Many years ago, I read a homeschooling mama-of-many saying that her family's dishes were all mismatched items from Goodwill. The family would wait until they had broken enough dishes, and then off to Goodwill they would go to collect more. Each dish was unique, and they loved the variety.
I thought that was sweet, but I didn't consider it an option for our family.
Don't get me wrong. I love Goodwill. To be truthful, I shop nowhere else. I already love buying mismatched coffee cups there. In fact, one of the great joys of my life is heading to Goodwill to pick out new coffee cups when we've finally broken enough to have room for more.
But actual dishes? No, no, no - those need to be matching. Perfectly matching. It's just an unbreakable law of nature, don't you know?
Only one thing stood in the way of my perfectly matched dish sets - that thing being my family. It's a rare day that goes by around here without the sound of glass breaking, despite my best efforts. (They can even break Corelle!)
And finally, I had to admit the sad truth. Either we spend time and energy (that I don't have) and a lot of money (that I don't have) tracking down matching replacements, or... we head to Goodwill.
And so we did!
And once again... I'm in love. I absolutely adored going through the dishes to pick out lovely mismatched pieces to make up our collection.
I can't wait to do it again.
Obviously, a miracle has occurred. Another obsessive-compulsive-perfection-seeking barrier broken... CHECK!
Perhaps if I live in this crazy family long enough, they'll succeed in breaking me of all (most?) of my unhealthy perfectionist tendencies. That would take a work of God, but if I can learn to live (happily!) with mismatched dishes, anything is possible.
And so, local friends, if you want to do me a big favor, come over and break a dish! That puts me one dish closer to a lovely trip to Goodwill to buy more mismatched pieces.
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| Another find of the day - a book holder for the boys' room! |
Have a wonderful evening, dear readers!
I had mismatched dishes for years, and finally got to buy a matched set at a discount warehouse last year. I like them, but I kinda miss the variety. And when they break, I will now be replacing them with items from Goodwill again, so what did I do that for? I dunno. Seemed like a good idea at the time.
ReplyDeleteOh, my goodness - "It seemed like a good idea at the time" is the story of my life!! LOL!! But at least I will only have to learn this lesson once (I hope). After several years of having so few dishes that we could barely make it through one meal without doing dishes (because we were SURELY going to get to the store SOMETIME to find the replacements), having a lovely set of mismatched dishes is a huge blessing.
DeleteThanks for visiting! Blog on!!
I can't relate to being a perfectionist (I wish I could, our home needs someone to care a little more about neatness). But, I can relate to having mix matched dishes. I grew up in a large family (oldest of 12) and my mom was always looking to expand her large collection of Correl plates and bowls. My husband and I have all match dishes right now. We are praying that the Lord will bless us with a large family and if He sees fit our dishes may have a short life span, too. :)
ReplyDeleteOh, I am so envious! A family of twelve, how lovely!! (I'm an only.) I do wish that I was less of a perfectionist, because it's a constant mental stress (the house is not perfect, an it's constant background noise in my head). But as I said, I think God is using our family to drum it out of me!!
DeleteHow many do you and your husband have presently?
Blessings! Thanks for visiting!