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Showing posts sorted by relevance for query tea party. Sort by date Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by relevance for query tea party. Sort by date Show all posts

Boston Tea Party Themed Tea Party Around the World


Yesterday I introduced my new series, Tea Parties Around the World. Today I am going to share our first tea party by looking at a historical one and having a tea party with that theme. Our theme is the Boston Tea Party. (After all we might as well start local.) To start we read some books about the Boston Tea Party. Did you know there were actually four tea parties in the colonies but Boston's became the famous one? These are a few of the books we found at our library. There are a lot out there!!

Relaxing Morning so here are some Birthday party ideas

This morning we are having a relaxing morning. Hazel slept in until 6:20 (much better than her usual time between 5 and 5:30). She is having fun coloring now, so I thought I would share some of the birthday party ideas I have been gathering.

To start I don't believe in going broke for a birthday party. I believe in an at home party with friends and family. I like to have a theme, but that is because I like to go a little crazy planning it. Hazel's birthday is New Year's Eve. We usually have a party for our friends and family on January 1st. When she is a bit older we are  hoping to have a small kids' birthday party for her half birthday as well. I tend to make most of the food and cake myself and I buy the appropriate paper supplies, but often buy special napkins and solid color everything else to save money. It is not about how much you spend but how much fun you have.

For her first birthday party we did a cupcake theme. We made invitations with pictures of Hazel saying "Our Little Cupcake Is Turning One". Needless to say instead of a cake we served cupcakes. I also made paper cupcakes and filled them with candies for favors. Of course this was before cupcakes were so in so I had trouble finding cupcake related items. Right after her party cupcakes became the very in thing. Resource: I bought a template because I couldn't find anything for free, but this site looks like it would work: http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/forums/templates-f143/cupcake-box-templates-go-linseys-card-t350478.html.





For her second birthday, we did a tea party. Our theme was "Tea for Two". Since it was still mostly an adult party, we served many different flavors of tea and typical tea time treats. I made a birthday cake and had my nephew paint a miniature tea set for the top of it that I bought at Joanns. I also had a bigger paint your own for everyone to sign so Hazel has a memory from the party of who was here. For the older kids that came we had white mugs to paint. I also had put together a bag of kids activities including a coloring book with pages I found on line with crayons and stickers. For a favor, I found garden teacups and saucers at Micheals on clearance in the fall for 39 cents each and bought them up knowing we were going to have this theme and put two tea bags in a nice bag and attached a tag that said "Hazel's Tea for Two" on one side and "Thanks for Coming" on the other. I attached the tags with a string to the bag and had them hanging out of the tea cups. Resources: http://www.coolest-kid-birthday-parties.com/tea-birthday-party.html, http://www.coolest-kid-birthday-parties.com/free-coloring-pages.html, http://familyfun.go.com/parties/tea-party-704536/#lollipop; http://hubpages.com/hub/Tea-Party; Pink Princess Tea Parties by Barbara Beery (I borrowed it from the library), Come to Tea by Stephanie Dunnwind, Let's Have a Tea Party by Emilie Barnes, The Totally Tea-rrific Tea Party Book by Tanya Napier. I borrowed all of these books from the library, but found I wanted to own some of them because of the many themes they had in them. From these books I took decoration ideas, recipes, etc. I also got many facts about tea and the history of tea and tea parties and printed them. I stuck them into my centerpieces and decorations so the adults could have something to read in case they got bored.

Advent, Christmas and a Tea Party Crafts & More! -- a Crafty Weekend Review & Link Party

Disclosure: I was sent these items to review free of charge from Oriental Trading. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review. I am including links to each item for your convenience but do not receive anything if you purchase them.

We are getting ready for our busy December which includes Advent (which starts next Sunday), Christmas and Hazel's birthday. Hazel decided she wants a fairy tea party this year for her birthday party. We recently received a few products from Oriental Trading to help get ready for all three things. We will go in order starting with Advent.

Our Japanese Tea Party -- Exploring Japan with Tea Parties Around the World

Disclosure: Tuttle Publishing gave me copy of this book free of charge for this review. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation.


