How to Host a Ladies Tea Party

 

 

Tea parties are such a timeless entertaining theme that never goes out of style.  To celebrate Mother’s Day, I invited a few of my girlfriends over for an afternoon of tea!

 

To replicate this sweet afternoon, invite your girlfriends by sending them a pretty invite in the mail.  (I found these tea themed invites at Minted.)

 

Set your table with linens, tea pots, tea cups and all the fixings you’ll need for tea.  

 

 

Fill any holes in your table with fresh flowers, candles and little bud vases.  I put these arrangements together using greens from my yard and flowers from Trader Joes! 

 

 

 

To complete each place setting, add a menu of what will be served at the tea.  Our menus coordinated the party invites and listed the variety of desserts and teas offered.

 

 

Tiered trays are the ultimate tea party fixture.  Fill them with small pastries like scones, shortbread cookies, jam filled thumbprint cookies, meringues and mini muffins.

 

In addition to mini pastries, I baked my signature sugar cookies with edible flowers and glazed them with buttercream icing.  They turned out so pretty!  Stay tuned for a recipe.

 

No tea party is complete without tea sandwiches.  Make small tea sandwiches like Cucumber Dill and Strawberry Basil .  Both recipes double as such a pretty party decoration on your table. 

 

You can find my recipe for the Cucumber Tea Sandwiches HERE and the Strawberry Basil Tea sandwiches HERE. 

 

 

These cranberry chicken apple bites are a great alternative for those who don’t eat bread.  They are quick to put together and taste so good.  Get the recipe HERE.

 

To complete the table, I placed a mini lemon cake next to each place setting.  I topped each lemon cake with a few flowers to add a little life to the desserts.  The flowers on the tops of the cakes reminded me of fascinators or fancy tea party hats!

 

 

My girlfriends arrived just in time for lunch.  It was so fun to gather around the table and sip tea together!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We sipped on tea,  nibbled on cucumber sandwiches and laughed so hard we cried.  I don’t think any of us wanted the afternoon to end.

 

 

Tea parties can be thrown for any reason and any season.  Mine happened to be to celebrate Mother’s Day, but why not just throw a Just Because tea party!  Bridal Showers, Birthday Parties, Baby Showers, Anniversaries…you can dream up any excuse for a tea part!

 

 

And what’s a party without a great take home favor??  Tuck a bottle of Lolea Rose into one of these darling dip dyed canvas totes from Minted and a box of miniature sugar cookies from Jenny Cookies Bake Shop.  Guests will be thrilled to take such a pretty gift home!

Happy Mothers Day my friends!

Photos by Kelly Clare Photography

 

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