Tuesday at The Table

Today begins an occasional series on the significance of the dining table. For those readers who are interested in quilty posts only, let the word 'Table' be your clue . . .

It's been a while since I wrote about The Table. It is very significant to my family and I, and much has happened around it since my last post that I may or may not share some day. Don't worry, though, this post won't be as heavy as the last. But I've been thinking about when the table began to be a big deal for me personally. I know it was a meaningful place for my family long before I was born. But I think one of my first memories of the importance of the table being imparted to me involved Betty Crocker. Actually, a Betty Crocker cookbook. I was a little girl, and my mom would open up that cookbook and turn to the page that had a picture of a properly set table. And I would set our family's dining table according to that picture. A picture something like this:

courtesy of sugarandcharm.com

Now we never had sherry or wine glasses, or even seafood forks, but I set what we did have, and I knew that it was important and that it made my family's time around the table special. And yessiree, in the years to come I would be given a book of napkin folding techniques and cloth napkins to fold in new and fancy ways. To me, as a child, it made the whole event of sharing a meal together of unquestionable value. Thus the table was set, the tradition continued, and it continues today.