The decorations are stored away. The process snowballed, but it is finished. We did have a nice Christmas celebration, but I like to clean up before the new year arrives.
I am finishing the planting of bulbs. Yes, not done with that job. Our fall was so late without a freeze, I kept waiting for my porch flowerbed to die off so I could clean it out and plant the bulbs. Last year tulips - this year grape hyacinths, snowdrops, ranunculus and many alliums. We have hardly had any rain and the ground so hard, I think I'll have to water the bed. Of course I didn't wear gloves and blistered my palms before I realized it. I have been getting coffee grounds from Starbucks to scatter on top of the bed to discourage the squirrels and enhance the soil.
I haven't made any resolutions for the new year. Sometimes I do and sometimes I don't. Sometimes they work and oftentimes they don't. One year I taught myself to knit. I usually don't celebrate, nor wait up until midnight.
Anyway, I thought I'd show you this beautiful cup. My friends across the pond might be able to tell me what they would have drunk from it. It is huge and I doubt they would have filled it with coffee, but would they have had such a large cup of tea? I think it would have gotten cold before you could finish it. It must hold at least two cups.
I love blue and white pottery and the saying on it too. The back and front also have beautiful scenes.
So, I guess my new year's resolution might just include a spiced tea and a cursory think of times gone past, and sing the little poem/song Auld Lang Syne.
PS ~ I found that it is a Roland and Marsellus wassail cup or mush cup. That's is all I'm going to find out as it is mind-numbing looking at all those maker's marks.
37 comments:
It's a beautiful piece of pottery, I would say quite an antique, and Robbie Burns would surely approve of it's sentiment, maybe even filled 'with a cup of kindness yet'.
It would be fun to have it appraised.
Good luck with your bulb planting deary.
Hugs,
~Jo
Hugs back Jo. Would they have used it for tea? I got some of the tea you recently posted about so I'll use it on New Year's Eve and ponder where it has been.
It would be great for soup, but that doesn't answer your question. :)
I'm itching to put the tree away too. Last night I took down the Christmas cards from where I'd clipped them to the curtains too. 'Am EAGER for 2017. I'll turn 40 in May and am so excited for the entire new year. :)
'Glad you had a nice Christmas, Donna. ♥
I am glad you had a nice Christmas too.echoing Val's words..cause she writes so well!!
That little girl has talent:)
LOve that cup..the aged look and I bet feel of it..
Have you heard Rod Stewart sing that song?
Love it.
not sure what it was used for..an antique dealer could help? For sure I will Google after..
we leave the tree up until after Epiphany and then..some..so maybe the 10th..and I know Jacques would leave it up till February..
I didn't set out the village or wreaths here and there.Tree..mantle..and mittens in my kitchen windo..so it is not overwhelming..I find the more there is here and there..the more I feel like it's too much..for me..
No resolutions for me..hopes..:)
Have you heard Rod Stewart sing that song?
Love it.
Bonne et Heureuse Année Donna..
Found on Blueandwhite.com
Maker: Wilkinson Pattern:Tower
Cup jumbo c1910
A very large cup with an inscription around the inside rim "Take ye a cuppe o'kindnesse For auld lang syn" Backstamp: Burslem England. A little discolouration mainly to the handle which also has a small firing fault, but overall good.
Dimensions: 16 cm diameter, 8 cm high / 6.25 ins diameter, 3.25 ins high
Our ref: MISC41464
Oops here is the link
https://www.blueandwhite.com/museum.asp?m=Wilkinson&p=Tower
I'm glad you had a good Christmas. It must be nice to have Christmas packed away for another year, we usually do ours on New Years Day. I have never seen a cup so large. I assume they must have passed it around to each other. Wishing you a good and peaceful New Year. Sarah x
Oh Val, you are just a baby. I think my forties were my favorite years. May yours be the best to come and I wondered if the cup might have been for mulled wine? I know nothing about the drinking of that though and the drinker of this cup would have been drunk after a cup this big.
Oh my dear Monique, thank you. I am looking forward to 2017 too. I haven't heard Rod Stewart sing that, in fact I think the last time I heard him was singing Maggie May;) Hope is much better than resolutions, so that is my resolution. Thank you for giving me the thought.
Well, leave it to you Monique. You are so good at finding things out. It has a RM on the bottom, but I am going to look now. Thank you. Still wonder what they drank from it. Certainly not a wee dram. More like a Route 66 Big Gulp from Sonic.
Sarah, that must have been why it's so large. I never thought of that. It is nice to have the Christmas stuff packed away and I finished planting the bulbs today. Yay! Hope your New Year is wonderful, but how can it not be living in the prettiest place I've ever seen. I want to travel there one day.
I wonder if it was a wassail cup, but that could be sloppy, door to door.
We'll probably leave up our tree until Epiphany, or not. It's not the weekend, next year.
It is just habit. Kids used to decorate the tree on Thanksgiving night and by Christmas I was ready to see it go. Hope you had a wonderful holiday.
