Cinco de Mayo Sunday Dinner Tablescape

Welcome to our Sunday night dinner. Viva Cinco de Mayo. These days, my 97 year old father joins us each Sunday for dinner. Mostly dinner in or sometimes dinner out.

I was determined to have Mexican food for dinner.

 

 

I was determined to have Mexican food for dinner.

 

I don't know about you, but I like my Mexican food spicy.

 

So how do you feed spicy Mexican food to a 97 year old man who thinks black pepper is spicy?

 

This is where careful planning comes in.

 

Did I mention that he has dentures and they don't fit well?

 

So no spicy food, nothing that would require a lot of chewing.

 

Menu:

Abuelo's papas con chile

Mexican pork roast

green beans

Mexican chopped salad with Honey Lime dressing

Flan

 

It worked. Great jalapeno flavor, no heat. Winner for everyone.

 

Mexican Chopped Salad with Honey Lime Dressing.

From Epicurious. Recipe HERE.

Son's plate, minus the feta cheese and the avocados.

I highly recommend that salad dressing. Can you say I would drink it straight? LOVE this dressing.

Loved the salad.

Romaine lettuce, radishes, tomatoes, corn, jicama, black beans, feta cheese and avocados.

Heaven!

 

Cast:

Guatemalen Linens (placemats & napkins - The Shop - Santa Fe, NM

Flatware - Wallace Silversmiths

Talavera dinner plates - Guadalupano Imports, Santa Fe, NM

Napkin rings - Pottery Barn

Mercury Glass candlesticks  - Jackalope, Santa Fe, NM

Etched Wine Goblets - Cielo, Santa Fe, NM

Blue goblets - Dollar Tree

Yellow-orange salad plates - BIA

 

Thanks so much for coming by. Dinner was a success and enjoyed by all.

I'm sharing this table with Cuisine Kathleen for Let's Dish on Wednesday evening

and with Susan for Tablescape Thursday at Between Naps on the Porch.

I hope to see you there!

If you want to check out some previous Mexican inspired tables,

click HERE, HERE,or HERE.

Una tabla de colores vivos tablescape

This was not what I had planned this week. Oh wait, I didn't have anything planned this week. I do have two tables that I haven't yet shared, but....

And then I came across these plates at TJMaxx on Friday. At lunch on Friday. And I snagged 8 of them. What was I thinking? I loved them. Why didn't I get more right then???? I love how the glass swirls inside the plate. And I loved the color.

This gorgeous plant arrived on Friday, too. Orange and teal.. wow what a great combination. But still not how the table came about. Friday evening I was "auditioning" the teal plates. Tried them with this and that. And then I pulled out the next best thing to a quilt.. a serape.

Saturday morning I sent asked my sweet, darling son to run over and snag pick up the remainder of the plates. He did. They are going to be fabulous for summer entertaining.

I also remembered that these glasses have a matching colored rim to the plates.

So for today, the table fits the menu and the hot temperatures! Una tabla de colores vivos. A brightly colored table. Using the napkin that I embellished last year with the napkin rings the grands call the birthday napkin rings, gave way to using a brightly colored flatware set picked up at Ross's last year. Adding the white charger and white salad plate kept the table from getting boisterous.

We will be dining late, otherwise the outside temperatures would cause much discomfort. It's just been too danged hot!!

The sun will be setting soon, and the table will be shaded. We'll turn on the outside lights.

 The sun is setting, its' time to turn on the lights.

 Oh yes. My dream of tiny white lights is long gone. At first, we had smaller colored bulbs strung over the patio. But this year, Mr. CJ found larger, more brightly colored bulbs and changed them out. Oh my oh my. This could be why he doesn't decorate inside.

We will be dining on Cilantro Rice (HERE) and Margarita Pork K-bobs (HERE), a fresh green salad and an adult beverage of your choice.

Cast:
Serape - Jackalope, Santa Fe
Chargers - Pier One
Dinner Plates - TJMaxx, Artistic Accents
Salad Plates - Wedgwood Windsor
Napkins - self embellished (tips and tricks to come Thursday at Stone Gable)
Napkin Rings - Pier One
Flatware - Ross and salad fork by Wallace Silversmiths
Margarita Glasses - World Market
Plant - from a friend sitting in a Wedgewood Windsor bowl

Gracias  por venir. Thank you for dropping in and spending your time with me. I'm truly honored. You can find me at Cuisine Kathleen's Let's Dish on Wednesday and Susan's Tablescape Thursday on Thursday.

Daylight in November Tablescape

With the leaves changing colors, I thought it'd be high time to set a table using these beautiful specimens of God's handiwork.

