As I have mentioned, before moving to Italy, I donated my old Pfaltzgraff dinnerware. I think I had about 5 large plates and 4 bowls left in my set, so it was time for a new one. I figured I would be able to find some nice Italian ceramic dishes once we arrived. As I found out after a couple of days after moving in, there is a company called Caleca a couple of hours away where they make hand-pained ceramic dinnerware and all the accessories that go with it. I had never heard of the company, but after looking at the patterns at the Nex, I think at least 1 if not all 3 of the pasta bowl sets we got for wedding/shower gifts are Caleca. I will be checking that as soon as I get my household goods shipment.
Saturday, I ventured out with a few friends, and we headed for the warehouse. After driving for a couple of hours, we arrived in the small town of Patti, where the Caleca warehouse is.
As you can see, there is nothing special looking from the outside. As the picture below shows, it appears that we are in the middle of nowhere.
However, once you go inside you are surrounded by nothing but dishes.
Here is a picture of the all the plates and bowls which are seconds, and have flaws. Some flaws are really bad and some you have to really search for. On the left of the picture there are about 3 rows of shelves filled with all the accessories and bakeware that matches the dishes and are also seconds. On the right are all the firsts, with no flaws. The seconds are considerably less expensive and then we get a discount for being associated with Sigonella.
As you can tell from the plates, there are several different patterns to chose from. I opted to go with a simple pattern for my dishes and then spice things up with bakeware and accessories. I spent most of my time digging through the plates to find decent seconds. I wanted, or needed, to get at least service for 4, but ideally 8 so that I don't have to wash dishes after every single meal. Below is what I brought home.
I chose 8 different colors, so we have a festive looking table. There are at least 4 more colors, and I think before we leave I will get the other 4 so I have service for 12.
For each color I got the large plate, the small plate (there is a medium sized one as well) and the pasta/soup bowl. The fruit/cereal bowls were tucked into the shelves, and they only had 3 of my colors. I guess they are hard to come by. So I picked up those 3 bowls and will look next time I go for the others.
I got yellow, pink, green (not a color I would like a whole set of, but looks good with the others)....
purple (the picture doesn't show the true color of the purple), dark blue......
red, tangerine (although in this picture it looks like the yellow, it is more of an orange)..
and light blue.
One thing I forgot to pack in my express shipment was a baking dish. I never realized how often I actually use those, and I have been making due with the foil ones. So I decided I could go ahead and get a new one to go with my dishes.
I don't know the name of the pattern, but I liked it because it is simple and has all my colors. They do make the solid ones to match any of the colors I got, but I didn't like them in the baking dishes and accessories.
So that was the excitement for this week. The rest of the week was getting things taken care of for school. We met with the guidance counselor, and I think we have schedules set for the kids, pending approval from the principal. Sam was thrilled because they have enough students interested and a qualified teacher to have a strings program! It has been a couple years since she has really played the viola, and she can't wait!
Here are a couple pictures of their school. There is a middle school section and a high school section. I think Mike said it was built for about 1500 students, and right now there are about 600.
We had sport physicals done, and both kids are officially on the swim team. Next week we have to find the school bus office and get pictures done for bus passes and they have to have some sort of briefing on how to ride a bus. Then on Friday is new student orientation and school starts the Monday after that.
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