Love that cup - and suspect it is a sharing cup. And hope that everyone's cup of kindness overflows this year.
The New Year will come in without me too - I am confident it knows the way. I will be happy to see the last of this one though.
Child, I do think you and Sarah must have hit on it. I couldn't imagine who could finish a cup that large. Kindness and hope - those will be my mantras for 2017.
I like a big cup, I gulp it faster however. You are ahead of me, I looked at the boxes to put stuff away just now, but decided to start some coals and grill after a good day riding horses.
Leaving decorations up for daughter and roommates who are coming here foe New Year and my Birthday. Then I will take the decorations down. Very easy to do. We set up so late that I want to enjoy the tree.
What a beautiful cup, love blue and white also.
cheers, parsnip
Sounds like heaven. Nothing smells better than a horse and saddle (except puppy breath.) I finally found a forever home for my Gracie and Brownie this summer. I miss them, but still think riding is one of the best things in life.
Thank you Parsnip. Hope Hamish is feeling better.
That is a lovely blue and white cup. I like a big cup for coffee, but not for tea. For me, when Christmas is over, it's over. I don't want to hear another carol! I hope to be packing up as soon as our daughter goes back to university. -Jenn
I still do the Christmas thing for the kids and littles. I kind of think one day, I'll be making a visit to their homes to wish them a merry Christmas.
Monique, I looked up the site and am going to look up more as I think from the pictures, my cup is much older. It was a wassail cup to be passed around in memory of the old times. Such a sweet ritual for New Years.
me too with the resolutions, sometimes yes sometimes no, sometimes they stick sometimes not. the most successful one was to start spending my pennies which expanded to include all my change. I did that one for years but then I started putting my change in a jar at night and when it was full I'd divide it up amongst the grandkids. the other more or less recent successful one was to do 5 yoga sun salutations a day.
Donna, that blue and white cup is a treasure! Yes, it would take a very large cup to hold lots of Kindness! Perhaps that is a sort of metaphor for the joy that we can find from sharing our lives via blogging. It's a very large cup!
My own Christmas decorating is a bit minimal, but I plan on enjoying the look of it all through New Year's. Putting away the baubles and looking through the cards and so forth are a way that I make a transition to perhaps a bit of new year's decluttering. Or at least some new year's reappraisals!
How I am hoping that 2017 will bring us some joys. Perhaps it is up to us to bring the joy?
xo
I'm impressed Ellen. You sure are a hard worker. We save all our change and give it to our son twice a year. He loves coins. Often, I'll order some really old coins on ebay and hide them in the can. He loves that.
So eloquent Frances. I love that. A cup of kindness... I too hope for a good New Year. Heard you had a deep snow. Good to stay inside and look at your treasures.
Monique, I don't know how you did it so fast. I found the maker's mark Roland & Marsellus and many English potteries made them. Aye yay yay, too many marks and I had a hard time finding them. I'm going back to your site to search.
That cup is just perfection to me. I don't wait up for the new year, either. At this time of year I do enjoy getting the house back in order.
It looks different without all the decorations. I just went by a fireworks stand and pray it won't be a repeat on New year's eve like it was on the fourth of July.
Oh, how lovely a tradition, that Wassail! I had so many thoughts on your cup, in that though the "wee dram" might be upwards of a pint, and served hot, it was meant for many mouths, as it was passed with good wishes and toasts and shouts of good fortune to those gathered, and to "The House." Maybe they trusted the alcohol to sanitize things, or most likely, the custom started and that cup was made (1890's, I would think?) way back before germs were invented.
I'd also reflected that some of that stuff was of such a proof, notwithstanding the fruit and cream, that a large cup filled half-way might prevent spillage occasioned by the woozies after the first few sips.
Anyway, cups overflowing with good wishes to YOU Faraway Friend. Was Haal and Happy New Year!
r
To you also dear Rachel. I do think it was an early version as the darkness of the blue and almost a flow blue, unlike the ones that had a perfect transfer picture and were a lighter blue. I'll toast to you (by myself) on the Eve. I don't party anymore.
What a lovely cup. There will be wassail celebrations in the orchards around here in January. The wassail cup is passed from person to person and may well contain 'hot toddy', whiskey and hot water to keep out the cold!
I read about the cider wassail traditions in the apple orchards for a bountiful harvest. You Brits have such wonderful old traditions. Have a happy New Year Rosemary.
What a fabulous (wassail--what a word) cup! Thanks for posting a photo of it. :)
Happy, happy from the west coast! x B
Oh sweet Bea, I hope your 2017 is the best.
Happy New Year to you
Love the large cup of course because it a flo blue color.The cup is wonderful, I have never seen one like it. It must have come from over the pons for sure
Sounds like you have a good news years resolution, just drink lots tea.
Janice
And hope yours is happy too. I forgot to use it. I usually just drink iced tea, but that spice tea is good.
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