China girl – Hive and Nest

My birthday is coming up notverysoon, but just to make sure I get something I truly love, I ordered some new dishes. Just so you know, I’m not one of those people who has several sets. (Like a girl I know who has twelve sets and swaps them out every month. She actually keeps her dining room table arranged like she will be sitting down to a dinner party at any moment–but I don’t think they do. Which means she has twelve collections of dishes that may or may not ever be used. That seems a bit excessive to me.)  I have one set of Portmeirion dishes that I love and that’s it. They were pretty expensive but they’re totally classic and I hope to have them for quite some time.

However, I fell in love with some new plates a few months ago (shhh, don’t tell my old dishes!) I never make a big purchase on the spur of the moment. I’ve had buyers remorse much too often to be foolish (never buy living room furniture without going home to think about it first!) But I saw these plates back in November and I simply can’t get them out of my mind. They are a set of six, all different designs. Have I mentioned two or three hundred times how much I love pattern. They’re by Rosanna, who makes loads of darling dinnerware. 

These dishes have never once come up on ebay.  So I’ve been left to scour the internet every couple of weeks to see if they are on sale somewhere.  And I lucked out.  I found the dinner plates for 50% off at some website I’d never heard of (salad plates were sold out, darn it.)  I placed my order, patting myself on the back for my sharp shopping skills.  

Four days later I got my dishes and they were as cute as I remember.  I inspected each one and then repacked them to put in my closet (I can’t use them until my birthday in April, remember!) Only I noticed something on one of the plates.

Food.

Someone has used one of my plates!  Revolting! I scoured it, to be sure.

I tried to email the company, but their email is down. And I’m not about to call them.  Can you imagine that awkward conversation?

The happy ending to this tale is that while I was looking for a photo for this post, I found the salad plates on sale at a different website.  Hopefully it’s a company where the employees don’t eat on the dishes before sending them.