New Dishes & National Iced Tea Day

My name is Phyllis Barkey and I'm a dishaholic!  [There should be a dishaholics annonymous for people like me!  ;-)]

I've been busy purging things at my house lately [so the task won't be so overwhelming for my kids someday], and I've had fairly good success selling things I was willing to part with on Facebook Marketplace.  

Yesterday, I took a break from my sorting to check emails.  In my inbox was the latest post from a blog I follow,  Home Is Where the Boat Is.  It's not a blog about boats [although Mary does live on a lake and has a nice pontoon].  Two of her passions are gardening and collecting dishes.  She shares photos of beautiful, creative tablescapes she puts together with her many sets of dishes and frequently provides recipes too.  Yesterday's post was titled 'Oh My Stars & Stripes:  Patriotic Summer Table for America's 250th Birthday.'

The dishes in her tablescape were so lovely.  At the end of her posts she shares where she obtained her dishware, cutlery and linens.  Many times they're from businesses that no longer have a brick and mortar store but sometimes they're recent purchases. The dishes in yesterday's post were recently purchased at Hobby Lobby, so I grabbed my purse and headed to the nearest Hobby Lobby quicker than the blink of an eye!   To my delight they were 40% off, but with a sale that good their inventory was low - so I only got service for three.   I'm a 'never say die' person [especially if it's something I want bad enough], so after visits to three other Hobby Lobby stores I finally got service for eight.   I'm a happy lady and my kids will have to deal with dispensing them when the time comes.  ;-)

I already had Melmac Patriotic Dishes that I purchased eons ago and will still keep them for outdoor eating and picnics, but these are so much nicer for an indoor tablescape.

Today is National Iced Tea Day and I've got a pitcher of tea cooling right now for dinner.   It's a steamy 89 degrees with 55% humidity in southeast Michigan as I type this post, and we have a heat advisory.  A glass of iced tea will taste very good.

Below are two pics I took on precious National Iced Tea days.   You will recognize the one from my header above.

A pic of my hubby and me enjoying a glass of iced tea in Charleston, South Carolina a few years back.

I hope you will enjoy a glass of iced tea today!

Memories

Today is daughter-in-law Sharon's birthday.  We took her out to lunch after church for her birthday, but I forgot to take any pictures.  The picture below was taken in 2013 at the Indianapolis Propylaeum tearoom.   It's a bittersweet birthday for her as her mother [who she was very close to] passed away the end of April.  Their birthdays are two days apart, so they always celebrated together.  Happy Birthday, Sharon.  You are loved!

I had just finished washing my hair this morning when our power went out and it wasn't expected to come back on until after 12:00 noon.  No blow dryer or curling iron to get ready for church! Ug! At first I was just going to stay home and watch the service online while hubby went without me, but then I realized I could take my curling iron to church and curl my hair in the ladies' restroom before church started.  I'm glad I didn't stay home because I would have missed seeing some very dear friends who visited today.

Wes & Marcia were the youth pastor and spouse at the church we attended [and where I was church secretary for 22 years] when our kids were growing up.  They had an incredible spiritual influence on them during their teen years and contributed greatly to who they are today.  Wes retired from active ministry last week.  He spanned youth ministry to senior adult ministry and everything in between.  Marcia said there's really not a lot of difference between the youth and seniors as long as there's pizza at the events.  ;-)  Today was their first free Sunday of retirement and Wes said they wanted to spend it visiting Steve's church.

Wes & Marcia are the couple on the left, and the rest of us attended church together when our kids were younger and now we're all at Steve's church.  Who would have imagined that the young questioning, energetic teenage boy would one day become a pastor!  

Wes commented on the above picture after one of the ladies posted it on Facebook that he could write a book about the memories from this group.  It was just like old times to be together for worship.   Friends [and great memories] are one of God's greatest blessings.

Steve probably contributed to a few of Wes' white hairs from when he was in the teen youth group!  ;-)

Our daughter, Lori, on the right with Wes & Marcia was in their teen youth group too.

Lori's husband, Dave, was also in Wes' youth group a few years ahead of Lori.

It's been a great day!  God is good!