Party Prep...Day of the Party

So the day of the party finally arrived. I was right on schedule, but I still had tons to do. It's funny, have you ever noticed how fast time flies right before a party? It seems like there is plenty of time and then it's gone. Fortunately, I didn't fall too far behind this time.

Two of my friends arrived an hour before the party to help assemble the sandwiches. They did a great job. Don't the sandwiches look yummy?

One of my friends brought the egg salad. I have got to get the recipe, as it is the best egg salad I have ever eaten! We also had chicken salad and peanut butter and jelly. It's been a long time since I've had a PB&J on white bread and I was surprised at how tasty it was. I wasn't alone...we all gobbled them up.

Our other sandwich was a very good Strawberry Cucumber sandwich. Since tea parties are not complete without cucumber sandwiches, I knew I had to have them. However, I'm not really a fan, so I spent some time looking for a good recipe. This one includes red onion and basil, which goes really well with the cucumbers and strawberries. Not only does it taste good, but I think it also looks pretty.

The final menu item to prepare were the scones. I found a traditional English Cream Scone recipe that tastes like something you would get in England. I served clotted cream and strawberry jam with them and they were a big hit. My timing in baking them was spot-on, as they were still warm when we sat down to eat.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I inherited vintage linens and china. They really made the party look authentic. My good friend made the beautiful flower arrangements and also provided flowers for each table setting.

Here are a few of the beautiful teacups I inherited from my grandma. It was so cool to actually use them. I allowed my friends to pick their favorite one to use and it was fun to see which one they picked. It was interesting that they all picked my favorites.

We had three kinds of tea: Earl Gray (of course), Glengettie (a Welsh tea), and a creamy chai.

The party was a huge success. We ate, talked, ate, played a game, and ate some more. My friends stayed for five hours, so I guess they had fun. At the end of the party, I had boxes for everyone to pack up whatever food they wanted to take home.

Although I was exhausted by the time my friends left, I had a wonderful time. I enjoyed every aspect from planning to implementing the party. I can't wait to do it again!

Party Prep...Baking & Cleaning!

I started seriously planning about a week before the party. I finalized the menu and then started making shopping lists. I bought all of the non-perishable items the weekend before and the perishable items on Thursday after work. I took Friday off and started baking as soon as I got home from the store. I even created a list of all the things I would need to get done from Thursday evening until the party.

As you can see, the list is very detailed. I felt like I was overdoing it a bit, but now that the party is over, I'm so glad I created the list. It was so satisfying crossing things off the list and I didn't have to worry that I would forget something. I will use a list again in the future. I am also happy to report that I was able to get to everything on the list except for the windows. (My solution was to just cover the bird poop with the curtains.)

As you can see from the list, my prep mostly consisted of baking and cleaning. Fortunately, I love to bake and I don't mind cleaning. I started with the things that could be baked and cleaned a few days ahead. I had tested the lemon and chocolate mousses and they could be made a day or two early. 

I am happy to report that I was putting the scones into the oven as the first guests arrived, as planned. 

The Menu

Baking the Sweets

I got most of my ideas from Pinterest. I wanted to try new things and this was my opportunity. I had so much fun trying out new recipes or ideas. As I mentioned earlier, I tried most of the recipes on my friends before the party.

This is my attempt at the Teabag cookies. I used my own sugar cookie recipe, but the idea definitely came from someone else. I found the teapot graphic and shrunk it down. The only thing I would do differently would be to use a heavier string (I meant to use embroidery floss, but I couldn't find my stash). I put them next to the teacups and everyone loved them. 

Every tea party has to have petites fours (I discovered this is the plural of a petit four). Personally, I don't think they are very good, but I couldn't not have them. To make things easier, I bought a pound cake from the store. I cut it up into 1/2 inch pieces, spread buttercream frosting on one side and jam on the other, put the two pieces together and then put them into the freezer until they were hard. I then cut off the edges, spread buttercream on all sides, froze it again and then cut them up into small pieces. The hard part was then spreading buttercream on the remaining small sides. (Traditional petites fours do not have buttercream on all of the sides, but I thought it would make them taste better.) Once they were frozen again, I poured fondant on the sides. It was a bit challenging to get the fondant to stick to all of the sides, but well worth the effort. The final step was to add the decorations on the top. Unfortunately, I forgot this step and I had to do them all in about 3 minutes as the guests were arriving. I wasn't happy with the results, but my friends thought they looked beautiful. Note: the buttercream was a hit. Everyone loved them and one friend even said they were better than the ones at the best bakery in town!

I have been admiring these Fairy Bites for some time and I thought this would be a great time to make them. My kid loved them and I had to ration them out to her, so that there would be some left for the party. They looked very bright and cheerful on the tray and I will make them again soon.

Orange Creamsicle Truffles. These are my go-to sweets. Everyone loves them. I should have dusted them again with powdered sugar before putting them out, but it didn't hurt the taste at all. And they really do taste like creamsicles. Note: I use the zest of 1-2 oranges, instead of only 1/2.

