Teapot Rescue

I just can't resist them  --  the lone teapot on the sale shelf, waiting for its faithful human to come and take it home.  This is my third rescue pot.  I definitely don't need another teapot, at least, another brown teapot.  But here it is, a real Brown Betty, fresh from a British imports store in Big College Town East Of Here, and it's from a well-known British manufacturer of hand-made teapots.  I paid four dollars for it, because it has a tiny chip in the knob on the top of the lid.  This means that my orange pot (another rescue from a sale shelf) will be moving to my office next week, where there's already a nice matching tea cozy waiting for it.

All of this said, I know where there's another English-made teapot here in town, in an antique store.  It's powder blue, and I have just the right spot for it in my cabinet of tea things.  Yes, the habit has gotten that far out of hand.  Yes, I use them.  One of these days, I'm going to invite everyone I know over for tea and I'll be glad that I have all of these, and have all of those tea recipes and little cream jugs and serving dishes and that small clutch of European-sized tea spoons.

Actually, what I really should be collecting now is tea cup-and-saucer sets, as in, single tea cups with matching saucers, that I like and wouldn't mind drinking out of myself.  Right now, I have a couple of sets that go with my dishes, but nothing that screams "proper tea" when brought out with a biscuit.  Along with those, I should make some small tea-napkins, each in a different calico pattern.  I can dig through my quilt fabric stash for those, and finish the edges with my serger.  It would be a good project to practice using that machine.

Knitting?  I've actually been crocheting again recently, and have nearly finished the Cheche a la Sauce shawl; another two hours and it's going onto the Done Pile.  Otherwise, I've only been oogling patterns online and laying further plans for the Regency wardrobe I'm thinking about.