Tea Party Success

 For the past couple of months my sister and my mom and I have been planning up my baby shower. I was super excited to have this thing since I've never had a baby shower, let alone a baby. Everything came together to a T! And the fabulous thing about it was that we didn't have to pay for any of the silverware, chairs, tables, linens, and flowers. The only things we DID pay for was the food, pom poms and the gas to deliver the all of the tables and chairs. How do you accomplish such savings? Well, it's called doing it yourself ladies!

• Since my sister works in a catering office at a golf course, she was able to get all of the linens chairs, and tables for free! Hook-up number one! It's always great to have a friend (but even better, a sister) that can score you awesome deals.
• Silverware is something that was a combined effort between my mom and my sister. They had whole sets of silverware that had been sitting around, never been used. It was great to not have to run to a party supplies store and pick up plastic cutlery.
• The fine china was provided by a family friend. He had everything that we needed and in the perfect color too! Everything was brand new in boxes. He was so very sweet to let us borrow as much as we needed. We used some of my moms china as well, so we had the perfect amount.
• I made the centerpieces all by myself by finding stuff that we had laying around the house. We were going to buy fake flowers at Walmart, but in a last minute scramble, decided to go with some fresh cut white roses that we had growing in our front yard. More savings! 

• We had an old silver tea set that was my Grandma Shirley's. It only needed a little bit of polishing up, and it was ready to go. 
• My dad had dug up his old rocking chair that he had used when he was young to let me use for our baby's nursery. So I decided, "why not use it for the shower too?" So I polished it, and threw a teddy bear in it, and it turned out to be adorable!
• My sister had thrown together a fishbowl, my baby shower invitation, and some ribbon to make a "Diaper Fund" bowl. 
• She placed all of the prizes, party favors, and what not on some back-yard tables covered with a blue bed sheet and an old table cloth. She also used two candelabras that she had purchased as centerpieces for her wedding. These things have come in handy more than once! I also used them at my bridal shower!

• I made all of the party favors myself. I bought a pack of tissue paper (20 sheets) which cost $2 dollars, and bought around 9-10 pounds of taffy which cost $12 dollars, and wrapped everything with some string that my great grandma had given me. I then made 20 flowers made out of white felt and safety pinned them on to the favors and also made little tea bag name tags to put on each favor. 

         

• I also made the pom poms which are super easy but redundant to make. All you need is 9 sheets of tissue paper per pom pom, scissors, pipe cleaners, a ruler, and some fishing line. I bought the tissue paper at Walmart for around .98 cents for a pack of 9 sheets. HERE is the tutorial that I watched on how to make pom poms.

• Food was handled mainly by my mom. Nothing was catered! She worked so hard to make cucumber tea sandwiches, meatballs, fruit salad, egg salad sandwiches, and a delicious family recipe of punch. I had decided a while back that I wanted to make the cake. I hate store bought cake and I don't want to spend a fortune on nasty fondant cake either. So I found a recipe for Lemon Meringue Cake in a Martha Stewart baking book that sounded delightful and possibly something that everyone would like. Some people don't like chocolate... crazy right? It took me several hours total to complete this cake! But it was well worth it. Everyone loved it. 

 That's all that I have to share today. I can't wait to see my baby Heidi Geraldine! Lord willing, I will have a safe and uncomplicated delivery... I'd like to give a big thanks to my sister for throwing the shower for me and to both of my parents for all their help in throwing this event! They made everything so perfect. I couldn't have asked for more. I love you guys! Cheers!