COUNTING DOWN, LEMON POTS AND A BEAUTIFUL RIBBONWORK BROOCH

Counting Down

While counting down the days, weeks and months till my husband comes home and finally starting to feel closer to that fabulous day, we have been trying to enjoy our days.  We have filled our time with many things and currently we are swimming as much as possible in our neighborhood  pool!  We are planning and preparing for our Tea Party which is coming up on the 6th of July, so excited!  And  we have been busy making a costume for Tiffany for the Anime convention here in August and making all sorts of fabulous recipes and treats to enjoy.  I have several projects on the back burner, such as making my paper doll handbag (I will share this when I make it) and all sorts of neat things.  

Lemon Pots

So this week we decided to make and try lemon pots.  I have seen the recipe may times and there are many out there but they are all basically the same.  While on Pinterest the other day, I happen to see some lovely lemon pots and it reminded me that I have always wanted to try them.  The recipe I pinned was in metric measurements so I checked the recipe and Tiffany and I went shopping for the ingredients.  

Ingredients

1/2 Cup Lemon Juice 
1 Tablespoon Lemon Zest
(about 2 lemons)
1/2 Cup Sugar
2 Cups Heavy Whipping Cream

(makes approx. 4-5 servings)

Combine heavy whipping cream and sugar in a pot and cook over medium heat.  Bring to a boil and cook an additional 3 minutes.  Remove from heat and add lemon juice and lemon zest.  Stir and let sit for a few minutes and then place in little dishes.  I used 5 small Limoges berry dishes.  Place in refrigerator to set and cool.  

Then you can add any garnish you like.  We added a sprig of mint (just bought myself a very pretty and so fragrant mint plant), whipped cream and some tiny pearl candies. 

These are so delicious that I had to share and they may make an appearance at our tea party.  We are making crepes in the morning to go with our lemon pots. 

So very delicious and refreshing!
I recommend them for a nice summer treat. 

Beautiful Ribbonwork Brooch

We are asking everyone to wear either a hat or fascinator to our Tea Party and I have decided to wear my new pink dress, so I am in need of a fascinator.  I went looking online for  a perfect ribbon work item to use on my fascinator but I also wanted to be able to remove it and use it as a pin or brooch.  I of course headed over to Etsy, where I had admired the ribbonwork of Lambs and Ivy Designs many times before and I found the perfect brooch.  

I emailed the shop to ask the size of the brooch and ended up meeting my new friend Dana of Lambs and Ivy Designs.    My ribbonwork brooch arrived today and I am so in love with it (she says while swooning)!  It is beyond gorgeous and certainly a treasure that I will cherish.  Dana is so very sweet and she took the time to get to know a little about me, not only did I get something beautiful,  I gained a friend.  You can visit Dana in her Etsy Shop here:
 Lambs and Ivy Designs

RibbonWork Brooch

Shown here with one of my Limoges Dishes.

Isn't this just lovely!!!

As I countdown the weeks until my husband returns, we are filling our days with crafting, making and tasting fabulous treats and much fun and laughter.  We are making our days brighter and building precious memories that will last a lifetime.  We are looking forward to our Tea Party and that fabulous day when my Eric returns. So not wishing our life away but still looking forward to having our family complete once more. 

We hope that you will join us each week as we share our happenings here at Tea Cottage Pretties. 

See you real soon, 

Beverly

Tea Cottage Pretties

My handsome husband, 

my Prince and the Love of my life...

TEA PARTY PREPERATIONS AND A VINTAGE DAY!

Tea Party Preparations

Sewing

and

A Vintage Day

Tea Party Preparations.

Tiffany and I are preparing for our up coming Tea Party and this week we made some graphics, did some shopping and we started making our rose sugar cubes. 

Our graphics for the Tea Party......

1.) Cards for Tea Party!

I used a vintage perfume label and worked my magic on it to make the banner, tea bag cover and bookmark. (Note: the teapot graphic is compliments of The Graphics Fairy)

2.) Cover for Tea Bag 
Thank You Gift

This will be folded and a tea bag will be inside. 

3.) This is our bookmark that we will be giving out as a Thank You gift!  I wanted to share it here and you are welcome to save it and print it out. 

With the graphics done we moved on
 to making our sugar cubes. 

Rose Sugar Cubes In Four Colors.

We are trying to prepare as many things as we can ahead of time, in hopes that it will make our Tea Party more carefree and relaxed.  We love our Rose Sugar Cubes so we decided to make them for our party.  Tiffany wanted them in four colors (pink, blue, green and yellow) so we went to work on them. 

I have recently posted the directions for making these splendid little beauties but I wanted to share them again. 

Rose Sugar Cubes

What you will need

1/2 Cup of Sugar
1 Drop of Food Coloring
1 Tablespoon of Water

Combine ingredients in a bowl and mix until your color is well blended and then mix a little more. 
The sugar should be slightly damp through and through. 
Then put sugar mixture into your molds and firmly pack them so that they get a good impression from the mold. 

