Color Party, 1905-style
Working on the color blocks quilt reminded me of my favorite idea from that wonderful one-dollar bargain book, Bright Ideas for Entertaining, by Mrs. Herbert B. Linscott, 1905.
Obviously these people were not concerned with the food pyramid, but there are some unusual combinations here. Lettuce, olives, and pickles? Maybe there was some salad dressing to accompany those. But red cake and cranberry sauce? Lemon pie with cheese? And what on earth are brown pickles???
Also, did you notice that blue and purple are missing? If I was going to create those menus, I guess I would have blueberries and bleu cheese at one table, and grapes, eggplants, and purple cabbage at the other!
Sadly, I don’t have any brown doilies or an old-fashioned red tablecloth to photograph to accompany this post, but I do have one dresser scarf that is beautifully embroidered with multicolored flowers. It may be from a later date than the book, but I think it would be at home at such a feast.
The corner edging is all buttonhole stitch.
Detail of embroidery on linen.
Detail of French knots.
Well, I’m off to go look for some of my favorite all-brown food – chocolate!
I almost quit at the COLD roast pork! Ugh! I think they needed a bundle of waiters, too. If that lady ever did a dinner like that, I wonder if anyone ever accepted an invitation from her again! The dresser scarf is wonderful!
Yes, I think even seven cents is too much for that course!
This book was aimed mostly at WCTU groups and church groups, for fund raisers, so I guess they were always looking for something different than had been done before, and something they could achieve with a lot of preparation ahead of time. I would guess some of these festivities would have given the whole town a subject of conversation for months!
P.S. I remember ironing things like that when I was young. Be sure item is evenly starched and always iron on the back so you don’t crush the embroidery
Did you notice the part where it says …”seven people pass out every seven minutes….” Probably the brown pickles were responsible. haha
My mother had beautiful dresser scarves like these, but they were well used and worn out and not worth saving. 😦
Love your take on the “passing out”.
I have a dresser scarf made by my mom too – but this one came from an antique shop. Whoever had it must have thought it was too pretty to use, or didn’t have kids!
We used to laugh at my grandma for putting things away because they were too nice to use. I guess there was some method to her madness.
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