I love to go to farmers markets, especially in the fall.
The largest farmers market in our area is located on the parking lot of the Rockville courthouse. I can hardly call it picturesque, but it has a great variety of vegetables, fruit, greens, flowers and even honey and handmade soaps. We used to drive by this farmers market on our way to my kids' theater class and we would always stop there if we were not already late, which we often were… Unfortunately, by the time we were driving back, it was already dismantled and gone, and since we have moved we do not even get to drive by it and feel sorry that we have no time to stop.
Last weekend we visited another farmers market, a much smaller one. This one is set in the picturesque town of Garret Park near the train station. There was actually only one Amish vendor that time selling a variety of mostly organic produce, some pickles, and frozen chicken and rabbit. It was a very colorful spread of several kinds of squash, cabbage, greens, root vegetables - you name it.
I bought enough produce for a nice soup and salad. For the first time in my life I saw Cheddar Cauliflower that was an amazing color of cheddar cheese but otherwise smelled and tasted like regular cauliflower - it earned my kids' approval :)
Such colorful produce inspires me to get home and start cooking right away and then to set my table nicely, with linen napkins and old silverware. Napkin rings play a big part in decorating the table, they are the jewelry for your napkin.
This fall I came up with a napkin ring design with a stained glass pumpkin ornament decorated with wire and beads. These napkin rings are very cute, but they're also functional since they double up as decorations for votive candle holders. So, for Halloween I will use them as candle holders, and then for Thanksgiving I'll slide them off the glass votives and use them as napkin rings. And I can also mix and match!