There is just something so elegant about silver in the dining room! I love to find silver utensils and platters and bowls in the thrift stores. The older the better!
Many people won’t buy them because of the upkeep of having to polish them to keep them so shiny and bright is time consuming and hard work. But I have fallen in love with the tarnished color of the silver. After all that’s how you know you are using real silver and not something that is stainless steel! That distinct tan color to me is beautiful! I think I would rather see tarnished silver than shined up ones!
We use vintage and antique silver utensils in the kitchen that we find at thrift stores. They are not expensive anymore because as the older generation dies out the kids don’t want that “junk” so they donate it to the local thrift stores. Which is where I find these lovely treasures! sad and lonely and waiting to be taken home for use.
I’ve often heard (and I am not a doctor so I don’t know if this is true) that using silver utensils etc gives your body trace amounts of minerals that you need to ward off illnesses that you otherwise don’t get through other means. So this may be why we rarely get ill from coughs and colds? Who knows? Maybe, maybe not? Lol allergies are a whole different story tho!
But it sure does feel fancy, eating from silver platters and silver spoons. Having a bowl of cereal or yogurt with a silver spoon is giggle worthy if nothing else! So don’t be afraid to buy those beautiful pieces of silver you find. Tarnish is ok as long as they get used often and don’t turn green lol. Who said you have to polish silver anyway? Why not enjoy the natural color that silver becomes? Not everything in life needs to shine to be beautiful!
Sometimes I will see a fingerprint ingrained in the silver tarnish of a platter from where it has been washed and put away. Imagine 100 years from now if someone were to see that same fingerprint and think: my ancestor owned this platter and that is their fingerprint! That’s a piece of history in the making! Why polish it and take it away? Now it is art and history! Beauty is in the eye of the beholder I guess lol… but it always intrigues me as to the designs that are held in the tarnish themselves. One of these days I shall place a flower or leaf against the platter to make a designer imprint in the tarnish to see what happens just for fun! Who knows! I might even start a trend! 🤪
Don’t be afraid to enjoy silver items! Enjoy and embrace the tarnish that comes with the item and see the beauty that age enhances it with. After all… we humans age like fine wine and become better with age, so why not silver? You can always clean and polish it later if it truly bothers you lol! But why not enjoy watching it age to perfection?
Conestoga Chuck 