A Baby Tea for Sarah and Caleb

Then Caleb silenced the people before Moses and said, 

"We should go up and take possession of the land, 

for we can certainly do it." 

Numbers 13:30

This is a picture of the sky at 6:33 this morning. When I first looked out at the sky at 6:30 there was a bright red sun on the horizon, but by the time that I ran down to the first floor, and then ran back up to the third floor, the sun was not there.

Today we had a baby shower in the form of an open house tea. I've never actually like showers. You have to sit in a large circle and play really stupid games with people you don't even know, and then you watch the bride/mother endlessly open presents that you are supposed to oooo at. And finally you eat a store bought bake and drink coffee or tea or punch. So when I was asked to put on a shower I said sure, but I felt a panic inside about what I would actually do. After many weeks of thinking about it I came onto the idea of an open house tea, where I could serve all sorts of traditional tea goodies, and people could come when they could, and the presents would be opened as they came. There would not be too many people in the room at any time, and people could enjoy visiting with Sarah and the baby.

As is to be expected in life, things did not go totally as planned. For starters, the weather was expected to break a record for hottest day yet recorded on that date. It was something over 100 degrees, and since this is Oregon we don't have air-conditioning. But .... we have a great big pool in the back yard, and it was suggested to people bringing children that they could go swimming, and they did, and they had a great time.

But also because of the heat on the days leading up to the tea, I was rather slow at getting things done. I had had great plans of having many things done ahead of time, but it simply wasn't happening. So by the time the tea started I still had many things needing to be done, some of which never were accomplished. To quote Robbie Burns: "he best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men, Gang aft a-gley." But what was most important of all was that everyone enjoyed themselves.

The house was reasonably clean, though not everywhere. Riley was able to set up the upper deck very nicely with out newly acquired outdoor carper from France. I love how it came together. I closed the doors to places I didn't want people to go, but children managed to find their way into them. The food was actually only half ready when the people began to arrive. But in the end the only thing that never made it to the party was the champagne grapes, blueberries, and strawberries. The Swedish cream didn't set enough, but some were eaten. But all in all, people enjoyed what was served.

Menu for a baby tea:

Lemonade - part canned lemonade, part water and lemon juice, no extra sugar added
Iced Earl Grey tea
Iced mind tea

mini quiche Louraines
tea sandwiches from homemade French bread
.... cucumber and cream cheese with chives
.... egg-salad with bacon bits
lemon squares
cakes
.... fruity nutty banana cakes
.... lemon blueberry bundt cake
.... chocolate zucchini cake
Swedish creams with strawberry coulis
flakey scones with Devonshire cream and strawberry jam

"Tea to the English is really a picnic indoors." 

 Alice Walker