Birthdays. Cold Cake. The Long Life of Beautiful Things.

I am eating cold cake  left over from Leo's 11th birthday party.   Yesterday also would have been my grandmother Colligan's Birthday 101.  We were supposed to go to her 90th birthday party in 2004 but instead, Leo was born. Today is my beloved Aunt Helen Fehrenbach's 88th birthday and she has passed many of her mother's tableware onto me. I am lucky to have some beautiful porcelain, crystal and cut glass dishes that once belonged to both 'Grandma Colligan' and Aunt Helen.

For as long as I can remember, I have been drawn to old dishes and glasses. One of my earliest memories is of an antique washing basin and pitcher that stood at the end of the hall at Grandma Colligan's. I loved drinking tea from Grandma Fehrenbach's floral English tea cups. As a young woman in Burlington, VT I purchased my first vintage piece - a purple Lustreware teapot and sugar bowl.  I smashed the tea pot in a fit one day, but had the sugar bowl for years and it gave me such pleasure to look at it. Over the years I have acquired many a sparkling old cordial glass and a number of colorful depression era dessert bowls. It's a beautiful sight to see these mismatched beauties scattered across the long table at the end of a summer porch dinner party. The Italian blue stemmed antique wine glasses break one by one as the years and the parties roll on.

All of this to say that an aesthetic appreciation for these old bits of clay and melted sand has been in me for a very long time but something has happened - something I don't understand - something wild in me has been unleashed and I CAN'T STOP COLLECTING these gorgeous things.

 My personal aesthetic tends towards monkish - I like to shave my head and wear a lot of gray so it is a little confusing how deeply moved I am by the sheer prettiness  of these things. But so it goes.

I am happy to announce that the lovely Maura of Cape Cod won the March Give-Away of the charming vintage peacock brooch.  Please subscribe to be automatically entered ALWAYS into my give-aways.  June Give-Away: Antique Limoges Trinket Dish.