Bridal Showers!! I don’t know about you, but I love this part of the wedding journey for the Bride and Groom. Creating this kind of event gets my wedding passion ideas flowing and warms my heart at the same time. This story is about a beautiful Bridal Shower Tea we put together for my youngest daughter. When I say we, I mean it was a team effort for sure. Plus, this Bridal Shower Tea had a super wonderful surprise behind it. As I said, it was an incredible team effort, but oh, so much fun.
My daughter’s wedding was set for January of 2015. So, we decided to throw a bridal shower for her in early November and wanting something out of the ordinary for her shower, we decided on a Bridal Shower Tea theme. While in college, my daughter had discovered the world of “Tea” along with her love of coffee, so having a Bridal Shower Tea seemed a perfect idea!
My first thought was to hold the shower at one of the tea house cafés in town, but I kept coming back to an image popping in my head of what I wanted for this event. So, I decided to have the bridal shower tea at my house and needed to pull together my “Tea Party Team,” my daughter Sara (the brides’ sister), my best friend, Lynne, and of course my hubby, Karle.
The twist to this event was my daughter’s pick for a Matron of Honor, who lived out of town. Early into this wedding journey, we received the exciting news that she was pregnant (Awesome and Exciting for sure), but her due date was two days after the wedding. So, knowing these circumstances meant not traveling during the last month of pregnancy, we knew she could not attend the wedding except possibly via zoom call. So, my daughter decided to keep her as the Matron of Honor, and her friend would do whatever she could via long distance. However, a conspiracy was afoot. My “Tea Party Team” and I conspired with the absent Matron of Honor to check with her doctor to see if she could still travel in November for the shower. Her doctor gave the travel ok, and the surprise was set! The bride’s best friend and absent Matron of Honor would be the BIG SURPRISE. OMGOSH, THIS WAS GOING TO BE BETTER THAN WE THOUGHT!
So, with the big surprise all set, I had a flourish of ideas. First, I needed to look for invitations. Once again, I found myself looking for something different and hoping the invitation industry offered what I was looking for, and they did. To my surprise, I found that online invitation companies all have themes for Bridal Tea Parties Showers! Suddenly, I landed on the site. A Bridal Shower Tea invitation site that allowed me to personalize the bride on the invitation. The choices were AWESOME! You could choose the brides’ skin tone, hair color, style (up or down hair design), the bride’s eye color, and even had several dress style options! Oh, I’d never seen anything like this. I was still old school (plain invitation in a plain envelope). This unique and wonderful feature to personalize the invitation to this detail fell right into our uniquely different bridal shower theme. The date was set for November, and I started designing the invitation. We were on a ROLL!
Next on my planning agenda was to pick which teas to serve. We have been purchasing teas from The Republic of Tea company for years, so that’s where my search began. You can find them on the shelves in specialty grocery stores, but online has a more extensive selection. My daughters and I love the fall season and having the shower in November meant one thing. Pumpkin Spice tea from The Republic of Tea, of course! The Republic of Tea has excellent fragrant teas. I love their round airtight tea containers, which of course, makes those little tea bags round as well. If you want to try their teas, they offer some great assortment sets to start with until you find your favorites. Their Downton Abby Collection and The Crown Collection are lovely, btw.
For the Bridal Shower Tea, I decided to serve six hot teas and one iced tea, in case some guests would rather have cold tea. Here is the list of teas we selected:
Hot Tea Selections
Peach White Tea – the brides wedding tea
Red Velvet Chocolate Cuppa Cake
Iced Tea Flavor
Blackberry Sage (awesome hot or cold, btw)
We researched the difference between a High Tea vs. Late Morning Tea and decided to combine the two. To make things a little simpler, we only used bagged teas for the bridal shower. I served the Blackberry Sage flavored tea as the iced tea from a large glass dispenser with a spout handle, and it sat on a stand on the tabletop. It made a beautiful display piece.
I searched thrift shops and found a beautiful ceramic sugar and creamer set on a matching serving tray. The more I searched for items, the more my attention to detail woke up. Next, I realized I wanted to serve the tea with “sugar cubes” (which you can purchase in different colors if desired). Next was the daunting task of “cups and saucers” for 25 guests!
