A Girl Can Never Have Too Many Teapots

My family knows how much I love tea.

So it was a teapot birthday.

The white one is Big Ben from World Market

and the red transfer ware one is a reproduction of an English teapot my dd got at TJ Maxx. I love that store. The teacup is old made in Japan.

Just wanted to share my birthday goodies. I also got an egg keeper for my frig. and some special blender tea just for me.

Linda

Kale and Avocado Smoothie and Today's Tea

I found this smoothie recipe from Veggie Nook here. I didn't have all the ingredients so I used what I had but I liked the fact that it had avocado, kale and spinach in it. I used frozen raspberries, stevia and coconut milk. I left out the hemp oil and the protein powder. Hers was a prettier color than mine but it tasted delicious, even my gd liked it. The avocado and banana gave it a lot of body. yum. I'll admit it didn't put a lot of kale in it. I figure next time I can use a bit more.

I wanted to get myself some herbal tea at the grocery today. Stash was on sale so I tried this one. It is pretty good. I like fruit flavored teas. Herbal teas seem to be getting better. I use to hate them.

I also wanted to get some of The Republic of Tea's daily green tea. This one of my favorite flavors. I was thinking it was a little expensive, but I realized that it has 50 tea bags as apposed to 20 in the Stash. So not so bad after all. I can enjoy it without guilt. My gd had a good idea, she says she adds a little herb to her green tea fresh mint would be nice or lemon balm or lemon verbena.

Linda

Kale and Scrambles Variations

I've been making scrambles for breakfast with sauteed baby kale. This morning I chopped bacon and sauteed it then added my baby kale chopped and when it was nearly done I added a chopped scallion and then my lovely pastured eggs. These eggs are beautiful lovely huge yolks a bright gold almost orange. They turned out delicious so I was thinking about what else I could do with scrambles and kale and I thought red onion would be good and you could garnish is with lox and sour cream or cream cheese. I'd leave out the bacon of course and the red onion would need a bit more cooking than the scallion.

This is what I drank with my breakfast. I sweetened it my stevia and used coconut milk. Trader Joe's is now carrying fresh coconut milk right next to their almond milk. It's pretty good and less carbs.

Linda

22 Days til Christmas-Holiday Tea & Shopping Traditions

Since I discovered Harney & Sons Holiday Tea I have had to get it every Christmas, so this has become one of my traditions. It is a lovely chore because the knit and tea shop I get it at is so lovely. I had to use restraint not to buy yarn because they have really nice yarn. The shop was busy with people knitting and shopping. I saw some buttons that would be wonderful for my shawl when I finish it. It is certainly a place that is inspiring for tea and knitting.


They have a great selection of tea things too. They also have a new tea Steven Smith Teamaker He is making a special blend for them but it isn't done yet, they are deciding on flavors. They had a sampler pack of his tea so I got some to try. My dd has invited me to tea Sunday and so we are going to try it.

I was with my gd and we were doing our annual Christmas shopping trip, another tradition. Once the girls got older it was hard to know what they wanted and so I started taking them out and they point out things and I make a list, then I go back and shop. I have to brag about my gd's they are 13 and 18 and so much fun to be around. I always enjoy their company. Recently I was talking to a couple of ladies who have 13 yo dd's and I said isn't 13 a fun age, they both looked at me like I was crazy. lol. I really meant it, they are becoming women and it is a lot of fun to watch them grow up and develop.

I'm deep into decorating and trying to pace myself.

Linda

Decorating with Garden Furniture

I wanted to display my tea things and I didn't have anything to use or a lot of room in my dining room. One day I looked at these little shelves that I was using to hold plants and decided to sacrifice it's use as a plant holder and see if it would work for my tea pots. I loved it. At first I had all my tea pots and fancy cups on it, but I found they got dirty and dusty so when I had room I put them in a closed cabinet and now I use it for tea pots that are decorative only.

