …
Flower Garden at Mount Vernon
Although there are lots of photos of me as a baby, it appears that we mostly stayed home or visited family in my early years. My father annotated the backs of the photos and he thought this first one was taken in about 1957 at Mount Vernon, George Washington’s home in Virginia. I turned five that summer and my brother was two. Since Dad was a teacher, we often took extended driving trips in the summer, dragging a variety of camping trailers behind us.
Here’s a more current version of the garden at Mount Vernon.
My dad’s side of the family was from Cincinnati and we used to go to visit relatives fairly frequently. A visit to the Cincinnati Zoo was a treat, and Dad could not resist taking a leggy photo of Mom. Since she’s not pregnant here, this is probably about 1957.
Next on the memory lane is me at John Bryan State Park in western Ohio. Dad says this photo was taken about 1958. We always used to go on a fall color trip every year.
We visited the Ross County Historical Society Museum, in Chillicothe, Ohio.
My grandparents lived near Kansas City, so we sometimes visited them there. We also must have made a visit to the Harry S. Truman Library in about 1958.These two photos appear to be taken from about the same spot, but the second (professional) one has a lot more polish and landscaping!
Every Easter Sunday, after church we would go to what we called Mrs. Aull’s Garden (apparently we weren’t the only people) and take photos in our fancy clothes. My youngest brother is about two here, so it’s probably 1961.
Those yellow blobs on the hill behind us are all daffodils!
The hillside of daffodils still exists, and can be seen here via these copyrighted photos. Aullwood Garden Metropark is still a beautiful place to visit in Englewood, Ohio.
With our little family of five complete and mobile, we began to travel further afield.
And I began to get into those awkward years.
Rocky Mountain High
Occasionally my mom took a picture, but she didn’t seem to get the knack of focusing either.
In 1964, we went to the World’s Fair in New York. My husband, who had a traveling childhood similar to mine, remembers that they served $2.00 hamburgers and everyone thought that was highway robbery!
We went back to Mount Vernon…
… and to Monticello.
I fell in love with the Appalachian Mountains all over again in 1967.
By the time I was sixteen, I had pretty much stopped traveling with my parents and was working during the summer to save money for college. The love of travel that they instilled in me never went away, however, and it’s a rare day that doesn’t find me dreaming about the next reservation to travel I’m going to make.
I’m linked up today to Wanderlust Wednesday at Time Travel Plans, The Tablescaper for “Oh, The Places I’ve Been”, Travel Photo Monday” at Travel Photo Discovery, and “Travel Photo Thursday” at Budget Travelers Sandbox, so stop by and get some more inspiration for your travel bucket list!
Got my bags, got my reservations,
Spent each dime I could afford.
Like a child in wild anticipation,
I long to hear that, “All aboard!”
Music and lyrics by Bud Green, Les Brown and Ben Homer (1944)
“The things you do for yourself are gone when you are gone, but the things you do for others remain as your legacy.”
― Kalu Ndukwe Kalu
Did I tell you about our family reunion this year? We’ve been having family reunion weekends annually for thirty-one years. Although not everyone comes every year, we have decided that if we don’t have the reunion annually, it could easily die a quick death and we don’t want that to happen. One of the gifts of having an annual reunion is seeing one’s younger relatives grow up and prosper — especially the children. This year, my cousin asked me to photograph her five grandchildren while at the reunion, and with some trepidation, I said I would. They were adorable and I got some fun pictures that expressed the children’s personalities, even though I’m an amateur photographer. As a thank you for my time, my cousin sent me a beautiful flower arrangement, and today’s sunflower tablescape was inspired by her thoughtful gift.
As I started to put together the elements of the tablescape that would complement the sunflowers, I didn’t really think I had enough yellow to make it work. Then I took a trip to the linen closet, where I found the coordinating placemats and napkins with yellow stripes and checks. It was still pretty pastel and the napkins carried a lot of pink, so I added a few pink-tipped carnations from the grocery store to the arrangement.
Then I began shopping for dishes in the cupboards. Of course, I had to start with my signature style — using grandma’s china and silver. This pattern, Stanwyck by Noritake, belonged to my next door neighbor and when she died, her kids gave me the entire set. The fragile blue and gold filigree pattern balances the bold orange and yellows of the Quimper salad plate.
While reading blogs this morning, I saw a post from Dawn at We Call It Junkin where she used her corn on the cob plates in her design. Brilliant, I said to myself, and since imitation is the highest form of flattery, I added my white stoneware corn dishes to the table with their yellow corn stickers. Who said I didn’t have any yellow stuff in my stash?
After that it was easy — just pull more French pottery from my collection courtesy of my beloved mother-in-law, including the Quimper candy dish filled with dark chocolate coated almonds, a pair of candlesticks, and a French butterfly. I added our wedding crystal, silver napkin rings, and my Gorham Trilogy flatware and got out the camera.
Voila! A sunny tablescape inspired by the sunflowers of southern France and enhanced by my collection of French faience. I’m pretty sure my mother-in-law would have loved the whole thing, and I miss her most at this time of the year because she’s not there to share the family reunion with us. Family is a true gift that cannot be underestimated or forgotten.
I’m linking up this week at Let’s Dish with Cuisine Kathleen for the Summer Fun Challenge, Open House Party with No Minimalist Here, and Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch. Be sure to visit these creative bloggers for lovely photos and inspiration.
Got my bags, got my reservations,
Spent each dime I could afford.
Like a child in wild anticipation,
I long to hear that, “All aboard!”
Music and lyrics by Bud Green, Les Brown and Ben Homer (1944)