So last month our plan was to have a Japanese tea party for Tea Parties Around the World, but life interfered and our tea party happened in May instead, but this is perfect since it is Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month. So through April and into May we have been exploring Japan. Now Japan is known for its tea ceremony. It sounds so fancy and has an interesting history. To learn more about the tea ceremony we read Tea Ceremony by Shozo Sato. 

Tea and Tea Parties

Disclosure: I was sent this book to review free of charge from Quarto Books USA. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review. I am including links to each item for your convenience but do not receive anything if you purchase them.

Did you know that tea is the second most popular drink in the world? Water is the first. Hazel is going through a stage of loving tea parties and always wanting to have one. I decided to combine all of this into our cultural studies of various countries and start a new series: Tea Parties Around the World and you are cordially invited to all of them!! Before celebrating a party I thought I should learn more about tea itself. And thanks to my friends at Quarto Books, I am able to share with you The Art and Craft of Tea by Joseph Wesley Uhl and some of the information I found out about tea from it. 

English Tea Party -- Tea Time Around the World

Disclosure: I was sent these books to review free of charge in exchange for an honest review. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review.  Some of the links are affiliate links where I will receive a small percentage of any purchases made through them at no cost to you. Thank you for supporting Crafty Moms Share!

Now that we are almost half way through December I am going to take the time to share the tea party we had in November. In November we looked at England. To do this we read some books, watched some DVDs from the library and also have some fun books to share with you. Some are for the little ones and some are for the older ones. We will start with learning a bit about England. It is a country in the United Kingdom. It's capital is London. Now I always have had a fondness to England since my maiden name is a town there. However I do not know a whole lot about the history of England besides little bits here and there. To learn a bit more we started with The Tudors: Kings, Queens, Scribes and Ferrets! by Marcia Williams.

Princess Hazel -- I See Me! Personalized Book Review for National Princess Week


* Disclosure: The Gymboree and Little Passport links in this post are affiliate links and I may earn a small commission at no cost to you.
Disclosure: I See Me! Inc.  gave me a copy of this book and ornament free of charge. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation.

Did you know there is a National Princess Week every April? It is always the last full week in April. It started in 2012 when Julie Andrews, Target and Disney joined together to create it. Julie Andrews's website says "Believe in yourself! Only then can you truly let your sparkle out for all the world to see." (Source) The website also has a post of 30 Ways to Celebrate National Princess Week.  We chose a fun way to celebrate and started a bit early. I See Me! sent us the Princess Personalized Book. All I have to say is Hazel was really excited when it came! 

Chinese Tea Party -- Tea Parties Around the World

Disclosure: I was sent these books to review free of charge in exchange for an honest review. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review.  

Now a series of Tea Parties Around the World would not be complete without looking at Chinese tea. Let's face it, the China is where tea began. January seemed like the perfect time for us to look at China since we were looking at the Chinese New Year already. I will admit writing this post has been intimidating me and I keep putting it off. How can I do the long history of tea in China justice? I have decided just to share with you my references and what we enjoyed as we looked at China and the history of tea. 

Rainy Day = Tea Party

Something to make me smile
Ok, I have discovered two new to me fabric stores. I'm so excited to have some place besides Joann's to shop! One is near Hazel's school so next year when she will be going by herself I will have some place to visit often.
Hazel's newest tea set

Since I made Hazel the needle felted tea set, she has wanted to have a tea party/birthday party. Her birthday is still several months away (new year's eve), but I have been looking for fabric in the theme I want so she is getting excited for it. And we celebrated my birthday last month and my sister's this past Saturday and went to a friend's 5th birthday party, so she has birthday on her mind.

So this morning she set up a tea party in the living room. Of course it required two baskets of fruit and vegetables to serve with the tea cups (we used both felt and plastic). She also invited the Dish and the Spoon to join us.
Our Guests
Her set up after the party
After getting a sore back from sitting on a foot rest, I asked her if she would like a real cup of tea. So we made a pot of chamomile lavender tea with a bit of honey in it. I added milk to hers and used my good china cups to make it special. She claimed the tea tasted like chocolate, but only had a few sips. But she enjoyed it. I remember these tea parties with my mom, so I want to have special ones with her.
Taking a sip
She wanted cheese with her tea
Our set table with candles lit
We are working on some fall crafts to share, but it has been hard to get Hazel to stay on task for them. Hopefully we will have some tomorrow for you. In the mean time check out:
1) Make and Takes Little Apple Favors I want to try this one later today!

