Since it is Monday morning and we are all longing for Spring I thought I would do a post on….martinis.
Actually it’s more about the pitcher than anything else. I was putting away a platter at my Dad’s house and I spied the pitcher tucked back in the china cabinet. This pitcher is the one thing my four sisters and I are going fight over when the time comes. Well it and the charm bracelet.
My parents were often asked how they survived having five daughters and my mother would always laughingly say ‘Happy Hour." People thought she was kidding but I’m not so sure… She used to prepare a batch of martinis for my dad and put them in the green pitcher and wait for his arrival. It was a very urbane, 60’s housewife sort of thing to do.
It was probably just a short-lived phase they went through but all of us remember it so clearly. And all of us want that pitcher ~ probably as a reminder of a happy time, a happy childhood, happy parents.
I was in a Michigan antique store when I was in my early 20’s and I had $15 to spend. I had a lace table runner (I’ve always had a thing for old linens) in my hand and I spied the exact same pitcher sitting on a dusty shelf. Both items just so happened to be $15. I am still kicking myself for buying the table runner (which is a fairly common item) instead of the pitcher.
Every antique store I go into I do so with the giddy hope that I might find another one, sitting on a dusty shelf just waiting for me.
I love that. I have fond memories of my parents having cocktail parties in the 60s. They all seemed so happy, now I realize they were all a little tipsy. My parents used to have New Years Eve parties and they would be doing the bunny hop dance down the street…such sweet memories. Oh, I tagged you on my blog today..I hope you don’t mind.
Andrea, I just found your blog and just love it!
The martini’s in the pitcher is so 60’s! My parents used to do the same thing but they would switch their drink of choice….lol. Once in awhile it was High Balls, then Martini’s, then Bloody Mary’s. I remember one summer my Dad riding my bicycle around the neighborhood and he was taking bloody mary’s to the neighbors in a big Coleman thermos then later that evening they’d have a big croquette party in our backyard.
Yes, great memories of happy childhoods!
I’m so glad I found your blog!
I remember those parties, too. My mother smelled like Shalimar or Taboo and gin, my father like tobacco and scotch.
And I can identify with the pitcher in the antique shop, tool been there and done that, much to my regret.
Haven’t dropped by for a while and it’s so nice to be back! Love your mum’s pitcher. I hate it when I miss out on something really special…hopefully you’ll find another one!
Hey, My husband and I are parents to 4 daughters — I wonder if we should be having happy hours too?!…perhaps when they hit their teenage years….Your posts are very amusing and your photos lovely — ‘happy to have found you via I can’t remember who!…
we had lots of happy hours at my house in my youth. Yes, and sometimes bloody marys. I love the pitcher
Sometimes we have happy hour now. sometimes my neighbors have a happy hour in their front yard in the summer and we sit out there and drink and talk and laugh and wonder what the other neighbors are thinking 😉