Let sit for 10 hours to harden and carefully remove placing the sugar cubes right side up on a plate to dry on top.  They will still be wet so be careful removing them and try not to touch the tops of them.  The tops will dry very fast so in about an hour or so, they can then be handled.  

I then placed them in separate plastic bags for safe keeping.  
Enjoy them anytime you want to have tea with just an extra amount of SPECIAL.....

We will be serving them in a beautiful 
Limoges bowl during our Tea Party. 

A Vintage Day!

I found a beautiful vintage styled dress that I fell in love with and it was only $12.99 on clearance.  It was too big (a size I use to wear) but I knew I could easily take it up a size or two. Now if that doesn't make a girl feel good, I don't know what does.  So I bought this dress and brought it home and in about 45 minutes I had it fitting me just right!  I went shopping (in my closet) for things to go with my new dress and I found a sweater, vintage pink Smartaire handbag (Miss America, LOVE THEM), pink Paris Hilton bow flats, vintage pearls, pearl and rhinestone ear bobs and my vintage Sarah Coventry heart watch pendant.  A girl should never wait for a special event to wear a dress (my philosophy), so I got all dolled up to run my errands.  It made my day special and I so wished that my beautiful husband had been here to see me.  So instead we took lots of photos for me to send him and here are a few of them. 

Smiling

Here I go!

Serious

Here I added a rosebud and a couple overlays. 

One of my favorite pairs of shoes!

We are having so much fun preparing for our up coming Tea Party. For me it is something fabulous to focus on and help pass the time until my husband comes home.  We are super excited about our Tea Party and we will be sure to take tons of photos. 

We hope everyone has a fabulous week and we will be back to let you know how we are doing.  

As always, we thank you for visiting and sharing with us.

Have a beautiful day.

Hugs, Beverly

Tea Cottage Pretties

#23 LIMOGES HANDLED SERVING BOWL

#23 Limoges Handled Serving Bowl

Today I wanted to share one of my Limoges bowls.  I am preparing things for Tiffany's Tea Party and I was looking at some of my pieces of Limoges. I needed something to put our sugar cubes in, that we are making. I grabbed my bowl to take some photos of it because I am using it in my next blog post as well (coming in a day or so).  I just love how my hand painted pieces look with lace so I grabbed my trusty lace infinity scarf and my iPhone and here is my pretty bowl. 

Limoges Handled Serving Bowl 

Isn't it lovely!

My favorite photo.

T&V LIMOGES FRANCE
Tressemann & Vogt
1892-1907

While I was looking for a bowl for my sugar I realized I needed a spoon for my sugars as well.  I pulled out my mixed match pieces and I found this sweet silver spoon, perfect.....

I tied a pink bow on it!

Perfect Sugar Spoon!

You will see this spoon again very soon.

My new post will be posted in the next day or so, 

please do come back to visit us. 

See you then!

Have a blessed day......

Beverly 

Tea Cottage Pretties

LOVELY SUMMER SALAD, TEA PARTY PLANS AND OTHER GOODIES!

Lovely Summer Salad 

Tea Party Plans

and 

Other Goodies!

Here at Tea Cottage Pretties we are planning a birthday party in July for Tiffany and we have decided on a tea party.  That's right a tea party with all the things that a tea party brings to mind; tea, French macaroons, cupcakes, prosciutto, different cheeses,  vegetable trays and a lovely summer salad.  With this in mind we wanted to come up with a salad that would knock your socks off, okay well maybe your stockings.  So this weekend we experimented with our salad and our first try was a hit. We are calling it Tea Cottage Pretties Summer Salad. It has Spring Greens, Strawberries, and Blueberries and is sprinkled with Candied Pecans. We first cut the strawberries and sprinkled them a bit of sugar just to let them make a glaze. Then we put everything together and it was so delicious. We served with cheese and ham and we had a delicious vanilla and coconut tea. It was fabulous and we are thinking for the party we will add blackberries as well.  

Tea Cottage Pretties Summer Salad

This will be our signature food for our 

Birthday Party - Tea Party. 

You could even use lovely vinaigrette on this salad and any variation of fruits and berries that you happen to love.  

The berries go very well with the spring greens.  

Delicious!!!!

We are also trying out some new tea here at Tea Cottage Pretties.  My darling husband bought us a special tea that we are ever so excited about tasting.

Being shipped to us from Paris, France this is the Marie Antoinette Tea! This tea is made from Chinese black tea and combined with rose petals, citrus fruit and honey.  I imagine this will be a lovely tea with a floral taste, like sipping on beautiful flowers.  

We also have been tasting a few more new teas that we can actually get locally.  

Here you can see we got apple/cinnamon tea, raspberry/mint tea and coconut/vanilla tea.  So far we have tried the apple/cinnamon and the coconut/vanilla and they were fabulous.  So we will probably be serving these at our tea party.  The coconut/vanilla has a very floral taste and smells wonderful. I think I could even use this in a nice bath. Each one of these teas is designed for a specific health benefit but we are more interested in the taste, although it is nice that we have a go to just in case.
(NOTE: The laxative tea does work but it is gentle)

We are going to ask those that attend to dress for high tea and we are requesting that everyone wear a fascinator or a hat.  We will of course take photos and share them here on our blog.  So be sure to look for our future post.  Tiffany's birthday is the fourth of July.  Her daddy always told her when she was little that the fireworks for just for her.  

