Something to be proud of...

I made a vow nearly three years ago that I would treat the DEB to a trip to China for our joint birthday in August 2012. It's been a challenge, but I've done it! I have squirreled away all my pounds and random pence for the better part of a year and a half, and I have just today made the final payment on our mega-excursion to the Far East!


It is a wonderful and much-needed sense of achievement. I set my mind to it, and I did it! Despite my constant and ongoing struggle to find consistent work. 


I did it. 


And, it was worth all the blood, sweat and tears to see the DEB's face on New Year's Eve, when he opened his fortune cookie to find that he would be going on a holiday of a lifetime! It's something he's always wanted to do, and I thought, why not, I'm going to make that happen for him!


That's not to say I'm not looking forward to it, too. China has definitely been on my "Must Go To" list, as well, although right now, I must say, I'd love a holiday somewhere hot and sunny, with a beach and a pool!


But, I sure this trip will be unforgettable. It already has been. Sometimes, it's the little victories in life that mean the most.

A gentle madness

"If you want a golden rule that will fit everything, this is it: Have nothing in your house that do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful."

 - William Morris, British craftsman/designer, whose designs generated the Arts and Crafts Movement in England (1834-1896)

It always grieved my father much that I was never a woman of property. He hated the way in which my 'scholarly vagabond' career led me from pillar to post of one rented house, flat or apartment to the next:

 "At the end of it all, all you have to show for yourself is a rent receipt," he would often remind me, from behind his newspaper.

The fact that I'd landed in Manhattan, the most expensive city in the universe -- where no one stands a chance of owning property, unless your last name is Astor, Morgan,  or Rockefeller -- made very little difference to my father's opinion.

I wish that he could have lived to see me finally become a "woman of property." Still, I'm sure, absolutely sure that he knows, and is very, very happy about it.

The DEB and I are very near to closing the deal on our new house here on Barford. I am thrilled beyond belief, and of course, like any sensible girl in the circumstances, my thoughts have turned to decorating!

Without a doubt, first on the agenda is: china/crockery.

Finally, I will have the space, range and freedom to indulge my life-long obsession with china/porcelain /pottery, particularly of the blue and white variety.

Obsessions are funny things. Either you get them, or you don't. If you're not a fan of "Blue & White china", there is no way of explaining or convincing you of this obsession is like, or about. 

But, if you are a Blue and White china fan, you will understand completely the relentless drive of this addiction. The palm sweating, knee wobbling, heart racing delirium of it all.

Of course, every obsession is like this, and for me (thankfully), I have precious few: books, china, and fabric (primarily for quilting). 

Being a collector, of whatever variety, is a wonderful way of seeing the world.  A few years back, I had an amazing trip to Japan, and while there I filled my suitcases with blue and white pottery and a gorgeous, broad swath of hand-dyed indigo fabric.

I have dragged these things around the globe with me, boxed and stored. They will finally now have pride of place in our new home.  

When I was living in NYC, the book obsession held full sway, now, it is time for china to reign! Every Southern Belle knows the importance of having a new set of china for your new home. So, let the games begin!

England is of course the mothership for the porcelain and pottery mad. Wedgwood, Johnson Brothers, Burleigh, Royal Doulton, Churchill, etc. and the big guns of the crockery world are based here. 

However, I have found, in my most recent explorations that the Brits seem far less inclined toward the "sets," or multi-piece "services" than Americans are. We, Yanks, like to get as much "bang for our buck" as we can, and have very little patience for building a china set one plate at a time...

No surprise than, after trawling the depths of the internet, I succumbed to the superior offerings of a American antique china retailer in North Carolina. Southern know-how wins again!

The pattern I have selected is Wedgwood/Johnson Brothers' "Asiatic Pheasants." 

To accommodate this new pattern, I'm going to sell on eBay the china set I bought just before I left New York: Johnson Brothers "Old Britain Castles" in pink. 

Pink? Yes, pink. I don't know who I was trying to fool with that one! I'm a blue and white girl through and through!  

Useful Blue and white links:

Lovers of Blue and White - www.blueandwhite.com

Burleigh - www.burleigh.co.uk

Wedgwood - www.wedgwood.com

Blue Monday: Sniffles and My First Faux Pas

Have come to the end of a very blue Monday. I’m battling what is either a bad case of hay fever/allergies, or a cold. Whichever, it has brought with it a quite annoying ringing in my left ear.  All of this has me longing for the comfortable familiarity of my former home. Drugstore giants Duane Reade and CVS were never far away. In my little corner of the Greenwich Village, there were in fact three (3) large Duane Reade stores less than 7 minutes walk from my apartment. Out here, in the rural Warwickshire countryside, Boots – a wonderfully elegant alternative to Duane Reade or CVS, more akin to Target -- is a half hour bus ride to Stratford-upon-Avon, or a 20 minute bus ride to Warwick. Ugh. Thank God, then, for Sainsbury’s, and of course, the D.E.B.

