Today was a floating holiday for me. Where I work, we are awarded one day a year called a floating holiday. It can be used any time, with or without approval. It's a freebie. I used mine to attend a tea party this afternoon.
I've never been to a high tea before and didn't know they serve snacks. I ate a big lunch earlier but I wasn't going to be rude and not try the beautiful finger food the ladies of the Moose Lodge prepared for this event. Along with scrumptious hand-made mints, miniature cupcakes, filled strawberries, little crab and chicken sandwiches, and crustless cucumber sandwiches on rye crackers, they had each table decorated differently. The ladies of the club brought tea pots and cups from their own collections to decorate each table. It was hard to choose which table to plant ourselves but I settled on one that had real bone china cups as I knew my tea would taste the best there.
There was a super interesting presentation by one of the ladies who is a former teacher. She had brought some pieces of her Blue Willow collection and with it she had a made a poster report that would have gotten an A+ if I was grading it. She gave about an 8 minute talk on how bone china made its way to the United States in the bottom of ships. I'll never take old china for granted again.
I really enjoyed sitting with a couple of retired women I did not know while I listened to some stories and enjoyed a few good laughs. We talked mostly about family reunions. One woman said her family once did a reunion in Ireland where 19 family members attended. She belongs to a couple of church groups and she helps in the kitchen at the Moose Lodge, and serves dinners there on the weekends.
To my surprise, the water for my tea was boiling hot when they brought it to our table and I enjoyed two cups of green tea while stuffing my face with the above-mentioned snacks.
All I could think about is that I can't believe I am almost 60 and have never attended something like this before, and that I would love to do it again. It was nice to be among service minded women who came together to enjoy a cuppa in the middle of a Thursday afternoon. Add to this the fact I was being paid while not working, making it even sweeter.
After the tea party, I stopped by my friend T's dog grooming shop and was talking with her and another friend about my experience and was asked if they has crustless cucumbers sandwiches. Who knew that's a thing? Apparently, it's not a real tea party without this.
This may be a lot to do about nothing to you but for me it was such a beautiful surprise on an otherwise surprisingly beautiful day. Oh, I almost forgot to write about the Ireland/reunion lady talking about her hearing aid app. Say what? Yeah, she has an app on her phone that adjusts her hearing aids for different places she goes. For instance, when she is in church, the music is too loud so the app automatically turns down her hearing aids for her. OMG, you know, a person only needs one good idea to make it big. Why didn't I think of that?
Have you ever been to a tea party? Did you enjoy it? Did you know there is a hearing aid app? Have you ever had a crustless cucumber sand?
love, susan