This was my one partial flop. The meringues turned out great, but there was supposed to be a little cookie with it. The cookies were like rocks when I took them out of the oven and the meringues just popped off. Since the meringues were great, I just threw away the cookies and served the meringues.

My friend gave me this really easy Dark Chocolate Mousse recipe. It's a really easy recipe, but very tasty. Since I wanted everything in small bite-size portions, I piped the mousse into little chocolate cups. Yum!

Okay, if you only make one thing from this post and you love lemon, you MUST make this recipe. It is that good. It is called Lemon Cheesecake Mousse and if you make it, please, please, please, use this recipe for the Lemon Curd. It is without a doubt the best lemon curd recipe ever and is so easy. You will not want to stop eating this stuff. Note: make sure that the cream cheese and the lemon curd are at room temperature before you mix them together. If you end up with little bits of cream cheese, I recommend running it through a sieve before you mix it with the whipped cream.

Well, I guess that's all for now. Stay tuned for more tea party prep...

It's time for a party

I decided several months ago that I wanted to have a tea party. There are several reasons for this decision and here are a few:

• I love to bake
• I love miniature things
• I have several tea pots (I guess my mom thinks I need tea pots!)
• I inherited a bunch of things that are perfect for a tea party (vintage tea cups, china, and linens)
• It sounded like fun

So once the decision to have this party was made, who should I invite? Actually, this was the easy part. My former colleagues and I have a history of going out for tea. Once we even went to an old victorian house for a tea party. Now that I had the group of people to invite, what excuse could I use for the party? Well that wasn't hard either. One of my dear friends and former colleagues is moving to Minnesota soon and I wanted to have a party for him. Since he loves tea parties, I decided to throw the party in his honor. 

Once the invitations were sent out I realized that this would be a big undertaking if I was going to do it right, and I wanted to do it right! I had been pinning ideas for several months, so I had lots of good ideas. I started testing out recipes on my very willing friends...most were very good, so the menu was coming along in my head. I felt comfortable that I could handle the menu items, but I realized that I needed tea cozies for two of the tea pots. (Fortunately, one of my very close friends had made a tea cosy for my biggest tea pot.) So once again I turned to Pinterest and found some great tutorials on making tea cozies. 

Since most of my sewing projects are for little children, most of my scrap materials are in pastels and a bit cutesy. I didn't mind and I was sure my friends wouldn't either. Here are the end results:

My favorite is the one with the lambs and I wasn't surprised to find that my friends liked it too! I was pretty happy with the end results. My friend S and I decided to try one out and we found it kept the tea hot. Success!

It felt good to have this project done and I really did enjoy such an easy sewing project after a long time away from the sewing machine. Now that this project was completed, there was plenty more to do...

Now that I am not working so much, I have the time and energy to spend on crafting. I love to scrapbook and I'm also trying my hand at making cards. Since most of my friends have birthdays in late winter/early spring, I decided to make some birthday cards. I found some unused candles, and here's what I created.

It was so simple to make. I ran the paper through my Cuddlebug, put the sticker on a piece of white paper, and then hot glued the candles and bow to the paper.

This one is my favorite.

Although this one doesn't have a candle, I like it too. The only thing I had to buy was the metal frame.

I hope these have given you some ideas. They all took very little time to make and my friends have loved them. The only word of caution is that all of these would cost a fortune to mail, so make sure you can hand them to the person or include them in a package.

I can't believe I am starting a blog. It's mind blowing! You see, I hate to write. I'm very uncomfortable sharing my feelings in print and I fret over everything I write. Although I am comfortable with computers at work, I don't use social media very much, except for Pinterest. I guess pushing myself to do new things goes along with all of the changes I'm hoping to make in my life.

My life is in transition. After 50+ years on this earth, I am recreating myself. 2014 was a life-changing year, most of it not good. I've decided that 2015 is going to be a transition year to a better life. My goals for the year are to:

• reduce my stress
• have more fun
• find more joy in life
• get to all of those projects I've been meaning to do
• get a new job
• spend more time with my family
• work on losing weight

I know it sounds like a lot of things to take on in one year, but I really feel that they are all interconnected. Although I didn't put getting a new job as one of the top goals, it must be done this year. You see, I won't have my current job after October 31st. At first I was devastated by this news. I've worked for the same place for 26 years. How could they get rid of me after so many years of hard work? It's not because I'm not a hard worker and very good at my job, it's because they are restructuring and want new (young?) people. I have to tell you, that was hard news to take. Here I was working 24/7 for them and they didn't even appreciate it.

Now that I've had time to adjust, I'm almost glad I'm leaving. I will be fully glad I'm leaving as soon as I have a new job (I can't express to you how scared I am that I won't find a good job!). Since receiving the news, I have made many changes in my life. I no longer work 24/7...I work 8/5. This has allowed me to make progress on the other goals on my list, such as my stress which has dropped by a ton (except for worrying about that new job).

I don't know how exciting it will be, but I plan to document my progress towards the goals I have outlined above. If you are interested, please join me for a year filled with ups and downs (hopefully, more ups then downs), as I work to create my new and improved life.

Marj