Tiffany is a blessing and a living miracle, being born 3 months early she weighed 2 pounds 6 ounces.  She was smiling from the first moment I saw her and never stopped smiling.  She spent 45 days smiling in the NICU and when we finally brought her home she weighed about 4 pounds.  She has grown into a lovely young lady and she is a pleasure to be around.  She is a hard worker and is very dedicated.  We are extremely blessed and we thank God for her every day.  She is our blessing and our beautiful gift from God and we are most honored to be her parents. 

And here she is this weekend ready to go out and run errands with mom. 

And now it's time to share some goodies with everyone. 

I needed a bracelet with teal blues in it and I finally got around to making one for myself this week.  I found these really pretty beads and some vintage seam binding and I made this really sweet bracelet. 

I am also planning another bracelet and here are the beginnings of what I am going to use to make it. 

These are beautiful buttons that I recently found!

I want to combine them with this vintage seam binding in beautiful teal blue. 

So look for this bracelet in an upcoming post. 

Now for my favorite thing that I found this week.  I had seen a vintage Sarah Coventry Heart Watch and I went searching for one to call my very own.  I got very lucky and found one and with shipping it was only $8.00.  It arrived this week and all it needed was some gentle cleaning and a new battery, meet Sarah.  

Isn't she beautiful! 

My new vintage treasure!

And of course I HAD to wear my new Sarah Coventry Watch while we were running our errands. 

Here's to delicious foods, crafting and vintage finds.  

With loving thoughts of our daughter and our many blessings, thank you for sharing with me here today at Tea Cottage Pretties.

A special welcome to my new followers, you are greatly appreciated. 

Hugs, Beverly

And 

Gentle Hugs for all those living with fibromyalgia....

 Coming Soon it's Audrey...

#22 LIMOGES LARGE POWDER JAR

#22  Limoges Large Powder Jar

It has been some time since I have posted a piece from my Limoges collection and I felt it was time.  This is a lovely amateur hand painted large Limoges powder jar.  I needed to share this piece today because it is on it's way to be cared for by a lovely friend.  

Limoges Large Powder Jar

Markings:

T&V LIMOGES FRANCE
Tressemann & Vogt
1892-1907

I want to extend a warm welcome to my new followers 
and thank you ever so kindly for following me.

Have a beautiful and blessed week,

Beverly 
Tea Cottage Pretties

Thanks for stopping by.......
See you soon......

PINK FRENCH MACAROONS AND PINK PARIS ACCENTED SHORTS AND A HANDBAG

Pink French Macaroons  and Pink Paris Accented Shorts and a Handbag.

It was just a PINK weekend..

My Tiffany and I have been wanting to make some of those French Macaroons and of course we wanted PINK.  So finally we found the Almond Meal/Flour and this was no easy task.  After searching our local shops for some time we finally found out that it is usually in the health foods isle with nutritional foods, vitamins etc.  So here is the almond meal/flour that we found.  It runs about $9.00 a bag but one bag will make a lot of macaroons.

I had searched the interwebs and I found a recipe that I thought would be easy enough and we followed this recipe for our Pink French Macaroons. You can find the recipe here:

           http://www.howtocookthat.net/public_html/easy-macaron-macaroon-recipe/

This was our first attempt and although they did not come out perfectly beautiful and they seem to be missing the macaroon foot, they are fabulous!  We love them because we made them together and we had so much fun making them.  Also, they are beyond delicious.  I had no idea French Macaroons were so delightfully tasty and good.  Now I know and I plan to make more in the near future.  I also think I know why I did not get the macaroon foot and I intend to fix that tiny problem.  

We filled them with white chocolate granache which I already know how to make. We are very happy with our macaroons and here they are.....

Aren't they beautiful!  We think so and WOW are they ever so delicious!!!!!!

I also made another pair of shorts and a handbag for myself.  I made the shorts just like I had made my other set using my favorite shorts to cut out a pattern.  

LIKE THIS

  

I used a cotton duck fabric that I found at Hobby Lobby.  It has shades of pink and green in it and cute little Paris images. 

I asked my resident model to show off my shorts and my handbag for me and she was happy to do it. Here is Tiffany modeling my new summer shorts and matching handbag.

Such a happy girl!

Isn't she the BEST model ever?  The camera loves her.....

Thank you my dear sweet Tiffany. 

Oh I almost forgot, while taking pictures my Tiffany wanted to take some of me.  I shared hers so it is only fair that I share mine. 

Me Dancing!

 Say Cheese!

My new too Faced Make Up 

makes me feel so special and girly!

Until next time happy everything,

Beverly

Tea Cottage Pretties

I was very blessed this week to feel so good on Saturday, 
I am thankful for my blessings.