My husband and I don’t really do Christmas. We visit the family, and take a little something, but we don’t do gifts for each other.
One year though, we were at our local thrift store on December 24th, and found some plates with chickens on them. I had to have them.
Since then, I’ve been curating dishes. It has gone way beyond what we need in the house to a fantasy of one day having my own brick and mortar restaurant, where these would be the dishes.
Mostly I focus on a specific genre of Japanese Stoneware made for an English company. I have a growing variety of patterns and colours that I imagine underneath one of my breakfast specials.
I’m still adding plates, but I also picked up some nice pasta bowls that are great for my morning oatmeal. And now, I’ve started collecting Korean stoneware coffee cups.
My mom use to do something similar. We had enough pots and hotel pans to start a mythical Mexican restaurant when I was a kid.
I have no idea if my restaurant will happen, but finding these treasures is fulfilling. I can’t help it. I’m enjoying the process, even if it does go against my minimalist tendencies, read: pipe dream.
Beyond Clarity 