Turquoise and Purple Bridal Tea: planning continues...

The Bridal Tea planning continues. I am completing trials of the food I want to serve so hopefully everything will turn out just right for this Tea. You may wonder why I am putting so much effort into a 1 1/2 hour event. I think it is because I am so busy at work, and it has taken up so much of my mental and physical energy for the past year. I just want to put my mind on something else for awhile.

Over Easter weekend I made Lemon Blueberry cupcakes with lemon cream cheese frosting. These things were DeLiCiOuS!! The only thing is...I didn't take photos. I would say I don’t know why I forgot to do this, but the fact is I do know. I am of the generation that didn’t grow up taking pictures of my food. We had film for cameras, and the film itself plus the cost of developing was way too expensive to waste on taking pictures of food. The only foodies then were the food critics that visited the fancier restaurants, and even they didn’t take photos of the food they ate.

Last weekend my daughter and I made cake pops with a purple Candy Melt coating. Once again, I forgot to take photos of the process, but I'll share the finished result. I snapped a couple of pics before my other daughter gobbled them up!

We actually tried the Duncan Hines Blue Velvet cake mix with these. The mix made a beautiful turquoise color...

but this particular turquoise and purple combination does NOT go together well at all!

Still, the youngest daughter has enjoyed each and every one.

But this weekend I tried the turquoise covered Oreos. And I remembered the photos!

I used a combination of Wilton Candy Melts: 1 green to 16 blue melts. I used the ones labeled, “blue,” not royal blue. I also used the ‘bright white” candy melts for the W’s I made to go on top of the Oreos. 

Follow the instructions on the Candy Melts bag to melt the candy.

Since I am just trying out this refreshment option, I used exactly one green and 16 blue melts. I put them in a small bowl and melted them at 50% power in the microwave, 30 seconds at a time and stirring after each. 

Then, I just dipped one Oreo at a time in the shallow bowl of melted candy. I covered two Oreos completely and covered just the top of two more.

I laid them on parchment paper to set.

I melted a few bright white Candy Melts in a zip top bag. I had planned to use a cake decorating bag with a decorating tip but, once again, since this is only a trial I decided I wouldn't go to so much trouble. After melting the white candy in the zip top bag, I snipped the tiniest bit off the corner of the bag to make a writing tip.

 I had printed some W's (the initial of the happy couple's last name) using a variety of script style fonts. The one on the top left and the one at middle right were my favorites.Plus, they fit on the Oreos without me having to print out another sheet in a smaller font size.

 I slid the paper underneath the parchment and traced over the letters. The melted candy was a very thin consistency and I think my bag had a leak in the seam. This, plus the fact that I am left-handed, caused me some trouble in controlling the candy to make pretty letters. By the time I got to the last two, I started working right to left so my left hand wouldn't get in my way. Still, the first two W's turned out to be two of my best.

To get rid of the excess candy coating that dripped from the edges of the Oreo, use a micro plane and just file it off!

I carefully peeled the W's off the parchment and laid them on the covered Oreos. I decided I would just drizzle some of the leftover melts on one of the Oreos that didn't get covered completely.

IF I decide to do these for the Tea, I will either have to "glue" the W's to the Oreos with tiny dots of white Candy Melts, or I will have to make all the W's first and place them on the Oreos as soon as I dip them in the turquoise candy and lay them out to set.

 Overall, I'm pretty satisfied with this attempt!

I'm hosting a Purple & Turquoise Bridal Tea!

My friends and I are planning a bridal tea for another friend whose daughter is getting married in June. I have spent most of the past two weeks searching Pinterest for ideas regarding food, decorations, and invitations. Below are some photos and links which have been my inspiration for the food and drink table.

But first, I need to clarify something from my searches. A bridal TEA and a bridal SHOWER are two different events, at least in the South. A bridal shower is a get-together at which all guests arrive at the start of the event, play a few wedding-themed games, have refreshments, watch the bride open gifts, and leave at the end of the event. A bridal tea is come and go: the guests arrive anytime within the allotted period, participate in small talk with the bride and the families of the happy couple, have refreshments, view the gifts that have been given, and leave when they are ready. Bridal showers are small affairs; bridal teas are usually large affairs with most, if not all, of the wedding guests being invited. I always thought everyone referred to a tea or a shower with the same connotations I use, but after searching "bridal tea ideas" and finding only English tea-themed shower ideas I realized I was wrong.

Anyway... on to the inspiration....

The bride has chosen bright purple and bright turquoise for her wedding colors, so I thought it would be nice to use these colors for the tea as well. And this is an afternoon tea, beginning at 2:00. (Again, I believe this time is pretty traditional for a Southern bridal tea.)

You can find most of my inspiration links on my Pinterest "Celebrating" board here but I want to show the ones that I plan to emulate at the tea.

