Here are a few quick pics from a recent gathering of friends I had at my home. Nothing was special ordered (no banners from etsy or spoons with stripes or polka dots), I used things I already owned and decided it would be fine. To start I'll say that I love a crisp white linen cloth and napkins so that's generally the starting point. Rarely do we have a social gathering and use paper. Most of you know that I love silver serving pieces and have collected many through the years and I use them all the time. I buy what I love but I also use what I love too. Why hide it away or save it for special occasions.
The picture below is of the tomato basil soup shooters I served. They were garnished with Parmesan cheese and a thin bread stick. Believe it or not months ago I needed glass shot glasses for a another horderve and found these clear glass ones at the dollar store (six in a package for a dollar and yes they are glass). They have been very handy and held many different horderves since I have purchased them.
Another view of the soup shooters, one of the sets of china I used and in the background you can see the scones.
This was a girlie evening, so pimento cheese and cucumber finger sandwiches were served to accompany the tomato soup shooters. Yes that is a mouse on the pimento cheese sandwiches, I usually put them on a cheese board.
Scones!!! I hate when I have scones in the house, but the event called for them so scones, mascarpone cream (no time to find Clotted Cream, my town is tiny and I had no time to make any...give me a break!), and orange marmalade. LOVE, LOVE, LOVE!!! I had the roses in the house and only added a dozen or so to the mix and kind of threw together a few arrangements and finished up with pulling out my juliska bud vases and adding roses here and there.
I personally like Harney & Sons tea (the Paris flavor is my fave), and had some out, but once again my tiny town does not have a huge selections so Bigelow it was. It was about the evening and friends so I knew everyone would understand.
Closer look: the china I used for this evening was Lenox (Citation Gold) and Nikko (Empress). All the silver in this picture was actually found on different trips to the Round Top Antique show and looked nothing like this when I found them. Keep you eyes open for tarnished and blackened silver pieces, I usually get the best deals and all they need is a little time and a lot of polish. I have been asked lately how many times a year do I polish my silver. I have tarnishing strips in the silver cabinet and some pieces that do get stored do go into dust bags, but honestly my pieces are polished twice a year (spring before Easter and November before holidays). Oh and I don't do the polishing, it's usually Pookie and this year another sweet girl helped Pookie and they did all of it in about six hours. They were INCREDIBLE!
I didn't put these in great order (it's late and raining and I've been trying to cut back on my diet cokes). Any who... with the tiny sandwiches and soup shooters the dessert were all tiny as well. mini cupcakes, cheesecakes and cookies. You have to be careful with all that adorable tiny food... "its so cute and little...oh crap I ate five mini cupcakes!"
Have a great week. Don't forget my Round Top shopping tours (post below this one, email for details)... great place to find silver! Actually it's a great place to find anything...