The Tea Cozy!

Who uses a tea cozy today..? I remember my mother had a tea cozy embroidered set way back in the 90's. She even had a beautiful tea set. We used tea cozy's back then. Some days when we would go visiting an 'aunty' in the neighborhood, they would serve tea with the teapot covered with a dainty tea cozy. Then slowly it disappeared from households. The one we owned went through the wearing out phase, collecting stains of tea and soon of rust. And it vanished from my memory.

Recently, my sister got married. In the run up to the wedding my mother would surprise us with little little things that she had collected over the years in a trunk, to be given to us when we got married. A bed cover from Fatehgarh, a small town in U.P, with its patchwork of very English prints, a hand embroidered table cover set (with napkins and place-mats) from Pune etc etc. The beauty of these simple treasures cannot be matched by the modern upholstery anyday, though no doubt they too look very good. So along with these, out came the Tea Cozy set with Kashmiri embroidery! Our eyes lit up with girlish joy! The word 'Pretty' just doesn't do justice. With its rosy pink embroidery and delicate looking napkins, we held it and I could see my sister loved it. I loved it too. 

In the excitement of the wedding preparations, I wanted to get married too! And I love my mother for collecting these simple joys. Its a great idea! So I began making of list of things that I should collect from across the Indian states, apart from the ones mama had already bought! Be it a particular type of saree, curtains etc, and guess what topped the list..The Kashmiri Tea Cozy set! So what if we don't use them anymore? 

Wherever there was a possibility of finding one I would search, Dilli Haat, Emporiums etc. I did not find the same one that my sister got. Sadly, some of them were 'modernized' and had lost the charm...

Finally, I got just the one(or two!) I wanted at Jammu!We visited Jammu recently and I bought myself not one but two Tea Cozy Sets...'for later'! It may be a stupid indulgence but one cannot resist these pretty girly things with the most simple yet alluring embroidery. So I liked two and couldn't let go of either! It is now tucked away somewhere in the same trunk from where my love affair with the Tea cozy began!