Lemon Blueberry Cupcakes

I made these for Easter to try them out. I actually used the frosting from the site, the baker upstairs, and used a shortcut recipe using a lemon cake mix from bettycrocker.com.

I had some fresh strawberries, too, so I decided to try a half batch of the blueberry version and a half-batch of my own strawberry version.

The frosting recipe called for 3 cups of confectioner's sugar, which is what I used. But I piped the frosting on the cupcakes and it was a little loose for my taste, so I plan to add more confectioner's sugar to the batches I'll make for the tea.

**UPDATE: The frosting set up very nicely, so the change I will make is to refrigerate the frosting for a few minutes before piping it on the cupcakes. No need to add extra confectioner's sugar after all.

I also took the leftover cupcakes to school for a taste test with the ladies in the office. They actually preferred the strawberry batch! Too bad. I'm still going with blueberry for the tea.

Now, this next one is my inspiration for adding a chocolate (candy melts) monogram to the top of the cupcakes.

Seeing the "30" on these cupcakes reminded me I made chocolate "1998's" for a New Year's Eve party we threw a long time ago, when we used to have the energy to clean the house so we could have people over.

I'll make "W"s in a nice script font to honor the happy couple-to-be. Maybe I'll do some monograms in purple and some in turquoise.

Now, I'd love to use turquoise doughnuts

or turquoise (Tiffany blue) candy coated Oreos, but this may be too many sweets.

(this photo comes from here but this item is no longer available. However, you can shop for similar items.)

A savory inspiration comes from Alisa Burke:

Herbed Cream Cheese on Cucumber slices

I found other savory bites ideas at beau coup

A couple of sweets, a savory item, and the obligatory - but delicious! - cheese straws from the local bakery completes the food. I am thinking the drink table will house lemonade with several syrups available for guests to add if they choose.

Mint Basil Syrup

Blueberry Syrup

Lavender Simple Syrup

There is also a pineapple basil syrup we served at my parents' 60th anniversary party. It came from Southern Living, I think. I'll have to find the recipe....

OK, this is a GREAT deal of inspiration! I love Pinterest!! However, Pinterest is probably also why I get so very overwhelmed so very quickly! There is so much I want to do that I get lost in exactly where to start.

Having this tea to host is definitely helping me work with an end in mind. This means I'll actually get something done! Hee, hee....

I can't believe it's been over a year since I put anything on this blog. However, much has happened to keep me more than busy: I am now one of two Acting Principals at my elementary school, which means I am working 12 months, not just 10. Also, my sisters, brother, and I took turns taking groceries to my parents each weekend once my father started fainting while driving -- we are all VERY thankful no one was ever hurt. And last month, my father died.

He fell and broke his hip. I suppose this is not deadly for most people, even elderly people. But my father had a myriad of health issues: diabetes, an enlarged heart and congestive heart failure, decreased kidney function, ...I don't know what else.

My sister told the cardiac team we were all well aware my father had about 50 needles to thread, all in the right order, if he was going to survive this. He had threaded the needles twice before in 2012 when he suffered two really bad UTIs. This was on top of a split kneecap and a separate incident when he broke his femur. His heart was too weak to have surgery at the time, and it was even weaker when he broke his hip.

I'm sure it sounds like my father was barely able to get around. On the contrary. He had recently bought a new riding lawnmower and hooked his lawn cart to it, put a chair in the back of it along with gardening tools, and drove it to his bushes. He would take the chair out and sit at the bushes, trimming each one. Daddy always said he just couldn't sit and do nothing.

So...while I have been out this week for Spring Break, I thought about my blog. Checking on it, I discovered two things: the aforementioned year's lapse in posts, and the following paragraph about my parents that I included in the "About Me" section. Reading it helped me in my mourning. And I thought it would be a nice way to honor my father by copying and pasting it here.

From "About Me:"
I have always enjoyed living in the South, aside from the humid heat in the summer. I am proud to be Southern. Now, being proud of being Southern does NOT equate with being proud of its history. Right here I must give a huge shoutout to my parents. They grew up in the ‘40s and ‘50s and by the time the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964 they had been married 9 years and had two children. Their childhood had been different than what mine would be. My parents were astute enough to realize my siblings and I could not be exposed to the same biases and discriminatory practices they had known as normal life, and they worked diligently to keep their learned behaviors and attitudes to themselves. I’ll be honest and say they didn’t always succeed, but they kept trying and eventually their efforts helped them change their own thinking. I think sometimes people like me who didn’t live through the angst, trauma, and tribulation of that time don’t consider the effort it took parents to change their ways so their children wouldn’t grow up with the same twisted opinions. I’m not only thankful for my parents’ diligence, I am also thankful they have been able to see how they influenced my children, who choose their friends based on personal characteristics, not skin color.

Charles Wesley

June 1935 - February 2016

I miss my Daddy so very much, but I rejoice that he is with the Lord in Heaven. This is exactly where Daddy longed to be in the last couple of years he was with us here on Earth.