A Fancy Nancy Birthday Tea

Rhianwen's party request was a Fancy Nancy tea for this year. Since she fell sick on her birthday weekend, we postponed it until later in October. You can't just skip a Fancy Nancy tea! We started out making origami butterflies. I inadvertently forgot to turn over the paper at the beginning so we all had to start over on the folding, but the girls were pros at folding by that point, so no worries. I should have been a pro at this since I made a ton of these for decoration. As you all know, Fancy Nancy adores butterflies (adore is fancy for love). We decorated them with jewels, and voila! A wonderful craft for them Rhianwen wanted to make hers into a bracelet, so we quickly punched a hole in the middle of it and added a pretty pink pipe cleaner to wrap around her wrist. That girl is the genius behind all of our creativity. Don't complement me b/c I am not the mastermind here.

Then we painted our nails, and while waiting for them to dry, read a Fancy Nancy story,

chose some accessories or clothes from the boutique, (the clip-on earrings were a smash...thank you Grandmama for ALL of it!),

posed for a photo,

and ran outside to play fancy freeze tag (if you are tagged, you freeze in a fancy pose).

Then they played fancy follow the leader (both games came from the Fancy Nancy tea party book). This was so cute. It made me fast forward to imagining about Rhianwen's wedding procession.


We had a treasure hunt and hung each item in a different location with clues for the next thing. They always love doing this. Here, they are removing necklaces from an Eiffel Tower (Fancy Nancy "yearns" to go to Paris one day).Grandmama was the source for all of our Eiffel Towers. She and Grandaddy were engaged there. How romantic!


Wally is reading the last clue to them. We love incorporating Bible verses into the clues to hint at what the next item might be or do.

Ooh la la! Fans!

Then they went back in and did a pin the accessory on Fancy Nancy game. They mostly just wanted to do it without the blindfold so they just chose an accessory and put it where they thought best. Somehow, I didn't get pictures of this!!!


Then on to the tea. We set the table with our china, and the girls found their place card and placed it where they wanted. They chose their tea cup as well. Some were mine and some were Grandmama's (thank you!). We needed most of them!


For the food, Rhianwen insisted on parfaits (fancy for icecream sundaes). So the kids all chose the garnishes they wanted on those. They also had cookies, fruit, and scones. And of course, fancy tea. Thistles, rosebuds, mint, or apple cider.

Everyone loved the sugar cubes.

Diggin' in. Note, Rhianwen still is holding her fan.

Ze cake. I decided trying to fashion a Fancy Nancy out of cake was beyond even my culinary artistic skills (can you sense the sarcasm?). I ordered a personalized sheet of edibleness and stuck it on buttercream frosting.

As always, ignore the adults singing.

Reading a card from a friend. Cute.

Rhianwen had a fabulous time, and so did we! 

-----------------
And now for the decorations, in case anyone is curious. I cannot believe I didn't take a picture of the entryway door! Rhianwen made a cute sign shaped like a tea-cup that said, Welcome! Welcome to Fancy Tea! We had a rusty (think shabby chic) Eiffel Tower from Grandmama, which was about 3 feet tall on the step and tied with a pink tulle bow and pink balloons.

We used Fancy Nancy books for decoration...so easy, from the library, so free!

The boutique.

The dining room, hung with pink and purple tulle, notice the origami butterflies. They are so easy to make, and affordable, and cute.

Some of the tea cups.

The table. Just a nice table cloth, piled tulle, couple of Eiffel Towers, and flowers. Voila!

Pretty.

Butterflies galore.

This eventually had all of the food on it. But I didn't have time to snap a pic then. We let them use fancy stemmed glasses for the parfaits. Amazingly, nothing got broken!!!

And that was that. Fun and pretty easy.

Last State Fair for Me...Hoorah.

Wally has been travelling like a madman. He's been gone a lot, but I guess considering other people's travel schedule, it's not that much. He's been taking some much envied trips to Clemson. While he was gone, Corwin was looking for him, and I said, "He's in Clemson, Corwee." Corwin turned around pointed to the TV (he knows Clemson football), pointed to his forehead (he loves his Clemson hat), and pointed to the football on his shirt. SO adorable. That was worth theWally's absence in my book. Once he came back, we dared the State Fair once again. By the end of it I was feeling sick and literally almost fainted after getting out of the car and into the house. Each year, it's gotten a little worse for me, whatever "it" is. So, we are not doing it again. Sorry kids!


I did come away with the desire to adopt a rabbit. They will "litter-box" train, are silent, don't bother most cat-allergic people. BUT they do chew on things and aren't so thrilled with children so maybe not. I want a little fuzzy tannish wiggle-nosed one. He seemed so friendly and curious.

The trains. Notice Corwin's face mashed into the netting.

This photo is always one of the kids' favorite in their yearly photo books I make them.

Horton Hears a Who. A GENIUS garden exhibit and one of my favorite childhood stories of all time.

Visiting the Forestry Service portion.

High five, Smokey! One of the service guys had a thick Southern accent. He called acorns "acerns" (how do you spell that?. Rhianwen said, "What are "acerns"?". I'm sure he must have thought, "These poor kids don't even know what an acern is!".


Talking to a schoolbus. The lady had a small mike and was standing behind a table away from it. It moved and sounded like it was taking a personal interest in them. So cute. They were transfixed.

First corndog (maybe...can't remember about last year). He hung onto this thing until the very end.

Their only ride. First time on a ferris wheel (Rhi, Alden, and daddy rode, mommy could barely stand at this point, and Corwee was too small). They loved it. You can see Wally waving in the seat on the right side of the pic near the lamps.

As I said, he held onto it unil the very end.