One of the things I love and, if I can be honest, sometimes equally dread, are tea parties with my two girls. I haven’t gone out of my way to try to raise “girly girl” girls, but I think that’s exactly what is happening. 😃 Tea parties with my grandmas, sisters and mom are treasured memories, so of course, I’m going to try to recreate that with my daughters, who are five and four years old right now.

The actual attendance of these tea parties is quite delightful. Full of random conversations, laughing, occasional sibling bickering, and repeated yelling at Rusty (our dog) to stay away from our pridefully selected treats. However, the preparation (which can truly take hours) and the clean up can be grueling for the lack of patience I’ve sadly developed in motherhood. So, those parts are not exactly my cup of tea. (see what I did there?! 😃 )

Dress Attire
If the girls know it’s a tea-party-kind-of-Saturday, they’ll wake up and start picking out the perfect dress up attire. It never fails one wants the blue tiara and the other wants their light up dress shoes, but we don’t know where the blue tiara is and we can only find one shoe! So, the hunt begins and because of my disorderly housekeeping skills, we spend way too much time getting all of this together.

Setting the Ambiance
The perfect music needs to be on, which is the Frozen soundtrack. Where the oldest is covering her ears to the songs about Anna saying she only loves Elsa and my youngest is singing along only to the Anna songs because she loves Anna and knows it bothers her sister.

Food/Drink Preparation
Here’s a fun fact for you, the girls don’t even like tea! So, they get their own tea-pot with water in it and I get my own tea pot with actual tea. And, it can never be just “tea”…I’ve tried! Crackers, cheese, cookies, and strawberries are a must at the table and have to be displayed with colorful dishes. On my last grocery trip to Trader Joes, I saw these mini heart cookies that screamed “My girls will love these!”. They are dark chocolate covered short bread cookies with a touch of pink and white sparkles….the perfect Valentine’s Day and tea party treat. They taste amazing! I couldn’t find the product on Trader Joes site, but just know, they sell at an actual store for $2.99 USD a box. So, go get a box before their seasonal Valentine’s Day selection goes away!

Clean Up
Once everything is gobbled up and everyone is done taking turns pouring “tea” out of the pot, I’m usually worn out by now. I know the right thing is to teach them to clean up after themselves and share the cleaning burden, but wow, that is easier said then done. It’s so much faster to just do it myself. It’ll be something on I work on in the future. Until then, I always mentally say “next tea party” and move on. 😃

Well there you have it….the official recap of our “tea” parties.  If you’d be interested in learning the history behind actual real tea parties and not the make-shift tea parties I put together, go check out this post at CulinaryTrace. Ermi is a Chef who loves sharing the history behind food. It’s pretty fascinating. Look for her on instagram as well (@culinarytrace).

What are some of the love-kinda hate things you get to cherish with your kids? It’s ok. This is a safe place to share. 😃