2) I {heart} nap time Halloween Crafts {Lifestyle Crafts}
3) I {Heart} Nap Time Free Printable for Halloween 
4) FamilyFun Magazine Tree sculpture  great nature craft!!

Indian Tea Party: Chai and Henna -- Tea Parties Around the World -- Exploring India


This month we decided to explore India with our tea parties. India seems like a good one to mention when exploring tea around the world. It was after all a big part of the British trying to grow tea somewhere besides China. When the British were able to smuggle some tea plants out of China they ran into the problem of needing the correct environment to grow it in. They decided on India and began to colonize there. In my British and Chinese tea party posts I shared great resources to explore the history of tea, so I am not going to repeat it all here. Of course tea is so sensitive to environment, methods of processing and even methods and times of picking, so the tea in India was even different from the tea in China.

Sip Tea with the Mad Hatter Review & Giveaway

Disclosure: I was sent this book free of charge for this review in return for an honest review by The Children's Book Review & EW Foundation. All opinions in my review are my own and I will receive a small compensation for writing it. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation for your purchase.

Have you noticed that good manners seem to be disappearing in our society? Manners are taught and usually they are learned at home. Even if schools try to teach them, if they are not used at home, it does not do much good and with today's school there is not time to really teach good manners. Today we are sharing a book that helps teach good manners and other social skills. It is Sip Tea with Mad Hatter by Loretta Neff and illustrated by Anirban Mitra.

Mother's Day Celebration with Link Party

This year for Mother's Day Hazel and I went to a tea house on Friday for afternoon tea. I had promised her we would do something like this when I had to miss the Mother/Daughter Tea Party at her school in April. I figured Mother's Day weekend was the perfect time. Hazel dressed up for the occasion with gloves and all. We had a wonderful time. 



Fairy & Ice Cream Party Updates

Disclosure:  Some of the links are affiliate links where I will receive a small percentage of any purchases made through them at no cost to you. Thank you for supporting Crafty Moms Share!


I am finally stopping to catch up after the holidays and Hazel's birthday. Today I am going to share some of the details of her two birthday parties. First we always have a family and adult and younger kid party for her birthday. This year we decided on an ice cream theme. I made invitations with My Memories Suite.

How the Queen Found the Perfect Cup of Tea

Disclosure: I was sent this book to review free of charge in exchange for an honest review. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review.

Between my Tea Parties Around the World Series and National Princess Week Resources and Giveaway (have you entered yet?) How the Queen Found the Perfect Cup of Tea by Kate Hosford and illustrated by Gabi Swiatkowska found its way to me.

Busy errands and things

First I have to start by saying Happy Birthday to Amy over at One Artsy Mama. I am participating in her BIG Birthday Celebration by donating my needle felted Dala horse for her giveaway. She is giving away 17 ornaments to 17 lucky readers. Go over and check them out for a chance to win.There are really some beautiful ones. I'm having trouble picking my favorite.

Now that Hazel is finally feeling better, we spent the morning running errands. Most of the errands had to do with Hazel's birthday party. Hazel's birthday is New Year's Eve, so we always plan her party for the first since people are off. This year since it is on a weekend we are actually having her party on her birthday, but in the morning so we won't mess up anyone's New Year's Eve traditions.

Every year we have had a large themed party for Hazel. For her first birthday we did a cupcake theme because I feel in love with some plates that said "Our Little Cupcake Is Turning 1." I searched everywhere for cupcake things and this was the year before cupcakes were in. I found very little, but did find a template to make paper cupcakes for favors filled with pink and purple M&M's. Needless to say we had cupcakes instead of birthday cake. My mother knitted her an adorable cupcake hat from a pattern I found in a magazine.