But, access to a drugstore (chemist’s) is only part of the problem. On days like today, and I think whenever one is under the weather, or “poorly,” one hankers for the familiar. I need/want remedies and cures that I know, love and trust. Heaven knows there is probably no difference whatsoever between Benadryl and Benalyn, or Nurofen and Advil. As Shakespeare wrote, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose, by any other name, would smell just as sweet.” Now, I love the Bard more than most, so I have always taken his words to heart, but sometimes, when a girl needs Tylenol, just she needs Tylenol!

All this has made me think I should have done a better job of greasing the wheels in New York City, and convinced someone, anyone, to send me routine care packages full of American necessities: any and every variety of Tylenol; Popcorn, Indiana - Gourmet Popcorn (Sea Salt flavor, mmm…); TIDE laundry detergent; Lysol spray, (“Crisp Linen” scent); real Diet Coke, Nutter Butters, and a manicurist.

But, a part of acclimatizing, is, well, … acclimatizing. So, I’m sure the British remedies will do their best.  

Committed my first faux pas this weekend. At the St. Peter’s-C of E  “Harvest Supper,” no less. Thankfully, I did not, as I was wont in the ‘90’s, get drunk and start performing a karaoke rendition of Madonna’s “Like a Virgin”. No, this infringement was far worse. Suffice it to say, the lesson I learned, the hard, but utterly polite way, was that most Britons over the age of 60 have not yet “forgiven” Wallis Simpson, and still view her as a “selfish, American, two-time divorcee from Baltimore.” Yikes.  And, I made the mistake of feeling the need to “stand up for my fellow countrywoman.”  Double Yikes.

Don’t you just hate that awkward silence that happens after you’ve said something truly asinine?  You can just see and feel that metaphoric tumbleweed drifting slowly across the room. Realizing I had rushed in, where a more angelic—or at least more sensible—woman would have feared to tread, I attempted to dig myself out of the hole I was in, by musing, “Well, for whatever else, she (Wallis Simpson) certainly had incredible style.” The women around the table had to agree with me.  The tumbleweed cleared, and we were all friends again. Phew!

In the end, it was a truly incredible evening. The D.E.B. and I actually had a super time, and even led our table to victory in the “Search Your Pockets & Your Handbag” relay. A miracle, really, given that Mavis on table 3, had us stumped when she was able to produce the requisite “unworn pair of tights.” (Don’t ask.) Ah, the English and their “party games.” (As if I don’t already carry enough useless items in my last season’s Kate Spade!)

We, the victors on the “top table,” celebrated our win with an extra bottle of red wine and a huge tin of choccies (chocolates).  In the midst of this afterglow, the very dear gentleman, with whom I had had my Wallis Simpson impasse, smiled broadly across the table from me, and reminded me that Winston Churchill’s mother was American. He then leaned forward, as if to indicate a shift to a more serious tone, looked me straight me the eye, and said with great earnestness, “We are all pulling for Obama, you know.”

The American presidential election, so remote and distant as it sometimes feels and seems (I must say, I’m pleased to have avoided the “party games” that seem to be running amok in the States right now), this moment reminded me that there is no remoteness, no distance in our world.  Whatever our differences of time, place, age or opinion, our collective destinies are, and have always been linked. America has had, and continues to have, a significant impact on British history, culture and life. More than we Americans are even aware of sometimes. 

p.s. Spent the evening unpacking countless boxes that just arrived from New York. After wading through mountains upon mountains of bubble wrap, and those dreadful, dreadful “plastic peanuts,” I am painfully aware that, true to my Southern belle upbringing, I have accumulated an unreasonable amount of china, silver and stemware -- the way some people collect stamps, or rocks. 

p.s.s. D.E.B. sits across the room from me as I type. He is strumming away softly on his guitar. He is so talented and creative. [Between us we have amassed five (5) violins, two (2) mandolins (both his), two (2) guitars (both his), and one (1) cello (mine). We are more musically stockpiled than the Von Trapp family in The Sound of Music! ] Sitting here, watching and listening to him, my thoughts drift… how magic it would be to create life with this man. This man, so like me—same birthday—and yet so different.