Pitchers and Steins for Show and Tell Friday

I've collected dishes of one sort or another since I was a little girl.  Pitchers have always appealed to me, so I thought I would share some of them for today's Friday Show and Tell over at My Romantic Home.

I can never remember how much of the story I've told before, so here's a little intro. I was born in Kansas, moved to Colorado when I was 3 and then moved to post WWII Germany with my family when I was 4. So lots of my memories and Show and Tell stories have to do with those almost 10 years I lived in a culture that I loved from day one. Antiques, collecting, architecture and just plain "old stuff" have always appealed to me.

Back to the pitchers and steins......this is a sampling from my collection that goes way back.

Upon arriving mid-winter after a perilous 13 day crossing of the Atlantic in a converted hospital ship, we were billeted in a hotel in Bad Schwalbach.  I have great memories of the few months we lived there, racing up and down the staircases, down the wide halls, and visiting the kitchen to see what there was going to be to eat.  You could count on only one thing that would show up for a meal ...... cabbage.  There were very few vegetables to be had in those days after the war, but cabbage was abundant.  The hotel always retained the lingering aroma of cooked cabbage.  It took me years and years as an adult to get past the smell and enjoy cabbage in its many iterations.  The little pitcher was a gift from a favorite waiter in the hotel dining room.

We next moved to temporary apartment housing within the compound of Frankfurt Am Main, as anti-American/occupation sentiment was running high. By that fall things had settled down and we were moved into a lovely two story house in the small town of Schwetzingen, just outside of Heidelberg.

I attended a grade school provided for the dependents of the military stationed in Heidelberg.  Although my father was a civilian attached to the Army, I was still considered an Army Brat and enjoyed all the adventures we had together.  Field trips were pretty regular events and one of my favorites was the ferry ride up the Neckar River, through the locks, with a stop in Neckargemund which was about 5 miles upriver and took about 90 minutes each way. The destination was the little pottery factory.

This little pitcher/vase is one of my treasures that I purchased at about age 7 from the factory.  I don't remember how much it cost, probably a week's allowance of about 25 cents. Wouldn't it be nice if the exchange rate for those years would work today.  The US dollar was worth 4 marks and 20 pfennigs.(This was decades prior to the introduction of the Euro in 2002.) The dollar went a long way even for a kid.  The tall pitcher with the blue flowers at the back inf the first image is from the same pottery and belonged to my mother.

The Heidelberg stein pretty much says it all for my years living there, "I lost my heart in Heidelberg."  The castle is pictured on the front, with the story of Perkeo and the great wine barrel depicted on either side.  It's a great historically embellished fairy tale, but that will have to wait until another day.

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