For her second birthday our theme was Tea for Two. We had a tea party. I made finger sandwiches and lots of tea and sweets. I had people sign a paint your own small tea set when they came. And on top of her cake was another paint-your-own tea set--this one mini that my nephew and I painted. (He painted and I adjusted the colors a bit so there wasn't so much black.) Again there was not much out there for tea parties yet. Now I see them everywhere. I seem to be a year ahead of all the trends. I did however find at Michaels on Clearance garden tea cups with attached saucers for thirty-nine cents each and bought enough for the favors. I filled each one with two tea bags and a small tea cup note book. For the older kids I had paint your own tea cup, but unfortunately, all but one was sick and unable to come.
So for her third birthday, I think I already shared, my theme is nursery rhyme. Come on after making dish and spoon costumes for Halloween could I pick anything else. I found some great paper at the Christmas Tree Shop for twenty five cents for twenty five sheets. Then I thought about rhymes for the invitation. This is what I came up with:
Isn't the paper perfect? Now I'm working on decorations, food, and activities along with the theme. I bought some strawberry tarts from Yankee Candle on clearance for adult favors and plan to make scented (and possible glittered) homemade play dough for the kids.  I want to have different stations like pat-a-cake with some homemade play dough, a Jack be nimble jumping contest, Humpty Dumpty Puzzles, photo ops with a Hickory Dickory Dock clock and a tuffet and large spider for Little Miss Muffet (and make a white bonnet like she wears).

I'm also helping a bit with the planning of a friend's son's first birthday party. The theme is Winter One-derland. I'll share more on that another time.

Do you do theme parties?

Let It Snow! Winter Wonderland Tea Party

Ducky and Princess Teddy got seats of honor

So Hazel had her well doctor visit and I wanted to make the whole day special so she would have a positive memory instead of just getting shots. We started today having a Winter Wonderland Tea Party. First we had to do some crafts to decorate and then we had to get all the dolls and animals. Then Hazel had to feed them all and get dressed herself (in costume). Then we had some tea and read lots of snow themed stories. Below are the ones I let her choose from and we have read at least 12 of them in the past two days.


I promised at yesterday's Sharing Saturday (which is still open!), that I would feature some snow-themed crafts today. I knew we did this, so I knew it would be a perfect fit here. Plus we used some of the ideas for our crafts. Here are those features:
1) From Life with Moore Babies: Colored Snowballs and More Ice and Snow Fun
2) From Making Boys Men: Frost Writing (For those without snow around but cold weather!)
3) From Gift of Curiosity: Snowman Craft for Preschoolers (see ours below)
4) From ArtClubBlog: Paper Snowflakes Tutorial (see ours below)
5) From Little Wonders' Days: Glittered Peppermint Winter Play Dough

And here are a few from past Sharing Saturdays:
1) From Gift of Curiosity: Winter Printable Pack
2) From Organic Aspirations: Sensory Play with Snow Indoors
3) From Like Mama ~ Like Daughter: Winter Themed Week in Preschool

Also check out the features from past Sharing Saturdays here and here. Some of these would have been great snacks for our tea party!
3-D Snowflake

So we decorated for our big winter wonderland.  I made a simple 3-d snowflake using some foam snowflakes I bought. I was inspired by Paper Source and just cut a slit in each and fit them together. Then punched a hole in one and put a string through it to hang.
Paper Snowflakes = Placemats
We made some paper snowflakes using the tutorial from ArtClubBlog (see feature above). We decided to use them as placemats. I also tried to make some out of felt using the same tutorial but my scissors were not quite sharp enough to make it beautiful. I am going to make them into pillows.
Felt Snowflake
We made several snow angel chains. Hazel had a go at cutting some but cut their heads off, so she used her smiley face stickers for heads and then added smiley faces to all of them. For hers we used the template at First Palette. For the ones I did I drew my own template to make them look more like snow angels. Here is my template.
I folded one of her large pieces of construction paper in half the long way and then folded into eighths in accordion style and cut this out. This is how they came out pre-smiley face.
The Snow Angel (Adaptation)
Source

I wish we had the book The Snow Angel by Glenn Beck, but the library did not have it in, so we will have to read it another time. We loved it last year.

Hazel also made a cotton ball snowman similar to the one shared by Gift of Curiosity (see feature above). We used a pipe cleaner for a carrot nose and stick arms.

