U is for utensils

Utensils can be plain or fancy. Some foods can't be eaten in front of an audience without utensils. Well, of course, if you are eating your food without the benefit of an audience, you can eat in any old messy style. Apparently, really good utensils are a sign of wealth. Or, at least, they used to be a sign of wealth. The saying, "he was born with a silver spoon in his mouth," indicates that the baby was born into a wealthy family of high social standing. The family had loads of money and was able to hire to servants to do all of the necessary labor, which included polishing all of those silver and, especially, the famous silver spoon.
I like utensils. I think that I'd like to have one or two sterling silver spoons, even if I wasn't born with one of them in my mouth. Nevertheless, I don't have any. Fortunately, I still have some nice utensils. They are silver plated, which is not anywhere near as extravagant as sterling silver. They are lovely utensils, with interesting patterns.
Some of my lovely utensils came from my grandparents, and, and others came from garage sales and rummage sales. One of my lovely utensils came from church. The kitchen was being cleaned out, and the utensil was on its way out. The pattern to this utensil is called Berkshire, and it was made by Rogers Bros. in 1847. Or, at least, the pattern was created in 1847. My spoon has a monogram on it. At some point, the spoon was owned by someone whose last name began with the letter V.
  

The fork was a utensil that my grandfather owned. It was made by Holmes and Edwards in 1923. The spoon is an example of the Berkshire pattern.

This is a closer view of the two very different patterns.

This utensil could be a Holmes and Edwards 1916 pattern, "Jamestown." The handle has a unique pattern, very different from any of my other little utensil treasures.

Silver plated utensils are much less expensive than sterling silver. They look great at a tea party with bone china tea cups. Neither the tea cups nor the utensils have to match any of the other tea cups or utensils. Matching is optional. 

I enjoy getting all of this lovely stuff at garage sales. The weather has turned to spring, and garage sale season is just starting. You never know what sort of treasures you might find!