Spring Fling Tea Party (with two puppies & a lonely tutu)

Today is the virtual Spring Fling Tea Party to celebrate the first day of spring that was graciously hosted by fellow blogger Artsymama and apparently is quite the international affair! I am looking forward to visiting all the other participating tea partier blogs to see what they did.

Here is the Spring Fling Tea Party that I created for my daughter and myself. But then "the boys" crashed the party and had to join in the fun. If you would like to view all the photos taken of our tea party, please take a peek - there are some darn cute ones!!

I decided to have our tea party in my daughter's room. Initially I wanted to do it in our backyard, next to our little fountain, but it has been cloudy and chilly - uncommon weather for southern california.

When I designed my daughter's room close to three years ago when I was pregnant with her (after two boys), I was inspired by the colors of this teacup - the "American Beauty" by Royal Albert. I also had visions of us having tea parties in the corner under my favorite chandelier (that I gave a makeover to, another great eBay find). I cannot believe that today is our first official tea party in that corner! Where did the time go? And today she helped me in the kitchen for the first time when I/we made scones. See the gallery of photos to view her with flour everywhere.

So not only is it the first day of spring, it's the first time baking together, and the first time having a tea party in her room!

So after all the preparations were made, I attempted to change Raina into a pink ballet body suit thingy (can you tell she's my only girl - I don't even know the names of the clothing!) and a pink tulle tutu. Kicked and screamed. Wanted NOTHING to do with it, like tulle was scary and evil. It laid on the floor....

But we did have a great time. Here are the details...

On the table: Usually I like to mix things up a bit, use different patterns for the china etc. But with my pink & green theme, I chose to be more matchy-matchy. You can't tell in the photos, but my teacup is the standard size American Beauty and Raina's is the demi size. The flowers in the milk glass vase were cut from the yard - the only thing bloomed. And the pint-sized bunnies were a find from the .99 cent store, stuck in moss in tulip champagne glasses. The serviettes are just cut from fabric with my favorite scallop-edge pinking shears.

On the menu: for savories we ate chicken, grape, apple and pistachio salad sandwiches and cucumber, watercress and cream cheese sandwiches. The homemade scones were almond cream and blueberry scones. For sweets (I purchased from my favorite bakery) lemon bar bites, an almond tart, chocolate dipped strawberries, coconut macaroons, sugar cookies and mini pink cupcakes with green sprinkles. The kids drank sparkling pink lemonade and I drank Garden Party loose leaf tea which has a nice, floral flavor to it with a hint of Earl Grey.

Giving "Puppy" some tea. Puppy is her love-y.

Giving "Sprinkles" some tea. Sprinkles was adopted at her two-year birthday party.

The girls.

The boys crash the tea party. They know a good homemade scone when they smell one.

So thank you Artsymama for inviting and inspiring me to have a tea party on the First Day of Spring!