China cabinet

Ya'll know how much I love Christmas, right? Well, this weekend take a peek at what I dug out of my attic....

no i have not gone crackers

Last week, I left Tommy in Winchester so that he could help our brother-in-law, London, home with furniture left over from Granny Teddy. The London Harpers live in Asheville so a quick stop off in Knoxville to drop off our china cabinet we inherited from here wasn't a big deal. I'd known for some months that the china cabinet was coming, and we made a last minute decision on Monday to leave Tommy behind a day to pack it up with London and split the hauling/truck rental with them. Our house is tiny so we originally thought we'd store the cabinet until we moved to a bigger house, but Tommy thought he'd try to squeeze it into our dining room anyway.

It baaaarrreeelllyy fits. But fits it does.

Again - I'd known the cabinet was ours for some time, but it wasn't until I got it in the house and in the dining room that I REALLY GOT EXCITED!

I didn't register for china when we got married (I'm more of a "there's beer in the fridge" kinda gal, not much of a proper hostess) and it's a good thing I didn't, because I now am the proud owner of three, count 'em, THREE sets of china (not including a full set of everydays I got from my Gran and a set of dinner/salad plates from Granny Teddy). It's all been stacked away in a Rubbermaid bin in the attic... until the other day.

here is grandmommy venable's wedding china

here is mama's everyday wedding china

here is granny teddy's plates

And they all now live HERE:

it's seriously huge. amanda said it best when she saw it: "i feel a little alice in wonderland looking at it."

I love it so much - I keep staring at it. It's so pretty! I knew I needed a china cabinet, I knew I wanted one, I knew I had one waiting for me in Winchester - but I had NO IDEA how much I would love it or how excited I would be to put all my china in it. I seriously can't wait to put out all my Christmas Spode in it next holiday season - both my grandmothers collect it and I have amassed quite an amount of it. I haven't drug it out in the past couple of years because it's a full day project to wash and put up all the everyday dishes and pull out and wash the Spode only to wash and put up all the Spode and get out the everyday dishes again (I don't usually re-wash the everydays again. It's only a quick little month-long stay in the attic, they don't get dirty. That's what I tell myself anyway...)

Next, sites and sounds from the weekend:

i self-photo with the statue downtown in front of the suntrust bank. when i was a kid i would sit on his shoulder and whisper in his ear.

here i am at a panel on blog ethics. you will all be relieved to know i blog ethically. i know because i asked. for real.

here are jenny, hilary, ames and me before the run for the schools zoo run

Gotta run now. The china cabinet needs my attention.