Another Grand Tea Party

I had a tea party for the two granddaughters when they were seven and eight. Now they are 12 and 13. I didn’t think they’d go for it when I suggested we have another tea party, but they were excited about it.

This time, we did things a little differently than we did the first time. And you can see how much they have grown since the first time.

Until I read the blog from five years ago, I didn’t realize, I had them help with the food. But with this tea party, I prepared the food ahead of time, so there’d be more time for fun.

I picked them both up after school. We had dinner with Grandpa and then went shopping for our outfits. We went to a thrift store where they tried on a ga-zillion outfits. Here are a few shots. I’m sure the employees loved us having to hang up all those clothes.

Lots of giggling took place. After they settled on the perfect outfit (which you’ll see later as it’s not any of the above), we hit the shoe rack, then the hat rack, and then the jewelry rack. They picked out a purple outfit for me and found me some matching shoes.

We came home and they were so excited that they changed clothes to show Grandpa. Since Lily had a birthday the day before, I had made some panda bear cupcakes and we sang Happy Birthday!

 

 

We then made lipstick to match our outfits. 

After that, we painted nails.

Once the nails were dry, we headed to the bedroom to play Pass the Pigs, and finally to sleep.

Morning came and we began make up. Then hair and we had an oopsy with Lily’s hair as I didn’t realize a brush curling iron would tangle in long hair… 

Lily was a good sport about it and after trying every trick in the book to untangle the mess (even demolishing the curling iron), we ended up cutting her hair. However, you can’t even tell. So there.

We got dressed and headed to the “Tea Room.” I had saved some old dishes of my mom’s. I split the set and “dished” them to my kids, nieces and sisters. Two of the sets were still here, so I dug them out and we used those for our tea.

Talking in our finest British accent, we commenced with the tea party. Princess Flame (aka Logan) 

 

and Princess Frost (aka Lily) 

behaved themselves in the finest manner, even when an unexpected guest showed up. They were gracious in allowing Auntie Jessica (who was not in proper attire) join in for a spot of tea. 

Queen Grandma-ma Purple Plum invited both Princess Frost and Princess Flame to join me for tea on an annual basis, with the stipulation that two other princesses would be invited (if not more). It was “quitely” divine. Quitely was a new British word we created.

Here we are posing to show off our shoes. Oh, the shoes. I don’t know how the heels could be any taller. You can’t see Princess Frost’s heels, but they are taller than Princess Flame’s or mine.

Guess how quickly my fur, hat and shoes came off? Before the tea party was over.

A dear friend shipped some fine Teddy Bears to me to be included in the tea party and here they are with Princes Frost and Princess Flame. Have you ever seen two more angelic princesses?

I shoo’d the girls off to play while I cleaned up. Grandpa-pa took us out to eat again—while in route, Princess Flame and Princess Frost sang to … ack, a popular singer that escapes me. Country and Western, if I recall. Ah... Taylor Swift.  They knew every word and they both sang just as good as Taylor, if you ask me.

 

Back home, we continued to play—making bouncy balls from Auntie Rita, and teaching Auntie Rita how to play Pass the Pigs. After Auntie Rita left, we learned how to zentangle. Both Princesses are quite artistic.

The princesses stayed the night again and Grandpa-pa chauffeured them home the next day while I was at church.

Ahh, what's not to love about a tea party?
 

Grand Tea Party

Dear Mom,

I had a tea party with my two granddaughters, Lily and Logan. Although they’re not my blood granddaughters, I love them just the same.

Not having had a grandmother, I envied those I knew telling stories of their grandmothers—sweet, heart warming tales. I’m not trying to take the place of their real grandmothers’ —just hoping to create some nice, fun memories.

Our Grand Tea Party began at 8 AM. We planned the menu. We decided on our pretend names. Lily—Princess Penelope (the blonde), Logan—Princess Onion, and I was Queen Grandmother Vera Sunflower. We made from scratch mini blueberry muffins, teeny chocolate chip cookies, a green salad and fruit salad cut up extra small.

I had a mini banana bread and tiny maltballs that we added. We dug out their great grandmother’s (child size) tea set and washed it. Lily and Logan polished the silver spoons.

We decorated our hats making several trips to the attic and basement for silk flowers, ribbons, glitter pens and scarves.

Decorating was ongoing as we waited for things to dry or deciding on one more embellishment. We rummaged through my old clothes for dresses and shoes. I found some hot rollers and curled the girls’ hair while over exaggerating their faces with makeup.

They both wished their straight thin hair was full and curly. I told them if their normal hair was full and curly, they’d wish it was straight and thin, and that they had beautiful hair.

We set the table, put the food on, made sure our babies (Lizard Geoffrey, Onion Geoffrey and Baby Queen Bear) were dressed and ready and our official tea party began.

We talked in our finest English accents while we sipped our hot cocoa (because they didn’t like tea) and munched on our goodies.

At 4 PM we kicked off our shoes, put on our bathing suits and finished off the day in the hot tub. I don’t know if they’ll remember, but I surely won’t forget it.