Then we laid out some fake snow that I had bought last year for my friend's Winter Onderland party but it wasn't used. And I had bought a package of snowballs post Christmas for this and we pulled out the wool ones I needle felted for her last year.
Then she gathered all of her dolls and animals. After getting them all around, she needed to feed them all. Ducky and Princess Teddy got seats of honor on the table. (See top picture) And of course Hazel needed to dress-up. She wanted to do the tea party before she took her bath and got dressed, so we are still in our pajamas, but she added on her tutu, ballerina top, wings, and crown and was carrying her wand part of the time.
Finally we were ready for our party. We sat on the snow covered floor and read books while we drank tea and Hazel finished her raisin bread toast from breakfast. Then we had a snowball fight.
Gathering all the snowballs and making a snowball pyramid
Then she wanted to play with her white balloon, but since we only had one white balloon, she gave it to me and used a red one. 

Now it was time to take her bath and for us to get dressed so we could have a special lunch out before her appointment. We had such a fun day. We still have our winter wonderland set up, but will have to pick it up tonight or tomorrow since the cleaning people come Monday morning.

American Girl or 18-inch Doll Accessories from a Party Store Product Review

 Disclosure: I was sent these products to review free of charge from Shindigz Party Supplies. All opinions in this post are my own. I did not receive any other compensation for this review. I added links to the particular products for your convenience, but not for any compensation. 

Yesterday I received an email from Shindigz informing me that my DIY American Girl Themed Party had won an award (you can see the award badge on the post). I responded what a coincidence since I was about to write a review of Shindigz products to use with an 18-inch doll. So yes, here are some ideas of party supplies that work with 18-inch dolls like American Girl dolls. We are getting ready for a Valentine themed Doll Play Date later this week. Hazel invited a few of her friends and their dolls over. We are planning on having a tea party with the dolls. First of course all the dolls need tiaras. These mini tiara combs are the perfect size for the dolls.


Friendship, Readathon, Book Clubs and More

   
Today I thought I would share a bit about friendship. It is the theme of the Readathon 2012 Week 2. Did you know that 1256 readers have signed up so they have donated over 1256 meals to hungry kids via FoodforEducation.org? (If you want to join just click on the Readathon 2012 button above and for each reader that joins a meal is donated!) For more information and some links to different friendship crafts and activities go to MeMeTales.

Snowy, Tea Party Kind of Day


Wednesdays are typically our day without many plans since it is the day between her two school days. I find it nice to have a day to play at home and spend time together. This morning was one of those days I was glad we did not have plans as it was snowing harder than they predicted. Our big plans for today was to have a tea party after breakfast and getting dressed. I made the tea during breakfast so it would be cool enough for Hazel by the time we got to the party.

Our next step was to get dressed and accessorized and then we had to dress all of our guests. Hazel wore her favorite pink dress and then piled on the jewelry. I told her she looked like she was from the 80's with all the bracelets (think Madonna or Cyndi Lauper). She basically put on every bracelet she could find and every ring. You cannot see it, but she did pick out a tiara which I am wearing in the picture above.

Then we poured the tea for our guests and got ours and our real snack (corn muffin top) ready. She loved this part. We even got a special guest who we gave a plastic cup to since she probably would have broken one of the porcelain ones.
I think she was a bit more interested in the pom poms and wands Hazel insisted we carry to the tea party. We had put them on the floor by the table and Fluffy was definitely keeping an eye on them. Of course her favorite part was that we would choose one of the dolls or Ducky to need more tea. Then after the corn muffin was gone she wanted me to cut up some apple. Needless to say it was a very fun morning.

After lunch we changed and put on our layers to go outside. Now the snow had turned to rain and it was wet and very heavy outside. However she really wanted to go play in it, so we did. After all, she has been wanting to make a big snowman for a couple of years now and we have not had a good snow for it. Well we did some shoveling and made a snowman and she made many snow angels. I think this might have been her biggest snowman yet. We used almost all of the snow that was on the driveway next to our garage. It made shoveling much easier after rolling it all into the snowman.
She also loved making footprints and dropping her shovel to make its footprint and handprints too in the snow. Afterward we came in for hot chocolate (well I had tea) and warmed up. By then the roads were clear so we went out to run some errands as well. We spent some time doing some crafts together, but I will share those another time. Have you done anything fun this week with your kids?