custom house: An Empty Nest Tablescape with Thrifty Bargains (and one Tiffany candlestick!)

Happy Thursday! As usual I am late in logging into Mr. Linky's lists of blog-party-animals, but I spent part of today on the telephone, pretending to be my 23 year old daughter.

Why, you ask?
Our daughters arrived in London this morning . . .

. . . and Alida's ATM card would not work, and she couldn't reach her bank by phone; they block calls from overseas!
So she emailed us for help.

Problem fixed. Moms can do anything. But I had to impersonate my daughter to the bank.

If I land in jail, send me a cake with a file in it, but make sure it's baked from scratch and includes some major chocolate. I want my cellmate Big Gertie to be happy with it.

Chase Bank had frozen the account for security reasons. Alida called the bank last week, to let them know she would be in London and would need to use her ATM card, and the bank said, "Sure, hon, you can access cash with your ATM card anywhere in the world!" Well... apparently they meant, "You can, but (ha ha!) we won't let you."

Anne didn't call her bank ahead of time, and had no trouble using the ATM. Hers is a much smaller regional bank. I'm thinking there might be a lesson there.

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Anyway ... on to happier things! For more of Tablescape Thursday (lots more! It's the 40th week of Tablescape parties!) go here! For Thrifty Thursday stories, click here. And to look at Vintage Thingies Thursday, put your cursor here and click!

Thanks to Susan of Between Naps On The Porch, Leigh of Bloggeritaville, and Suzanne of Coloradolady for hosting these three fun blog parties!

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For the next blissful week, Howard and I are Empty Nesters again.
Tonight, a cozy dinner a deux:

We'll begin with shrimp cocktail in my Grandmother's etched glass dishes,
very vintage (the glasses, not the shrimp):

It is leftover shrimp, but a little shaved ice, shredded lettuce,
Crosse & Blackwell cocktail sauce and juicy lemons will redeem them!

A bit of champagne, to give the leftover shrimp a boost, in flutes that were a gift
25 years ago from my in-laws, from Bloomingdale's in Chestnut Hill near Boston:

Then dinner: very simple! Turkey cutlets, in a lemon wine sauce with some fresh thyme from the garden, on Wedgwood Patrician dinner plates -- I only have two of the dinner plates, both from Ebay:

These dinner plates are smallish -- which is good; I can fill them
and we can pretend we are having a larger dinner than we are!

With the turkey, a Gewurztraminer, because I get a kick out of using my old German wine glasses with the green ribbed stems; I think they go nicely with the green-bordered Wedgwood. Besides, it is fun to say "Gewurtztraminer."

I got these glasses 30 years ago, after Howard and I got back from a wonderful 3 weeks in Germany; I bought them on a deep discount at Fortunoff's -- an amazing New York area chain that just this year went out of business. I will miss Fortunoff's!

For some mood lighting -- candles -- 88 cents at K-Mart. We'll put them in mismatched holders:

A heavy crystal candlestick, one of a pair from Tiffany's, a gift from the radio station
in New York City where Howard worked for nearly 20 years as a reporter and anchor:

And the other crystal candlestick, also one of a pair, a Christmas gift to me from Howard,
back in the day when our gifts to one another were exceedingly modest:

It's from Big Lots, and cost him $3. How great is that?
I love these candlesticks, and went back to Big Lots and bought more for gifts that year!

The flatware is my Georgian pattern silverplate, that I have gotten on Ebay in bits and pieces:

No shrimp forks, the little salad forks will have to do:

And the napkins -- old linen (a few wear holes at fold lines) with handmade lace edging -- very soft and sweet.
From a church rummage sale on Eastern Long Island, years ago.