I have used a lot of "garden or porch furniture" in my house because I found myself with a lot of rooms to furnish and no furniture. I really like the wicker and iron used in some porch furniture because it's smaller in scale for my smaller home and it gives a casual feel.

This is all about making do with what you have. Look around your house and garden with a creative eye and see what you can use for a different purpose. If you look under my tables that are draped with a cloth you never know what you will find underneath. In my craft room I used a hamper as an end table. I have a small round green bistro table covered with a sheet and topped with a nice red plaid table cloth in my reading corner in the dining room and next to it is an outdoor iron and wicker chair covered up with cushions. This chair was thrown out by a friend and my dd took it, then she gave it to her sister and now I have it and it is still going strong.

Linda

Tea for Two and Two Tea Books

I couldn't resist showing you my new little friend and her matching mini quilt, made for me by Paula. Isn't she sweet. I'm naming her Miss Paula. She was part of a box of goodies Paula sent me, she is so generous and talented.

I also wanted to talk about tea books. I love the Laura Childs tea mystery series and discovered she had started a new series The Cackleberry Club Mysteries. Eggs in Purgatory is the first one. I enjoyed reading it. It is very much like her other series. This time the main character is a widow and runs the Cackelberry Club with two friends. It is a cafe, book nook and knitting nest. They serve all kinds of interesting eggs for breakfast. They also serve lunch and afternoon tea. I like the fact that they do talk about the food and the tea.

The thing I liked so much about the tea mysteries was all the detailed description of teas. I always wanted to learn more about teas and as a result of reading these books I tried some different teas, Assam, Keemun, Dragonwell, Darjeeling. We have a knit shop in a nearby community that also sells tea and they have their own Drayton, the character that knows all about tea. He described teas to me and helped me pick out the ones I bought.

I found that what I really like are the flavored teas and I found a book at my library Tea for You by Tracy Stern, that talks about the flavoring agents that you can put in tea. She starts by giving the flavor profiles of several teas and then herb teas and other ingredients like spices that you can flavor your teas with. She also gives a few recipes, but encourages you to try different teas with different additions and find your own blend. She said she always uses vanilla bean and many times cacao or nibs crushed for a chocolate flavor.

So I tried the vanilla bean with the Assam and liked that. Next I want to try the nibs and orange peel. When I find a combination I like I'll make up a batch for myself. I also would like to try something with green or white tea.

Black and green teas both have health benefits and many spices do to. I like star anise and would like to try it in a tea. I already use cinnamon quite a bit.

Tracy likes Chai and talks about that too. I've never been that crazy about it, but if I made my own version maybe I'd like it better.

So happy experimenting.

Linda

Tea in the Children's Library Plus Taking a Break

Hi, This is what I call my children's library, because my collection of children's literature is here. I started reading this delightful book while enjoying my tea this afternoon, while the bunnies looked on from my grandmothers rocking chair. This is a landing area at the top of my stairs. I also keep all my American history books here too. I'll post pictures of it on my Around the House blog later.

I'm taking a wee computer break. I don't know for how long, but I feel the need to reconnect with my spiritual life without the distraction of the computer. I'll catch up with you all when I come back. I already have a couple of posts ready and waiting.

Linda

Herbal Tea Blends

I've been trying some herb tea blends. The Herbal Tea Garden book has a chapter about herb tea blends. She talks about after the Boston Tea Party someone suggested they try some of their native plants and she gives several suggestions for 2 herb blends, then 3 herb blends and multi herb blends. So I'm experimenting.

This book doesn't really talk about medicinal properties so much as just having herb tea to enjoy. I've had a hard time finding herb teas in the grocery store that I like. So the first one I tried was rosemary and lavender. I liked it. I love rosemary. One of our favorite black teas from Eastern Shores Tea has rosemary in it. I wanted to try combining this duo with some other herbs. In Rosemary Gladstar's Family Herbal I found a blend of several herbs to use as a nerve tonic and for depression. So I tried that today it has a lot of chamomile in it and I'm not crazy about chamomile although it's not too bad, but I decided to add the rosemary along with the other herbs in the remedy lemon balm, lavender and roses and it toned down the chamomile flavor.

