Stories from the High Tea

Betsy at her table
(c) Savoring the Sweet Life

 The women go all out in decorating their tables for the Annual High Tea. Betsy Veneziano was the chair and her table design was really cool. All the gals at her table also wore fascinators.

If you want to see all the tables you can go to Facebook to see Jacqui Todd’s photos of all the tables. Professional photographers also took photos, which she has generously given us permission to use here. You can see all the photos at Savoring the Sweet Life.

So many of the hostesses used china that either had special meaning to them or that they’d inherited. Today and next week, we’ll share two of those stories. Stay tuned for more in the September tidings.

(c) Savoring the Sweet Life

From Jennifer Burgess: 

I inherited this dinner set from my mother-in-law. She had this from her gift shop way back when In Long Island, New York.  From what I remember she said that it is one of the dinner sets her parents had brought over from Germany. 

I would say that it is at least 60 years old or more. I did some research and found out that is from Denmark. The artist is Fanny Garde. The  company is Bing and Grondahl. This design first came about in 1895 and is very popular with the Danish families and the seagull collection was discontinued in 1997. Now it is a collectors item so if you break it it is hard to find a replacement. The more common one is without the gold rim. The gold rim ones are very limited and has a number on it. This helps to identify the year  it is made.

Jennifer's and Ruth Lim's table setting
(c) Savoring the Sweet Life

My mother in law had always told me that what ever happens to keep this set as it holds a lot of memories as she used it a lot when the family got together. My husband David said he remembered that his mom only used this set on very special occasions, especially with her family, and she is very careful to make sure that her kids do not break any of them. So I'm glad I inherited this. 

Carried by a community

by Cindy Taylor

The first day we came to Good Samaritan, Mary Anne was celebrating her birthday. A Marine was being deployed, and Fr. Chris and the congregation gave him a special blessing. Those and holding hands for the Lord's Prayer really impressed me.

My husband John didn't grow up in a church, but he feels so at peace when we leave the service. He wishes there were an early weekday service so he could go before work. When I think about the effect Good Sam has had on our lives, I think of my husband and his walk with Christ. When I see him pray, it means a lot to me.

We had gone to a different church many years before, but when I had a miscarriage there was no reaction from anyone in the church.

Cindy's favorite picture with her granddad

December 13 2009. My granddad had died far away the day before. Though he wasn't ready to go, they couldn't keep him alive. I came to church that Sunday just sobbing, and people would come up to support me. Rebecca took me into the chapel to pray for me. It got very warm; the sun came out enough that it was like a spotlight on my face and Rebecca had just the right words to say. She carried me through that horrid pain. 

Are you carried by your community of faith? Of friends? If not, why not?

Reflections on the Prayer of St. Francis

by Leanne Shawler, Communications Director

I have a blog of my own, and have had for a few years. Recently, it’s morphed from sharing about my art and other daily stuff, to focusing on what’s really important: God’s love.

One of the ways I’m doing this is enlisting the help of a small group of Christian bloggers and friends to reflect upon the Prayer of St. Francis, line by line. We started back in April and will be finishing up in June. You can see the posts on this subject so far, here. They go from most recent, backward.

As we have a statue of St. Francis in our Memorial Garden, I thought it might be of interest to my fellow Good Sammers and other folk who read here. 

So far, it’s been an invaluable exercise, especially when I get stuck with the “hard" lines. Learning to stop, let the line sink in, write down ideas, even the bad ones and giving each short essay the space to develop. 

It’s also been enlightening to discover how God has been working in other people’s lives. I've gotten to know my companions in this project a little better.

Have you ever reflected on a prayer, line by line? (Would you like to? We could make it a recurring project here on the “love. be loved.” blog.)