My First Silver Sunday Party...Whoohoo!

This is exciting! I am finally going to join Beth's silver party at http://thegypsyfish.blogspot.com/. But of course I will not abandon the other parties so after you visit Beth, go see

Sally at http://smilingsally.blogspot.com/

Susan at http://betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/

Mary at http://dearlittleredhouse.blogspot.com/

Let's all have fun and go there!

John's patient was selling this vintage sterling Poole 6 piece silver set. He came to the house to show me but after I saw the price tag (over $5000), I looked at the tray but I did not even bother to unwrap the tea and coffee set to look at them. I knew they were out of my price range. But, he went to see dh at the clinic and told him he will give them to us for $1500 since that was the offer he got from the antique shop downtown. He said he would rather sell it to us than to them. John asked me if the set is worth that price.

So I went to work. I searched Ebay and found a set selling for $4999 and a 3 piece set (no tray) for almost $3000 and a 5 piece set (no tray) for over $3000. I told him they are definitely worth what he is selling them to us for. The tray alone is huge and heavy, almost 30 inches long so you can imagine how big this set is. I don't even know where to put it permanently.

Anyway, dh was not convinced yet so he checked Replacements.com for himself only to find out that the replacement value is almost $7000. I know Replacement is always overpriced but I think the deal was still good. To make a long story short, we bought the set and it is sitting on the breakfast nook right now.

Take a look at the design on the tray, very ornate.

and here is the whole set, a tray, coffee pot, tea pot, waste bin, sugar and creamer, all of them marked "sterling" and "Poole 990" at the bottom. The pattern is Lancaster Rose.
Do you see that little strip on the handle? Did you all know what it is for? I just found out and I wonder if I was the only one who did not know its purpose. It's to keep the handle from getting hot.



I copied this picture on Ebay and they have it listed for $4999.00.
I also have this Victorian EPNS marked silver plated set. I have posted this set before when I used it as a centerpiece on one of my past tablescapes.
I just love the bird finials.
teapot
Coffee pot
love the etching on the body

Last but not least, I am showing you our Sheffield coffee pot. It has an ivory finial and has ivory strips on the handle too to prevent it from getting too hot to handle when there is hot fluid inside.

Ok now for Metamorphosis Monday....... just take a look at how the breakfast nook used to be before the pool was built.

I replaced the valance with one with blue plaid. And you can see the pool from the windows. See the blue water?

I brought the orchids in because it was freezing last night again.

and I added this ivy topiary. Isn't it pretty? I bought 2 and I wish I bought more because they were on clearance at $5 each. I know the ivy is hardy because of all the hanging plants I have on the porch, the only 2 live ones now that did not freeze are the ivy.

Thanks for coming and now, let's all go visit our gracious hostesses!

Vicksburg, MS and Cream & Pink Colored Cymbidiums

I can't believe it is weekend again and you know what that means! Yep, it's Pink and Sightseeing Saturday!

For Pink Saturday, which is hosted by Beverly of http://howsweetthesound.typepad.com/my_weblog/, I would like to show you my Cymbidium plant. I believe it is in the orchid family. Can you just see that lovely cream with different shades of pink flower? I found it at Sam's and I just had to have it.

Make sure you visit Beverly for more beautiful pinks.

I placed it temporarily in the foyer for now because it is supposed to be cold this weekend.
Eventually, it will end up either on the back porch or the pool deck.

Hope you like the flowers as much as I do.

And now for Sightsseing Sat., I would like to take you to one of our neighboring cities. My sis, her daughter and kids usually visit during summers. We took them to Vicksburg, which is a very historical place on one of their visits, . There is a battleground there but we still have to visit it someday.

The building below is a railroad station and behind it is the Mississippi River.

Aren't these pretty crape myrtles? I think they will qualify for Pink Sat. too.

We visited the doll house museum.

Pretty Shirley Temple dolls.

Aren't the "Little Rascals" just so cute?

There was also a playground nearby and the kids really enjoyed playing on the wet deck.

the casino

In the hotel lobby, the kids were trying to be proper like Southerners, lol.

I am a bit overwhelmed again, hosting a dinner party Friday night and then I have to pack for my coming trip to Florida. The trip also means I have to do some advance postings cause I do not want to miss coming parties like Laurie's Valentine Party and Marty's Cloche Party. So, I hope you did not mind this short trip. Thanks for coming. And thanks, Beverly for another fun pink weekend.

Blue But Not Sad

My favorite event is here since I get to play with my toys. Thanks to Susan of http://betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/, this is made possible for us dishaholics. Go ahead and visit here and you will see what I mean.

Before Christmas, J and I met a Filipino family while at church. Believe it or not, this is the first Filipino family I ever saw here since we moved so you can just imagine how excited we got. We waited in the back of the church after the ceremony to approach them. We've been socializing with each other since then.

Last Sunday, we had them for dinner and this was how I set the table. We used the kitchen table because our formal dining room table was already set for our next dinner party, which is scheduled for this coming Friday.

