Tea Time!

Today I'm excited to share some pictures with you from the Mother's Day tea that I hosted over the weekend.  A few weeks ago I shared the invitations.  My sister Larissa came down on Saturday and helped with all of the baking and decorating.  I couldn't have done it with her.  Thanks, Riss! 

We used a simple piece of burlap as a table runner.  I mixed and matched the dishes for the place settings.  I used my wedding china and some plates that I picked up at TJ Maxx.  I used some colorful tea cups that were a gift a few years ago.  The napkins are from Target.  

We decided to give each place setting a personal vase of flowers.  Larissa put all of those together.  

The first course was tea and scones.  We served cream scones and strawberry ricotta scones.  I forgot to take a picture (grrr!) of the second course, a spring salad with an herbed white wine vinaigrette.

I used this recipe to make tea punch.  It is a great recipe!  I'll definitely use it again.  It's a little sweet.  I might not use so much sugar next time.  The recipe calls for orange juice which I used, but I'm thinking it would be delicious with pomegranate juice.  It will be fun to experiment with this drink this summer.

The third course was a potato leek soup.  Larissa garnished the soup with a few dots of cream and some fresh chives from my garden.

The fourth course was an assortment of finger sandwiches.  We had a spring ham sandwich with sun dried tomato aioli, cucumber canapes, white cheddar cheese and pimento sandwiches and broccoli salad roulades.  I would like to point out that I did not serve Easy Mac at my tea party.  My adorable 3-year old niece was sitting across the table from me.  She's the one eating the Easy Mac.  How low brow!

Finally, it was time for dessert!  Larissa made this gorgeous strawberry lemon bundt cake.  It was amazing--not too sweet--not too heavy--perfect!  She's a wonderful baker, which is great, because I don't really enjoy baking all that much.  I handle the savory, she handles the sweet.  We make a good team!

A few more shots for your viewing pleasure!