Princess Tea Party

We had a belated 4th birthday party this week for our daughter. She wanted to have a girl's morning with dress up dresses and a tea party to celebrate. So since Auntie Lora was in town to help me get caught up and pull this off, we decided to go full out for a fun girls morning. We invited a few friends from "school" to come for a few hours of feminine, sweet birthday time. The girls came in dresses despite the cold, rainy weather outside to our warm house all decorated for springtime and high tea. They were escorted to the dressing room to the sparkly table put on necklaces and bracelets, hair ribbons or tiaras and sparkly hand lotion, and a princess dress if they needed one. 

 Then they went into the birthday room decorated with flowers and toile to string their own special bracelet or necklace, and decorate a picture frame. We also did a little face painting of a heart or crown on their cheek or forehead. Then the girls were served as close to "high tea" as I could imitate, offering them restaurant style service for tiny turkey and cream cheese sandwiches or peanut butter and strawberry jam, accompanied by vanilla and strawberry yogurt parfait cups. The cups looked like dessert with a touch of whip cream and strawberries on top. Each girl was offered her food on a crystal platter, and she replied, "Yes thank you" in beautiful fashion with quiet giggles over the formality. They were beaming being served by a Mom in a velvet dress with glitter on her hands too. The girls were offered cinnamon or strawberry tea, but they chose pink lemonade served in pretty pots and with real cups and saucers. There were spring flowers on the table, sparkly glitter, toy jewels, little place-cards with their name, and doilies. The girls loved it and so did I. Joseph and Daddy were gone, and Johnny was allowed to stay dressed as a dragon. When we got to him we said, "I'm sorry sir, this restaurant doesn't serve dragons." The girls giggled and Johnny convinced us all he was worth feeding. He planned to end the morning as a knight but that was forgotten in all the fun.

After lunch the all danced around to soft music like little ballerinas and they danced and swirled with the very long white toile we had decorated around the room. They didn't want to stop, caught up in the freedom of dancing half in this world and half in the world of limitless imagination (with no hint of self consciousness or vanity) as one can only do at a very young age. They were more beautiful and graceful than we even imagined.

 We ended with singing and serving a pink chocolate three tiered home-made cake and sending the girls off with hand done bookmarks, a little sparkly crown that said, "You are a daughter of the King", and some sparkly lip gloss and hand lotion. It was such a fun, special day. We wanted each girl (who has at least one brother, and a few were only girls to boy's housholds) to feel feminine, carefree, and happy that she was truly a princess, a girl created for love and beauty and goodness. This was not about making money for disney or barbie (although of course a Belle dress was very welcome) it was about the timeless beauty of feminine childhood and the freedom to be a fairy-tale princess with your friends.

  For me it was most of all about celebrating four years of life with our girl, our dream come true, our gift from heaven. I dearly thank God for her life, and remember longing for her, (as we have for so many) and then one beautiful day four years ago holding her in our arms. What a wonderful gift it is to have a daughter. We have limitless glitter on our floors and furniture for the foreseeable future and I've decided I like it that way. Thank you God for our sweet wonderful girls.