Enchanted Teas with Dahlia

I have always wanted to do a murder mystery themed tea party because I thought it might be interesting to combine elegance with just a touch of horror! So this week I finally went ahead and organized one! Special thank you to my mom and dad for helping me with the story line and other details! And thank you also to my grandma, sisters, and the D'Angelo family for attending and participating! For this event I kept the menu relatively basic by preparing simple finger sandwiches (egg salad as well as cucumber) and a fruit tart. To add to the theme, I iced some sugar cookies with black question marks. My mom used the same black icing to draw the outline of a body on top of the cake, but added some colorful flowers to balance out the gruesomeness. ;) The setting was a high school reunion! In attendance was a tough-girl bully, perky ex-cheerleader, glitzy celebrity, exhausted mother, successful business woman, cafeteria lunch lady, and drunken teacher. Each of these party ...

I've always loved browsing through antique shops, looking for treasures for my tea parties! It can be easy to get distracted in these kinds of stores, so I like to have a few specific things in mind while I'm there to help me stay focused.  The first thing I make sure to see if they have is obvious tea party essentials like tea cups. Occasionally I'll come across complete tea sets, but it's more common to find a lot of random pieces. You can use mismatched tea cups at a tea party without it clashing, in fact I think it adds an element of whimsy and makes each place setting unique! Another good reason for snagging individual tea cups could be for if you're going to play games at your tea party... they can be used as a prize! There are all sorts of craft ideas that turn tea cups into creative gifts such as candle holders or even potted plants  (<---click the pink words to be directed to websites with instructions on how to do these fun crafts)! Other ...