Sunday, November 23, 2008

Chinese Tea Party


For Sheridan's 8th birthday, we celebrated by having a Chinese Tea Party. I made a pagoda out of bamboo in the living room to hang the pink paper lanterns and fabric swags.

I used my 100 year old Haviland china and wrapped the napkins with red Midori ribbon and beaded panda ornaments.

The guests wore the pink Mandarin dresses I passed out to them on Wednesday. They looked so cute! They even wore their hair back in buns. When they arrived, the girls practiced picking up grapes with chopsticks.

"Tea" time consisted of egg rolls, raspberry lemonade, PB&J, Fluffernutters, turkey roll-ups, chocolate dipped strawberries, grapes and veggies with dill dip.

The girls loved stuffing their own panda bears. I even had little kimonos for the bears to wear.They each made a wish on a wishing star for their own bear and then made a wish for Sheridan and put it in her bear.
Yasi taught the girls how to make origami bunny rabbits.
Here are the fortunes cookies I made in the frosted take-out boxes.
When Sheridan opened her presents, each gift-giver got to sit next to her while she opened their gift. It makes the girls feel special. I asked one guest what her favorite part of the party was and she said "opening presents".
The cake was a two tiered Devil's Food cake with home made ganache. I made a double batch and whipped the first batch for filling and a crumb coat and left the second batch to drizzle over the rest. I chopped a total of 4 lbs. of bittersweet Belgium chocolate and used 1/2 gallon of heavy cream for it. The girls said it tasted like fudge. The cake was inspired by a Martha Stewart wedding cake. I even bought the sugar cherry blossoms from Wendy Kromer, the same ones that are on the Martha cake. Martha used fondant but I found kids don't usually like it. This is the Martha cake...



I love the rhinestone monogram on the top of the cake!
Sheridan and her guests had a fabulous time. All the many hours of planning paid off BIG time...it's so nice to see my daughter having such a good time with her friends.

19 comments:

April said...

I love it!!! The cake is gorgeous!

Gone said...

It looks like the PINK TEA PARTY was a HUGE success!

Joanne Kennedy said...

So many details! I love it! I wish all little kids could have such a great party. They deserve it.

You did a great job...as always.
Hugs,
Joanne

Pink Slippers said...

I had SO MUCH fun looking and reading the post. Your daughter is so blessed to have such a creative and fun Mommy. She looks like she has a good group of little friends too. What a fun a pretty party. You are going to do SO good in your business.

Polka Dot Moon said...

You throw the most amazing parties!!!! Looks like everyone had a fabulous time!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!
Denise

Maryjane-The Beehive Cottage said...

Oh Donna, what a precious birthday party you gave your daughter!!! A little girls dream come true! The pictures are fantasic! Your talents are endless.

Happy Thanksgiving dear!

Hugs,
Maryjane

Natalia said...

Hi there,

What a lovely idea for party. It looked AMAZING!!!

Anonymous said...

Oh my goodness, Donna, I don't know where to start! I do want to say right off the bat that you should, if you haven't already, be honored with some kind of award! You are so creative and ingenious with those parties of yours! I am just awe-struck by what you do!

A PAGODA--in your LIVINGROOM! How do you THINK of things like this? I'll bet those little Mandarin dress-wearin' guests nearly keeled over when they got a look at that!
You just don't miss a trick with the theme of a party---the chop sticks, stuffing a PANDA, origami bunnies (whoa--did they really make BUNNIES--you know how I love them), and fortune cookies.
The idea of having the gift giver sit by the birthday girl when it was her turn to have her gift opened was so great! Finally---that CAKE. Donna, is there no end to your talent? You even put a rhinestone S on top of the ganache laden beauty!
All I can say is that little Sheridan is one lucky little birthday princess!
I want to tell you how lucky I am to have found you through blogging this year, Donna. You just amaze me with your talents---and your commitment to your family and friends. I wish a very Happy Thanksgiving to you and yours! Dana

Jorgelina said...

Congratulations! A beautiful, funny and original celebration.
What a lovely idea for party
The spectacular cake.
So many details!
Pretty Thursday.

Anonymous said...

YOU MEAN THIS WASN'T PINK SATURDAY?YOU COULD'VE USED THIS.HOW VERY LOVELY.YOUR LITTLE GIRL HAS GOT TO FEEL LIKE A LITTLE QUEEN.AND ALL THE LITTLE GIRLS ARE SO BEAUTIFUL.AND 100 YR OLD CHINA?BRAVE MAMA...ANN

Mo..."Mo's Cottage" said...

That is the cutiest party ever....You are amazing....All the girls look sooooooo cute and Fabulous in their dresses....Loved it!!!!!!
Hugs,
Mo :-)

Cindy said...

Wow, your daughter is so lucky!!! What a great party...it's so original! Your cake looks so beautiful!

Judy said...

Beautiful party. I have 2 adopted Chinese daughters and I may just steal your idea. The cake, the dresses and the decorations were gorgeous!! Judy, Meilyn Xiulin and Reagan LiPing

FrenchGardenHouse said...

Wow, what a beautiful party! You are a Mommy who gets a capital "A" for parties. :) Gorgeous details, and a lifetime's worth of memories, too.
xo Lidy

SarahJarnagin said...

This really was a spectacular party!!! Great job!

Kendra@My Insanity said...

You really have a way of making kids parties so elegant! Which is special, because they don't have the opportunity to be in that kind of a setting all of the time. I know they felt special!

I did a Mulan theme for my daughter a couple of years ago, but it was a little less refine, I think!

Amy @ Living Locurto said...

Wow!! I went through both your posts on this party and it's just amazing! I like your style:-) I can't wait until my daughter gets bigger to do something with such detail.

I loved everything. What a unique idea!!

The Adventure of Linds and Lyds! said...

I found your blog via myinsanity and wowza I think you are my party planning hero!!

selphishgirl said...

I can't believe my good luch to find this post on having Chiese party! My daughter will be 8 in December and she LOVES China and pandas! We took her to Chinetown in the summer and you would have thought we were in Disneyworld! Thanks for the ideas on this blog...I will be using many of them for our Chinese bash! I LOVE the kimono idea! A definite must. Two questions...where did you find the panda bear charms attached to the napkins and where did you get the bears to stuff? Thank you for your inspiration!!
~Jena selphishgirl@aol.com