Good morning everyone and happy Friday! This Friday could not have come soon enough. I am sorry I haven’t been posting much. If you have read previous blogs, you know I work in a hospital and run a recovery program with my husband. This week has been one of the toughest weeks in a long time for both, which is why I haven’t been posting much.
We hit an all time high of in house COVID patients at work, then to make matters worse had a chemical plant explosion and some COVID cases popped up in our ministry forcing us to do online ministry for the next few weeks. If you want to see what we do go onto Facebook and search for Horizons Salem Celebrate Recovery and like the page. We will be going live on Mondays at 6:30.
Back to Willow. I have always loved willow with writing on it. I felt like this post is rather fitting for many of us. Do you know where the saying “Take a cup O kindness for days o auld lang syne ” comes from? This saying was pulled from a Scottish Poem by Robert Burns written in 1798. The English took this to be bidding farewell to the old year at the stroke of midnight on New Year’s Eve! Like seriously who else doesn’t want to get rid of 2020? Lets bid farewell and start again!
The cup above is the only piece I have in a color other than blue. It is a bright orange and is a mustache cup! How precious is that? It has beautiful scalloped edges painted with gold guilting and is a fine bone china. It is made by Copeland, one of my favorite manufactures of the willow pattern.
Next up is my most cherished piece, but for a completely different reason. When I met my husband we were so young. I believe I was 19 and he was 18. We met at college. He was a swimmer and I was a cheerleader. Ben’s roommate was a male cheerleader so we met before classes even started. It wasn’t until a few weeks after that we went on our first date.
About 6 months into dating, I made my first trip to Erie to meet Ben’s family. Ben’s mom said to me later, I knew the first time you came here, he was going to marry you! That first trip to Erie was to “camp”. I had grown up camping with my mom and stepfather and loved it but we had a really nice camper with running water, and all of the amenities. Well “camp” had none of that…… outhouse, bats, a spring, spiders……
That first trip, I helped hang drywall at camp. I was none too excited but you know how it goes when you are “in love” you will do anything to make them happy! I spent much time on a ladder with Grandpa Lloyd, but Grandma Mag got a huge place in my heart that weekend. She was such a kind gentle little lady, who adored all of her grand kids. She reminded me of my great grandma I lost when I was 7. Yet even as dainty as she was if Lloyd got out of line she helped him abruptly back on the right track!
Grandma Mag and Grandpa Lloyd had a place in Florida where they spent winters near St. Pete beach. I had only been to Florida 2-3 times as a kid with my parents, so getting to go to another area of Florida to visit them was so cool for me. Grandma Mag knew I liked antiquing, so we would hop in a car, leave the boys behind and head to Front Street to catch a few shops. Sometimes the boys went along but were left at the counter to talk war stories!
All the shop owners knew my dainty little counter part and would ask how Lloyd was, when he was playing at the VFW as he had a band in Gulf Port and had quite the following. Anyhow, one of the shops was a huge 2 story old plant building they turned into an antique mall. It was called the Gas Plant Antique Mall. I loved this shop. In West Virginia, we didn’t have antique shops like this.
The gentleman behind the counter knew Grandma Mag, of course, who didn’t! She was the cookie lady who followed Grandpa Lloyd to all of his gigs. I saw on the top of a shelf this jug I so desperately wanted. It is pictured below. I think it was $45 at the time. I have got to say I think I was making $4.25 an hour (minimum wage at the time). so that was a lot of money. I decided to go back home and see if I could find it in any of my books.
I think I even message Jeff Siptak from the International Willow Collectors Group to see if he knew of such a piece. This was probably early 90’s. He thought it could be a fairly rare piece, so I called Grandma Mag and asked her if I mailed her the money, could she go back to the shop and see if they would ship it to me. Obviously she did that for me, with no issue. She loved chatting with the people at the shop, so off she went.
I received the jug in great condition and later it was featured in the Willow newsletter. At the time, I felt famous for having a picture of something of mine in a newsletter. Now all I do is write about things, so it is kind of funny how things change! This piece is made by Royal Doulton. I have only seen a few so I don’t know how widely it was made. This is missing a metal lid of sorts, but it still holds a big place in my heart! Thanks Grandma Mag!
Next up is some lovely Tiffany. You know how I love anything Tiffany!!!!!! These too are Copeland and are simply gorgeous with animal finials and gold guilting. I love the shape of these pieces. I hope some day to get an entire tea set with this pattern. A girl can dream right?
And lastly I have a set of 6 of these cups that well, don’t match anything I have, but who knows, maybe I will come across something that matches them. I was intrigued when I looked at the mark because I believe the mark is on one of my copper printing plates I could not identify! I still can’t identify it, but hey now I have more than one reference…sigh.
Well, that is mostly all I have for you today. I hope you have one of those pieces that brings back cherished memories of someone you loved dearly. I am hopeful that in heaven they have antique malls full of blue willow and everything is free!!!
Happy Willowing, Much love…tune in on Monday at 6:30!
Christine
Blue Willow Treasures - A collectors showcase 
I have never seen a willow pattern in a colour other than blue, so this was very interesting for me to see. As for mustache cups – what an excellent invention they were at a time when most men sported them!
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