Blue Floral~ Tea Cup Tuesday

Once again, it's time for Tea Cup Tuesday, hosted by Terri at Artful Affirmations.  I'm also linking up with Tea Time Tuesday at Rose Chintz Cottage.

I love that it's spring, so that I can go outside and do my photographs.



Today's cup and saucer is one that I inherited from my Grandmother. She collected teacup and saucer sets. 

 This is a lovely bone china tea cup and saucer with a blue floral design. Both are trimmed in gold.

I think this handle is amazing. I love how it curves inward at the bottom, then outward as it moves upward.

 
The cup and saucer are both marked "bone china" and "made in England" with a crown denoting the maker.

I decided to pair the tea cup with this material I found about 2 years ago or so at one of the yard sales on the 127.

 Every August, there's this massive yard sale called the 127 sale. The sale starts in Ohio and travels down Highway 127 through Kentucky, Tennessee and Alabama. Thousands of people set up and sell for these four days.

I originally bought this to make some pillows for this old metal-framed couch I had in my sunroom. I love the old-fashioned scenes and clothing depicted here.

 This material is made by Waverly. It's called Presidential Homes and the registered number is 6422144.

Thanks so much for visiting today!

Simmons Radium Silver Butter Knives

A long time ago, I collected silver and silver-ish items. Then a few years ago, I sold all my silver. Or so I thought until the other day when I found a box with some cutlery that I'd completely forgotten about.

Inside this box, I have 4 butterknives marked Simmons Solid Radium Silver, but the thing is, I don't know what that means.

So I tried to do some research on the internet. From the Wikipedia Commons page, here is a photo of a miner pushing a car of silver radium ore 340 feet below ground. Eldorado Mine of Great Bear Lake in Canada.



From The Eldorado Silver Radium Express:
Eldorado Gold Mines Limited was incorporated in 1926 but with the doubtful value of its claims associated with its mine at Long Lake, Manitoba, and the discovery in 1930 of pitchblende (uranium oxide) at Great Bear Lake, Northwest Territories, the company changed direction completely. The point of land where the discovery was made by the company's Managing Director, Gilbert A. LaBine (1890-1977), became known as Port Radium. The ore consisted of both uranium oxide and silver in significant amounts. At the time, the mining economies were driven by the world price of radium, which was extracted from uranium oxide and sold on the world market for US$ 50,000 per gram or, taking inflation into account, about US$ 500,000 today.

Some others on the internet think that the word "radium" implied a standard. And that items would be labelled with it, but not really contain any radium.

From IEM's question page, where another person inquired about radium silver and flatware:
We also know that the word "radium" was occasionally used as a descriptor for things that were bright or gleaming. The term was likely coined because the element radium was used to produce luminous paints that made objects gleam or glow in the dark.

I believe these knives were made sometime between 1920-1940. They're not at their best in these photos as I don't have any silver cleaner.



I'm interested in selling these knives, but I don't know if they're worth more than $1. If anyone has any ideas, I'd really appreciate the input!

Duchess China~Tea Cup Tuesday

Hello Everyone,

It's Tuesday, so that means it's time to showcase another Tea Cup! I'm linking up to Terri at Artful Affirmations for Tea Cup Tuesday.

We're having some beautiful weather, so I decided to do some photos outside.



Even though I only own a few white things and have no white walls (or even neutral walls) in my house, I love white on white. Sometimes I think there's nothing more tranquil than the color white.

Back in March, we had lots of warm weather, which tricked some of our bushes and flowers into blooming early. These "snowball" flowers normally don't bloom until May where I live, but this year, they bloomed in April and are now dying.

 This tea cup set is made by Duchess and is trimmed in gold. It's the only white set I have.

Thanks for stopping by!
~Michelle