I want to try sage and lemon balm. A 3 herb blend I want to try is thyme, rosemary and spearmint. Then a multi blend is rosemary, lavender, lemon balm, spearmint and cloves. Most of these recipes are a tablespoon of each herb and a cup of tea is made with a teaspoon of the blend. I steep for 5 mins. It's all according to taste unless you are doing a medicinal mixture. Rosemary has you steep the medicinal blends more like 20 mins. I do look up the medicinal purposes of each herb because I don't want to be drinking something all the time that may cause a problem.

As I said before I don't grow all these herbs, but I've bought dried herbs. I harvest some of my herbs today. I was told in the nursery that they like to be trimmed regularly, it helps them to grow more. So I cleaned up all my plants and pruned them back and I'm drying all the herbs. I'm hanging the bigger ones and just laying out the smaller bunches.

Rosemary was a friend of Tasha's and she says some very nice things about her and says she was a very good herbalist. As I was pampering my plants today and cleaning them and gave them a good soak I thought of Tasha and how she loved her plants and loved to groom them.

Linda

Tea and a Movie

I've been watching this mini series that my dd talked about on her blog. I love seeing Botswana and the animals. Plus the story is really cute.

Linda

Tea in the Library with the Classics

This is my autumn tea pot. I love Harney & Sons, Cranberry Autumn Tea. We have a knit and tea shop that orders it at this time of year.

This is my library/office. I actually have books in almost every room, but a whole wall in this room. I wanted to share that I just finished watching "Little Dorrit" on dvd. It is based on the Dickens book. At first it seemed kind of depressing, but I got into it and ended up liking it. I really like Matthew Macfadyen, he was also in Pride and Prejudice as Mr. Darcy. So now I'm thinking I should read the book. I have a few Dickens books, but have never been able to get into them, but find it a lot easier after I've seen the movie. It's suppose to be a hard read, so I don't know if I'll be able to get into it, but I want to try. As you can see by picture I also have "Bleak House" which I can also get from Netflix and watch first. I would like to read a few of these this fall and winter. Right now I have several books I'm in the middle of, but I will just read a few pages each day until It grabs me and if it never does, well I tried.

Linda

Sunday Tea in My Reading Corner

Just wanted to show you I had my Sunday afternoon tea. I also wanted to share my reading corner. I've started to do some fall decorating and I decided to put up a rack of mysteries for the long cold, dark nights that are on their way. The days get short up here in the northwest early and I thought if I had some books out that would entice me to read I wouldn't just sit in front of the tv. I like a good mystery sometimes and I have several that I haven't read.

Linda

Tasha Tudor Lifestyle Pt 1 Afternoon Tea

I spent Saturday, the day after TT day rereading the books written about her life. I read Tasha Tudor World and Forever Christmas and I'm reading TT's Garden. I was looking for inspiration. How can I bring some of her world into mine?

I quickly realized many of the things that many of us are trying to do to save money are very much in keeping with her lifestyle. Simple and frugal living. Making as much of your stuff as you can. Raising food, if you can. It was all done with an 1800's aesthetic. She was lucky enough to have many treasures passed down in her family.

But it was her passion to have this lifestyle that really made it happen. Many of us have had the desire, but not the passion to make it happen. I'm never going to live like she did, those days are gone for me. Also I have tried some things and decided it wasn't for me. So what can I take from her life?

One small thing that I decided on today is that Sunday would be a good day to sit down and have tea from a real tea cup and a tray with all the accouterments. I drink tea a lot but I usually have it in the biggest cup I can find because I don't want to have to keep filling up a small cup. Another words I don't want to take the time to keep refilling my cup. That doesn't sound like I'm really savoring that cup of tea, so at least once a week I want to sit and savor and enjoy at Tasha's pace.

I hope to come up with other inspiration but for now it's Sunday afternoon tea.

Linda