Here is a small sampling of my new tea-themed collage cards!
My family and I spent the past week in the South Carolina Low Country. Our time in that area is relaxing and familiar because we are natives of South Carolina and have vacationed regularly in the Charleston area for the past twenty years or so.
There are a number of sites in Charleston that would be of interest to any tea lover. The Charleston Tea Plantation, now called the Charleston Tea Garden, is a fun tourist site just outside of Charleston. And there are a number of places in the city where you can take an afternoon tea. (You can read about those through the South Carolina entries over at Destination Tea.) But there is a lesser known attraction in the area where you can hike forest trails surrounded by an understory of large, naturalized tea (Camellia sinensis) bushes. This lovely place is at the Caw Caw Interpretive Center, a part of the Charleston County Parks System.
My husband has done a great deal of historical research into the cultivation of tea in South Carolina. You can read about it on his blog post over at Brown Dog Press. In that blog post he recounts how tea bushes came to be on this land that is now the Caw Caw Interpretive Center. And according to the Caw Caw website there are now thousands of naturalized tea plants in the park.
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| photo courtesy of Unsplash.com |
I imagine many of us will welcome the arrival of 2021 with open arms! And, as we welcome the arrival of this new year, we probably cannot help but think about things we would like to change or improve in our lives. I guess that is what new year's resolutions are all about. So I will share with you here a few of my tea blog-related resolutions for 2021.
First, I plan to use my background in art history and in library science to find and link to sources of tea-related information and imagery from this website. Here is how I plan to start:
Next, I hope to write and post new blog content more regularly.
These things should keep me plenty busy for a while. And I hope they will result in a website that is a rich information resource for tea lovers.
I recently set up a tea-themed display at my local library branch. This is a wonderful way for any tea lover to share her/his/their love of tea with a local community.
The display I created is on view at the North Asheville Branch Library, Asheville, North Carolina, for this month of December. It features books from my personal tea library which are also available for check out through the Buncombe County, North Carolina library system. I identified each book with the type of person I thought it might appeal to. For example, some of the book headings are "Tea for the fiction lover" (Tea Girl of Hummingbird Lane by Lisa See), "Tea for the memoir lover" (Infused: Adventures in Tea by Henrietta Lovell), "Tea for the Activist" (The Way of Tea and Justice by Becca Stevens), and "Tea for the history buff" (For All the Tea in China by Sarah Rose). You get the idea.
In the display, I also included an assortment of different style tea pots, a Limoges tea set, and two children's ceramic tea sets. I also included a flyer entitled "What is tea?" as well as two botanical drawings of the Camellia sinensis.
The exhibit has been well received by both library staff and the public. For me it has been a fun way both support my local library and share my love of tea with my community.
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| Photo is courtesy of North Asheville Branch Library. |
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| Photo is courtesy of North Asheville Branch Library. |
I just completed this tea-themed mosaic. It's rather Baroque, but great fun. I had a fabulous time putting it together.
It’s that time of year: time to get spooky! With this in mind, I’ve crafted décor for a Victorian Halloween Tea Party. These projects give a nod to some spooky Victorian pastimes such as palm reading, crystal ball gazing, and divination with tea leaves (also known as tasseography). At the tea table, we will display our curious collections under bell jars. And we will drink a full-bodied black tea accompanied by tea sandwiches, scones and sweets. So read on to learn how you might craft décor for your own creepy Victorian tea time.
The first crafted items that I will
discuss are the decorated pumpkins.
After all, what is Halloween without pumpkins? I purchased all of these
pumpkins at a thrift shop.
1) -Paint two layers of white chalk
paint, allowing drying time between layers.
2) -Sponge on off-white chalk paint. Allow to dry.
3) - Rub a very light coat of “tea
stained” wax on the stems of the pumpkins.
4) -Trace the silhouette of a teapot onto
the largest pumpkin. Paint it black. Once dry, attach a cameo brooch to the
silhouette.
The next crafted item for our spooky
Victorian tea is a small crystal gazing ball. Crystal gazing, or scrying, was a
form of popular entertainment in Victorian circles.
Instructions:
1) - Find a black and white clip art image
of an ornate tea pot. (You can find a
number of these at http://thegraphicsfairy.com)
2) -Size and print the image onto clear
transparency film. Transparency film is
available for laser printers, copiers and inkjet printers.
3) -Trace a circle around the image using
a thin tip sharpie marker. Cut out the image just inside the lines of the circle.
4) -Roll up the cut out image and slip it
into a clear Christmas ball. You can
find these clear balls at any big box craft store.
5) - Attach the clear ball to the top of a
candlestick using the adhesive of your choice.
I used Lexel by Sashco. It is a
clear, paintable caulk that is available at hardware stores.
Victorians were avid collectors. For this spooky tea party we will display our
collection of shrunken skulls under a bell jar.
1) -Choose a silverplate plate that fits
under your bell jar.
2) -Cut the end off of a Styrofoam ball
and glue it to the silverplate plate with the adhesive of your choice. I used Weldbond.
3) - Glue moss over the Styrofoam ball. I
used Weldbond. Let dry.
4) -Stack your mini skulls and glue them
to the moss coated ball. Also glue them
together. I used Lexel as the adhesive
for this part of the process.
5) -Stick floral pins and butterfly or
dragonfly charms into the moss coated Styrofoam.
6) -Once dry, place your bell jar over
the arrangement of curious items.
The illustrations in these vignettes
are from the digital collections of the Library of Congress and from the New
York Public Library. To search the digital collections of these two
institutions, go to the following two web addresses and enter “tea” as your
keyword search term.
http://digitalcollections.nypl.org
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| Creative Commons use. ©The Trustees of the British Museum. |