A white matelasse coverlet provides a textured backdrop for this table. Enamelware chargers that look like leather, Mikasa Daylight dinner plate and soup bowl, Ironwood salad bowls, brown napkin in silver napkin rings, and two vases filled with leaves.

Love this roll of grapevine mesh. Used it to take away a bit of the white and add some more fallish character. Also sprinkled pecan here and there.

The wooden candle holder is one of a kind made by a craftsman in Taos, NM.

 Love the way the leaves on the Mikasa dishes peek out and are repeated in the leaves tucked into the napkin rings.

See the faux stitching on the chargers? They really go with so many different things!

Ironwood bowls are fabulous.. just don't soak them in water for any period of time.

Most leaves in Lubbock never attain a wonderful crimson color. Mainly they are green one day, yellow the next and then on the ground the third. Well  maybe that is a wee bit of exaggeration, but it's close.

I love the amber wine hocks.. they really do go with most tables this time of year.

See how these dishes really do fit quite well into a fall setting.. the leaves are the same color as the ones in the vases!

I love how well Mikasa planned out the positioning of the leaves on the plates so that they are on opposing sides of one another when the dishes are stacked. Dinner plate and soup bowl.

Although I have the green chargers with the dishes, I thought the brown chargers grounded the dishes better for a fall setting.

Because it's good to see who is sitting across from you, removing the vases to the buffet and bringing in a grapevine basket filled with leaves for dinner makes good sense.

Brought in the mercury glass candleholder to pick up on the silver edge of the chargers, the flatware and the napkin rings.

Cast:

Matelasse - vintage

Chargers - One King's Lane; Golden Rabbit

Mikasa Daylight dishes - Mikasa, won on Alicia's Tablescape at Table Twenty One

Flatware - our everyday stainless by Gorham

Wood bowls - Ironwood

Wine Hocks - Stein Mart

Napkins - Tuesday Morning

Napkin rings - Stein Mart

Mercury Glass candleholders - Jackalope, Santa Fe, NM

Wooden candleholder - Taos, NM

Clear votive cups - Dollar Tree

White vases - Tuesday Morning

Grapevine mesh - Hobby Lobby

Pecans and limbs - outside our doors

Thanks so much for dropping in. I hope you'll leave a comment letting me know you were here and making it easier for me to reciprocate a visit. 

I'm linking up to the Hostess with the Mostest - Susan at Between Naps on the Porch's Tablescape Thursday party. I hope I see you there!

 

Rushing Fall tablescape

I know I shouldn't push fall to come this soon. However, with the massive heat wave we have had, maybe bringing in the browns will make it feel cooler! We did have two days this past Labor Day weekend where the AC didn't even think of kicking on! In the 60's on Sunday and 73 on Monday. We sat outside, we cooked out, we had doors and windows open, we reveled in the cooler temps!

So in honor of the cooler weather... browns and whites in a symphony of textures graced the table.

Our everyday Gorham flatware , so that everything is dishwasher friendly.. we are enjoying the cooler temps remember?

Simple white dinner plates on the nito/rattan chargers

Topped with a soup bowl in a lovely hue of golden brown

 Topped with a simple monogrammed napkin

I found these open weave Irish linen napkins a few weeks ago at an estate sale.. They had never been used! So I promptly sat down, washed them and then gave them each a monogram.

The burlap runner, large and medium cloche, mercury glass candelsticks, and cross all grace our dining table.. so no set up was necessary except the dishes and a few votives in lower glass containers. The glasses used are some of favorites, each purchased in Santa Fe.

 The matching carafe to the wine goblets.

 Spanish moss tufts fall from the candlestick to add to the earthly charm of the table.

A favorite white pitcher stand on guard at this end to refill guests drinks as needed.

 Pinecones, antique candles that were used as car headlights, a cross and some dried greenery sit atop the silver tray under the largest cloche.

 The smaller cloche sports a lovely etched thistle design.

Cast:

Burlap runner - handmade by moi

Cloches, silver tray - collected over time

Mercury glass candlesticks - Jackalope, Santa Fe

Water goblets, wine krugs - Santa Fe.

Cross - Spears Furniture, Lubbock

Nito/rattan chargers - World Market, Pier One

Dinner plate- Wedgwood Windsor

Soup bowl - Certified International

Flatware - Gorham

Napkins - estate sale, embroidered on a Bernina 730E

Thank you very much for dropping in this week. Thank all y'all from the bottom of my heart for all the well wishes this past week. Both parents are doing well and on the mend. 

I'll be linking to Tablescape Thursday at Susan's Between Naps on the Porch and to Seasonal Sunday at the Tablescapers... please drop in, I'd love to catch you there!! Besides.. Susan is hosting a fabulous giveaway from one of my favorite bloggers - Lana at Motif!! Check it out HERE.