Lynne graciously donated her grandmother’s China tea collection (she trusts me with anything! No stress here), including beautifully flowered teacups and saucers. I had cups and saucers from my China collection, plus, I picked up some individual cup sets while browsing home décor stores. So, with the combination of different China patterns, we decided to make it an eclectic and colorful event using all of the patterned cups and saucers. The wedding colors, Victorian Purple, Red, Silver, and Off-White, needed incorporating into the event. Several unique items needed to be purchased to be able to “set the mood.” I bought cloth napkins in red, purple, and silver-grey to bring in the wedding colors. Then we needed napkin rings. I found a DIY pattern to make napkin rings in the wedding colors, but you can also purchase something theme related. Next, I found small off-white vases to set on tables with fresh red and white roses and lots of tiny, soft white baby’s breath on solid red and white tablecloths and table runners. Finally, I located clear glass and off-white tea caddies at the thrift store to place at each setting to hold used tea bags.
I ordered small individual sugar tongs to place at each seat to pick up those beautiful sugar cubes! And you can’t have a tea party without Honey Sticks. Yes, I found HONEY STICKS. How easy is that? NO MESS. They are available in different flavors depending on the blossoms that the bees were pollinating. It was so “sweet”! I also
picked up several ceramic decorative teapots, plus I had a 3 or 4 of my own. I kept those filled with the more popular hot teas, and the other teapots were just decorations. Finally, I found beautiful tea party-oriented favors through different online stores and purchased sample tea collections to send home with each of our guests.
The Bridal Shower Tea menu came together really quickly. We had delicious orange/cranberry scones, two different flavors of mini cupcakes, and a selection of shortbread cookies shaped like Fall Leaves. We did make the usual pimento cheese petite sandwiches and the cucumber/cream cheese petite sandwiches. We also bought mini quiche bites and popped them in the oven for something warm to eat. Finally, we added a bowl of mixed nuts and plenty of sliced lemons.
The decorations for the Bridal Shower Tea were fun and beautiful. I rented several tables and paid extra to rent the white folding chairs so that every guest could sit comfortably while eating and drinking at a table. The fireplace mantel was decorated in wedding colors, with flameless candles glowing brightly. Tables were placed in the middle of the room, lined up with the fireplace to allow the bridal party to easily sit at the end and see all guests. The kitchen and family room were a large open floorplan, and the kitchen had a huge island. I used the island to showcase the teas we were serving and had all teapots sitting there. My dining table sat between the island and the guest tables, and we placed the food choices there for easy access. I then arranged three dozen roses and tiny soft white baby’s breath in a crystal vase and set it as the centerpiece for the food table.
Our final decoration item was a collage of different sizes, colors, and textures of paper lanterns in all the wedding colors. My team and I bundled these lanterns together and hung them in a large cluster from the ceiling light over the tables with crepe paper streamers reaching towards each corner in the room.
I must give a loving thank you at this point to my wonderful husband. Through all of this, he was right there either helping out in the kitchen or hanging from the ceiling light as he attached the paper lantern bundle over the tables. Thanks so much, honey, for always being a huge part of the team.
Finally, the day of the Bridal Shower Tea was here. Everything looked great and just as I had imagined in the beginning. My “Tea Party Team “and I were so excited about the huge surprise for the bride. My daughter Sara was in charge of communicating with the Matron of Honor as she headed our way and making sure she was coming in with other guests at the same time. We had cameras running as a group of guests came in, and the Matron of Honor was in the middle of them. It was all worth it as my daughter’s eyesight caught her best friend that wasn’t supposed to be there. The tears flowed from everyone as the two best friends hugged for what seemed like an hour. The bridal party girls were all together and having a great time for the first and only time in my daughter’s wedding journey. Our hard work was a huge success and worth it for sure. The one thing I forgot…… tissues for the happy tears!
Fast forward to the wedding. It was just beautiful and also a huge success. And the Matron of Honor? She and her husband had a beautiful bouncing baby boy….… TWO DAYS AFTER THE WEDDING!! WHEW!