I used 2 shapes of Polish pottery dinner plates, round and heart. Most Filipinos are not salad eaters so I served soup and therefore added bowls on top of the plates. I also have 2 shapes, round and heart. You will notice the lace plate chargers I bought from JC Penney's about 2 years ago.
I did not really have much room to do a centerpiece so I just placed a little candle and a thin vase with white flowers.
I used a bamboo flatware with an Asian and casual feel.

Toile napkins and duck napkin rings. The goblets were pretty cheap, $1.99 each from Walmart.

I decided not to use a tablecloth, just to make the dinner on the casual side. I served chicken tinola (chicken with soup, papaya and spinach), Red snapper escabeche (fish with sweet and sour sauce), Pancit (sauteed noodles with shrimp and chicken) and of course, rice. And for dessert, we had Mocha chiffon cake, made from scratch.

Thank you for coming by for a visit. I love it when you do. Come back again anytime soon!

Party Hopping!

It's Monday and I want to join 3 parties.

Sally of http://smilingsally.blogspot.com/

Susan of http://betweennapsontheporch.blogspot.com/

Mary of http://dearlittleredhouse.blogspot.com/

But wait, since I am showing a lot of tabletops and it's almost Tuesday and I might as well join Tabletop Tuesday also, which is hosted by Barb of Grits and Glamour. To see more outstanding tabletops, go visit her at http://gritsglamour.blogspot.com/

Can you guess what this is? It's blue and it's also my contribution for Blue Monday.


Ok, I'll show a little bit more of it. Do you know what it is now?


Yep, it's a hula hoop. Can you twirl a hula hoop around you without it falling on the floor?





I can probably do about 150 turns without it falling but that's nothing compared to my sister, Tess. We were cruising in Hawaii one time and all 3 sisters joined a hula hoop contest in the ship. All the contestants' hoops have fallen (including mine) except for my sister and as the music kept going, her hula hoop kept going too. She was asked to stop and then was given another one and she had to use 2 at the same time. Again, the music gave up before her hoops did so the emcee just kept adding more and more until she had all 7 of them. Would you believe that none of them fell and the emcee just gave up, turned the music off and declared her the winner. Even I was really impressed. I couldn't believe how good she was!


I moved the game table close to the glass doors. We do not use this particular door to exit the house, we use the other one on the right. I originally moved the table so I can vacuum the rug really well but then I realized I can do my hula hooping here until I get tired of it. I thought it might be a good exercise for the legs, abdomen and hips. Maybe I should do some yoga too cause I desperately need to exercise.

Ok, now I'd like to show you some minor changes in our living room for Met Monday. You will see the lion chair pushed back all the way to the corner and some tables under the windows and 3 more occasional chairs.

This is how to used to be.

I moved the 2 smaller chairs to the dining room and moved the tables to our guest room for the grandkids.

Then, I moved the lion chair and the other one closer to the sofa to create a more cozy conversational pit. I think I like it better this way because it is less cluttered and it's making me breath better.

Janie of http://blondiesjournals.blogspot.com/ wanted to see a full picture of the painting I made for the sofa wall, so here it is. If you haven't visited Janie, you should. You will really enjoy her blog. She is an excellent writer and she has 2 gorgeous homes that she shares with us. I printed the picture from the internet and copied it so even if it is my original oil painting, the pic is not an original creation.

Since I am already showing you our living room, I might as well show the table tops that I did not show for last week's Tabletop Tuesday. This is the side table to the left of the sofa. On top of it is an astral lamp, a red Meissen compote, a celeste blue Meissen lady vase, a fairy lamp, a Sevres casket and a cherub planter I bought from a store closing downtown a half price. I won this oval marble top end table on my very first estate auction. I got a pair of them.

Below are what is on top of the end table on the right side of the sofa. It has an identical red Meissen compote, astral lamp, a Meissen boy vase, cherub porcelain and a gold crown tea light candle holder.

It was very hard to take of picture of the lamp when it is lit so here it is when turned off.

Did you notice another change here? I sewed 2 pillows using an identical material to the window swags and replaced the throw pillows that used to be there. Mamalinde from RMS was so nice to send me the material. She wouldn't even let me pay for it nor for the shipping. Thanks, Linda!

How do you like the new look?

Here are 2 wall shelves hanging on the walls dividing the foyer from the living room.

Hope you enjoyed the tour of our formal living room. Even if we do not actively use it on a regular basis since we have a very John and child proof family room with the TV and a pool view, John and I would sit in this room every now and then just to enjoy it. And sometimes, I have caught John sitting here by himself just staring and admiring it. Even when I do not see him, I know he's been here because I see the pillows messed up every now and then. He never puts anything back in place and I know it's him cause there are only 2 of us here......unless we have a ghost, lol!

Thanks for taking a virtual home tour with me.
Thnaks to our lovely hosts, Susan, Sally, Mary and Barb for all these fun parties!