VICTORIANA LADY

Welcome to the local annual spring tea where our ladies tea society attended.

Some background about the tea. It's been hosted for over 20 years with 27 hostesses this year, and 8 guests at a table.

Each hostess is responsible for her table theme, favors & refreshments. The church provides the sandwiches which were quite varied and delicious.

My menu included Butterscotch Scones that read Eat Me, written in frosting, brownie petit squares with white chocolate chips, &
assorted Petit Fours.

My specialty was my home made hat cake. (See my Recipes page
for how to make one). I frosted it with white icing, used tiny purple,
pink & yellow spring flowers along the one side of the brim. I finished
 it off with a purple organza ribbon and a pretty silk butterfly coming
out of the other side.

I started with a bright yellow tablecloth. Over that a lovely white lace one. For the centerpiece imagine two large stacked pedestal crystal
cake plates, on top of each other, loaded with  Petit Fours, brownies,
& red silk rosebuds.

In the center of the top cake plate I placed an heirloom cut crystal vase filled with red & white velvet roses.
(If you remember in the story the Queen was upset that the roses were white and she ordered them to be painted red.) 
Clear crystal beaded servers held the scones & tea sandwiches. Next to the Petit Fours was a Limoge roses tea pot.

Our serving plates were pink with flowers & butterflies on them. I used two matching patterns of Chintz tea cups. Throughout the table I added whimsical touches from the story; clear mini glass bottles with tags saying, Drink Me, a large stuffed Victorian looking rabbit, mini tea
cups, a large hat in the style of the Mad Hatter's hat, and Queen of Hearts playing cards.

The favors were miniature tea pots and bookmarks with a picture of Alice holding a Drink Me bottle.

For the chair backs, white lace ribbon tied in a bow. I have collected colorful, whimsical hats over the years and pinned a hat onto each
chair bow. Eveyone at the social loved our table!

The tea was done by candlelight which adds a warm glow.
It was fun visiting the other tea tables, the ladies are so creative.
We can't wait for next year's tea!

The Pleasure of Tea and Friendship Society's  Blueberry Tea

Menu:
Blueberry Green Tea
Blueberry Bread
Cream Cheese filled Tea Sandwiches with Blueberry Jelly
Blueberry Buckle Cake
Blueberry Custard Creme Pie
Blueberry Muffins
Assorted Berry Ambrosia

The table setting was a white tablecloth with white scalloped lace over the top and dishes of Blue Willow I inherited from my great aunt. The centerpiece was my great-great-grandmother's white ironstone pedestal cake plate. On it I placed a wreath of blue silk hydrangea flowers accented with little blueberries. In the center of the wreath was a dark blue pillar candle. I found little blue and white tea cups and saucers at a craft store. A blueberry votive candle was placed in each cup. 
 The favors were bonbons and small chocolate candies wrapped in white tulle tied with blue ribbon.

For the door prize I found a lovely matching teacup, saucer and dessert plate at a second hand store. I put several tea bags in the cup, added a teapot magnet and wrapped them in pink cellophane tied with ribbon. For the presentation of the gift I chose to write a little newsletter with tea hints on it. One of the copies had a word in lower case while all the others were in capital letters. I passed these out randomly. The person who had the error on their paper won the gift. I thought this was a different way to pick a winner, more interesting that picking a name out of a hat!

Everyone sat around the dining room table after dessert, sipping tea and talking - no one wanted to leave! This tea seemed like it was over too quickly! It was a wonderful two hours of peace and tranquility.

For some of the recipes from our tea , click on my RECIPES page