Jack of All Trades, Master of None

Napolean Hill, one of America's earliest Motivational Writers says, "The jack-of-all-trades seldom is good at any. Concentrate all of your efforts on one definite chief aim."

That's me. Jack of all trades, master of none. I like saying I know a little bit about a lot of things but not a lot about just one thing. Is that a good thing? Or a bad thing?

It might be a good thing to concentrate all your efforts on one definite aim in your career or business, but not in your personal life and hobbies and interests. While it may be good to be an expert knitter or sewer, wouldn't it be better to be just a so-so knitter and so-so sewer and so-so cook and so-so painter and...well you get my point. Try lots of new things and have fun with them, rather than getting all intense and stressed out about trying to be perfect at just one of them. What do you think?

I like being just so-so about a lot of things. That being said, I have a new interest. Blogger hosts a Blogs of Note award that it gives out daily to a blog they think is worthy. I try to check out the blog of note each day and some of them are great and some of them are things I'm not interested in at all, but it's always fun to check.

The other day, I checked out a blog of note about Tablescaping! What is tablescaping you ask? Good question, I'd never heard of it either. So I clicked on the link and Tablescaping is simply setting a beautiful, interesting, unique, special table for either a special event, or as this blogger does, just for everyday use. Go check out this blog and look at all the great tablescapes and see if you don't get some idea of your own. I know I did. Let me share.

I decided to try my hand at a Valentine's Day table, see what you think. I first got the idea because I have the Corelle Pink Heart dishes like these...

I've had these dishes probably since 1990 or so. And I love them and use them as my everyday dishes. But then I remembered some dishes I bought about 8 years ago while shopping at a Goodwill with my mom.

They have beautiful flowers and a butterfly which I love, so I thought I would try these instead, since they aren't my everyday dishes.

I didn't have a pretty tablecloth or runner I could use, so I stuck with the crocheted tablecloth thingy I've been using on my table, since the color is neutral and it's kind of romantic.

I then looked around my kitchen to see what else I had that would work and be valentiny. Remember the post I did about the champagne flutes my daughter gave me? I mentioned some amber colored glasses, they are really more rose colored, although they do photograph a bit more orangy.

And see the pink napkin above? On Friday I went to the American Cancer Society Discovery Store (a nice way to say thrift store). It's an awesome and wonderful store and I went there again today. I'm hooked! It's so well decorated and the displays are made with such attention to detail, I love it. Anyway, I bought four pink napkins, just cause I like pink, I had no plans at that time to do a tablescape using them, but they sure came in handy!

And here's the whole table. The angel blowing a kiss in the middle was the centerpiece for my niece Sarena's quincinera in August of 2005. I have two of them and I just love placing them in different places around my house. The other one is in my bedroom right now, on a nightstand, blowing me kisses before I go to bed :-) I think I still would like a different centerpiece and I will show you what I did differently at the end. The pink candles I've had forever and had never used them. I have some lilac ones exactly the same, and the hearts strewn about are candies.

Here's a closeup of the napkins and the silverware, I didn't put any knives on it. I don't know why, maybe whatever I plan to serve for Valentine's day won't need cutting?

The napkins look rather plain don't you think? So i found this wonderful website that teaches you lots of different ways to fold them. I did the one below because it was the simplest and also the only one that I saw that didn't require an iron and starch, (I just don't do irons and starch)!

So here is the finished table. Except the angel still doesn't seem right. I think I need to add some pink flowers to her, or maybe something totally different???

How about this? This was my purchase today at the American Cancer Society Discovery Store. I saw it Friday and secretly coveted it. It was $18.00 and that seemed pricey to me, but remember what happened last time I saw something I wanted and I didn't buy it? Well I took a chance again with this item. When I was there on Friday I saw a sign that said that on Super Bowl Sunday they would have everything in the store 25% off. So I figured I would wait til Super Bowl Sunday and if it was there it was meant to be...and it was there!! Yippee!!!!

So here's the final table, sorry about the lighting but it's late in the evening. It still seems kind of bare to me. I think I'll email the Tablescaping lady and have her take a look at it and give me some ideas. I'm thinking maybe if I take the cover off the cake stand and put pillar candles in shades of pink and white in varying heights it might help. What do you think?