to not have a Christmas Table worthy of Kirsty Allsop?

[autumnlights12]

On Facebook this morning. Several friends have uploaded their immaculately dressed dining tables, already ready for Xmas day. Best china. Best crystal. Best serving dishes and best cutlery. Fancy table feature with various twigs and candles. I have none of this. WIBU to rush out and panic buy perfect Crimbo table accessories from John Lewis? Or will my Tesco best non china suffice? Sob.... Facebook has once again made me feel deficient.

I love a nicely dressed christmas table but i have 9 to booking day lunch and only 4 chairs.
But i do have matching crystal wine glasses, cutlery, plates, etc just no chairs.

booking day is boxing day

My parents table is quite posh now but they are in their 60s and this is what they want to spend their money on.

Growing up it was far more of a Peter Kay scenario with emergency chairs meaning we were all sat at different heights :)

I love doing the table but wouldn't put plates and cutlery yet. I genuinely like all the arty/farty/poncy decorating - a foliage centrepiece, candles, crackers. It's a personal choice though and I would not upload a picture to Facebook. That smacks of smugness. There are lots of things that should be photographed just for private viewing, not to put on Facebook.

My daughter also pulls me down to earth if I get too poncy with her 'Mum, you are going Kirsty.' Mismatching is cool, HoHo...but I understand. I have collected inexpensive stuff from charity shops...yeah I know, it's too Kirsty. I will shut up now.

We don't have a wide enough table to load it up with decorations and have space for all the dishes. I've learned from previous years my nice table centre will end up on the side so we can fit the bread sauce there. Don't worry about it. It's all about being dressed with the food!

Also, where are these people goign to eat dinner tonight and tomorrow night?

Naaaaah! Its just us for Xmas. I thought I was doing well to have bought a cheapo disposable Christmas tablecloth and some napkins . we dont even own best china/crystal!

id ignore FB!!!!
in the zoo house the zoolets are perfectly capable of accidently breaking "unbreakable plates" so will be eating lunch off santa malamine numbers from poundland,with pieces the snowman kitchen roll as napkins

i have no desire to spend lunch fretting aomethings going to be shattered

they enjoy themselves thats all i care about

id ignore FB!!!!
in the zoo house the zoolets are perfectly capable of accidently breaking "unbreakable plates" so will be eating lunch off santa malamine numbers from poundland,with pieces the snowman kitchen roll as napkins

i have no desire to spend lunch fretting aomethings going to be shattered

they enjoy themselves thats all i care about

I dont have FB , why would you put pictures of your dining table on it ?

Oh my god. I feel so inadequate now!!

We have a table. That's a start...?!

We have regular plates and cutlery.

That is all.

I have no fancy plates, don't own wine glasses, no napkins, no serving dishes, no table mats.

MIL and SIL are coming to us for lunch. Fuck, I'm gonna look like a complete twat aren't I?

I have a nice home, but we never usually have guests for meals. So never saw the need for all the showy off shit.

I don't think the table is big enough for serving dishes anyway.

I also have a newborn baby. Does that get me off my social faux pas?

We do have crackers though. All is not lost! Twister crackers too .

Might see if I can get some cheap stuff in asda tomorrow morning. Unlikely I guess...?!

We have a dining room but usually eat in the kitchen. We will use the dining room on Xmas Day, but the table will only be laid on Christmas morning. There will be no fancy table decorations here and there may be some matching wine glasses depending on how many DH has broken in the dishwasher.
I'm afraid I can't get excited about adorning the table - life's too short. I too have friends who go down the decorative table route. One of my friends has knitted covers for individual ferrero rocher chocolates for each dinner guest, in the shape of robins. christmas puddings or santa hats!!! They look lovely - but completely pointless IMO!

The more I hear about fb, the more I don't want to sign up to it.

I wrote about this the other day, as the thread is appropriate I assume I won't get jumped on for posting it?
(Completely agree with you, by the way, and I'm sure half the people on Facebook just tell big fat lies to make themselves look better, when in actual fact they're sat slurping a Pot Noodle instead of a monster Christmas lunch
"Budge over Kirsty, move over Phil, it's my turn to have a Perfect Christmas (or not) castawaywithdreams.wordpress.com/2012/12/20/being-organised-for-christmas-yeah-right/

I have a separate dining room but at the moment the table is being used to write cards and wrap presents on. It is fairly tidy as we eat in kitchen area. Why would you lay your table so far in advance.

The table isn't huge and was bought 2nd hand on ebay but is nice. For a centre piece I have put some ball balls not being used on the tree into a glass dish but as someone said will probably move it off the table.

my mum usually does christmas dinner so I am quite excited in some ways. I do like using nice china and the serving dishes belonged to a relative and are from the 1930's I think.

i wouldn't put pictures on fb. bit showy offy but some people like to do that.

Jeez, most we do is snaffle a clean table cloth into the ironing (last week) and hiding it so we can put a clean cloth on for guests. I have my glass and woe betide any one who tries to make me drink out of another in my home! It is crystal but not by design and is unique (in our house)
Mum does this sort of thing, great looking but such a blinking faff to do and then clear up

OH FUCK!!! I don't have a gravy bowl - Christmas is cancelled.

Boat not bowl.

I bought some wine glasses for about three quid from Tesco, does that count?

I fancy Phil

aibu?

Do people really do this? Why?

When one of the school mums handed me the crackers she won in the PTA raffle because they wouldn't match her table settings, I knew then I was never going to be a Kirsty Allsopp. Here, it is the usual Denby, any napkins/tablecloth/crackers I cobbled together at carboots and fetes over the past weeks and last year's candles.

I have a lovely pine table that can seat 8 in my kitchen diner-huge room. I only use a tablecloth on Xmas Day. The last time I saw it was about three years ago, I do wonder where it is......

Who gives a flying fuck? It's the PEOPLE round the table that count

I do have different plates for Christmas - but its not best china by any manner of means, its garishly decorated Christmas plates that I got out of Morrison's years ago, we love them!