Tablescape Thursday - Father's Day Dinner

I just love Tablescape Thursdays and playing with my dishes - thanks so much Susan (Between Naps On The Porch) - for inviting us to the dish party every week! Even more fun than just playing, is the opportunity to visit the tablescapes of all the other dish players too! I always learn so much from each of you.


Here we are approaching our Father's Day table. All the men in my life love the water (ocean, river, lake, probably even mud puddles. Me too - well everything except the mud puddles!) So I decided the sailboat/beach theme would be perfect to honor their special day.


Here's another look from a different angle -- I think you can see more of the full table this way. None of the dishes, glasses or flatwear I've used here are anything I haven't posted in other tablescapes. But hopefully they look "fresh" within a new themed tablescape. I know that it's unusual for me to tablescape without a tablecloth - but for the men, I thought the grain of the wood in this old oak table looks more masculine.


Here's a closer view of one of our place settings. You can see my china has shells on it and I thought that this large shell not only picked up the theme of the china - the colors on the shell are exactly the colors on the china. I don't even remember where I got these huge shells, but I had two of them in my Summer stash, so I've used them at two of the place settings.


For the other two place settings I've used two "skinny" starfish. The soft grey of these starfish also pick up the color of grey from the china. With these, you also get a better look at the ivory damask dinner napkins.


Here's a closer look at my china pattern - I loved it when I picked it and I still love it today. The shell flatwear is not my good silver, but it matches the theme of the day.


This particular china pattern has been discontinued, but you can see it's Noritake Stanford Court. I was able to find some deals several years ago on e-bay and managed to increase my place settings to twelve.


A close-up of the cup and saucer.


It looks like I'm showing you my flatware - but what I really wanted to show, were the vintage (of course) placemats. I got four linen placemats at the antique store for $2! Now I can't get plastic placemats from K-mart for that! And these are lovely for my "manscape" - they actually even remind me of a man's handkerchief (vintage of course!)


Here's a closer look at the sailboat centerpiece. I'm using a plate stand to hold the boat and they're sitting on a picture frame with shells completing the beach look.


For just a touch of whimsey -- I've added a Virginia blue crab to the scene.


On the other side of the sailboat we see an old bottle has washed on shore with a note inside.


When we were first married we spent a lot of our vacations at my in-law's river house. My husband would put on his hip boots and go out on the low tide searching for old bottles. We have several boxes of these treasures. One day we keep telling ourselves we would love to have a display of them, but right now we don't have the right place to do that. Anyway, this is an old wine bottle from the 1800's. The bottom is rounded and there is a flatness to the side so the bottle would lay flat and the cork wouldn't dry out. I just reached in one of our old boxes and this was the first one I pulled out. They're all quite interesting (to us anyway - especially knowing that he pulled each and every one of them out of the river himself)


Here's a picture of our table by tealight. Now, I probably wouldn't really serve our Dad's by candlelight. Have you ever noticed how many men really dislike eating by candlelight? I think it makes them nervous - like we're trying to slip something "healthy" into their diet or something, without them seeing it. I believe that my mother-in-law used to say that if she tried to serve a nice meal by candlelight my father-in-law would make a quip like, "What did you do? Forget to pay the light bill?" How about the men in your life? Do they like dining by candlelight? Or not so much?


One last look at our tablescape just for "us girls" -- before we turn the lights back on.

Be sure to check out all the other tablescapes at "Between Naps On The Porch" -- Tablescape Thursday is an event that just shouldn't be missed. You'll be amazed at what's on everybody's tables -- and there's a table set just for you!

See ya!