THURSDAY SMILES !!!!!!!

How To Maintain A Healthy Level Of Insanity:

1. At Lunch Time, Sit In Your Parked Car With Sunglasses
       on and point your hair dryer at passing cars.  See if they

   slow down.

        





2. Page Yourself Over The Intercom. Don't Disguise Your
        VOICE... 
   
3. Every Time Someone Asks You To Do Something, ask if  

        they Want Fries with that. 

4. Put Decaf In The Coffee Maker For 3 Weeks . Once Everyone has Gotten Over Their Caffeine Addictions, Switch to Espresso.

5. In the Memo Field Of All Your Cheques, Write 'For liposuction'


                
6. Skip down the hall Rather Than Walk and see how many 
       looks you get.         

 

7. Order a Diet Water whenever you go out to eat, with a
        serious face. 

                                           
    
8. Specify That Your Drive-through Order Is 'To Go'. 

          
                   
9. Sing Along At The Opera. 

                    
                    

10. Five Days In Advance, Tell Your Friends You Can't
           Attend Their Party Because You have a headache. 

                           
11. When The Money Comes Out The ATM, Scream 'I Won! I Won!'

12. When Leaving the Zoo, Start Running towards the    
            Parking lot, Yelling 'Run For Your Lives!   

            They're Loose!'             

13. Tell Your Children Over Dinner, 'Due To The Economy, 
          We Are Going To Have To Let One Of You Go.'

             
Shopping and laughter are still my best therapy! 

So there it is, my dear friends, my first Thursday Smiles.  Hope you enjoyed it!

WEDNESDAY IS REDNESDAY

Yahoo!

Its my first time participating in REDNESDAY!  Its hosted by Sue at Its a very Cherry World !  I was told that she loves cherries.  Its too soon for cherries, where I live, but my red tulips are out!  I live in Canada so flowers at any time of the year are really appreciated!

Finally color in my front yard!

Crocus (its yellow, I know)

Tulips and Daffodils

Dwarf Irises (I should keep those for Blue Monday)

Iris Rose

(FAT CAT)

rolling around in the grass 

   

I

SUE 

FOR HOSTING REDNESDAY

and I finally love my red butter dish .  So many of my friends commented that it did belong on my newly created shelf.  They said the red punched it up a notch!

I love chickens and roosters.  I have a few in my kitchen (as decorations).   My husband said that we have enough.  But I saw this frame at Home Goods and I fell in love with it.  Mother's Day is around the corner.  Let's hope he changes his mind!

Yikes!  I just looked outside and it's snowing like crazy.  My flowers will probably become a distant memory!

The first red rose
Sent out of season
The second red rose
Sent for no reason
The third red rose
Sent for happiness and health
The fourth red rose
Sent for gaining life's wealth
The fifth red rose
Sent for gaining new friends
The sixth red rose
Sent for guiding you through life's bends
The seventh red rose
Sent for praying you never tire
The eighth red rose
Sent for giving you all of your desire's
The ninth red rose
Sent for your happiness in love
The tenth red rose
Sent for hoping I'm your turtledove
The eleventh red rose
Sent for igniting passion and fire
The twelve red rose
Sent for hoping I'm your desire.

Poem written by B. Lanier

THANKS FOR VISITING!

TEA ANYONE?

Hi EveRyoNe,

Its my first e-tea party!   I'm very excited about the weather here in Montreal.  Its so beautiful that I could probably entertain every one dans le jardin (in the garden)!  At the moment my home is undergoing extensive renovations and I cannot access my dining room where I keep all my good china.  So I went shopping on the internet trying to find beautiful cups, saucers and linens that would help create the best TEA PARTY.  

So here goes!  I hope you enjoy my first TEA PARTY hosted by Sandi at Rose Chintz Cottage and Inspirations

1.  CHOOSE A GOOD LOCATION:

  This lovely garden party picture is one that I found while exploring on Country Living's website!

2.  BE MINDFUL OF THE CHINA YOU WILL BE
      USING: 
 

 

I found this photo of these lovely dainty duos on the flickr account of nhearon2003.  They are all different and special in their own way!

This  pretty cup is from the website of Fine European Antiques and Accessories. My favorite tea cups have flowers and gold details just like this one! :)

 

Isn't this a beautiful shade of blue for a tea cup?! Its oh so pretty! I found this beauty on the wonderful flickr account of fleamarketstudio.

T

These pretty pink cups and saucers are from the wonderful flickr account of Damselfly58. She is a fabulous photographer and more of her work can be found here.

 

This Victorian style teapot is from the flickr account of The ParTea Planner.

 I love simple table settings that stick with white, gold, and an accent color. So, for tea parties I will stick with this color palette and add pink as our accent color!

 

This golden cup and saucer were found on Fine European Antiques and Accessories.

 

This fancy teapot was something that I came across and fell in love with on the flickr account of togrbil2.  At first, I thought it was a coffee pot but its a more stylish, elongated tea pot.  I love it!

 

I'm in love with Moroccan tea glasses and wouldn't these look lovely at a tea party! I was living in Qatar last year and bought similar glasses as well as a full Arabian Tea set.  As soon as the renovations are finished I will show you how glamorous it looks. My next tea party will consist on serving mint tea which is very popular in the Middle East.  Men are in charge of serving it....

 

These plates are from Royal Crown Derby collection and in their Gold  collection. they can be found online at Small Islander.

3.  CHOOSE ACCENT COLORS WELL:

 

And now for our accent color PINK! i thought that this girly lace tablecloth would give the perfect pink touch to a table! you can find it online at Rocket St. George.   J'adore!

 

For an extra pink sparkle try adding a lovely bouquet of pink flowers (peonies are my current favorite!). this lovely arrangement came from Elegant Creation by Mily!

4.  HAVE A VARIETY OF TREATS AVAILABLE:

Scrumptious Treats!
 

As far as food goes for a tea party I like to go simple. An afternoon tea party may consist of little finger foods such as little sandwiches.  Instead of listing off more ideas I will go straight to the best part, dessert! When I was little my mom threw me a birthday tea party and we had petits fours like the ones pictured above! They are so simple and add a fun touch to any kind of party! I found these pretty petits fours on the great website of Adorn Magazine!

 

Another fun idea would be to serve fancy cupcakes like this one! for more inspiring cupcake images visit the oh so talented Zalita on her fickr account!

 

This metal lace cake pedestal would be an amazing  decoration for serving either cupcakes or petits fours! You can purchase this one online at amazon.com, just search Metal Lace Cake Pedestal.  I really like the glass insert that  comes out easily.  Its very easy to wash!

5.  BE THE HOSTESS WITH THE MOSTEST:

Tea Party Fashion!

For fun I added a few dresses that any tea hostess would want to wear.  They are very cute and feminine!  Finally, warmer days are here!  These cute dresses are very tempting!

This gorgeous eyelet sundress can be found on the Delias website. its called the Helena Eyelet Dress.

 

My second  dress of choice is this gorgeous pink lace dress that I found on Alloy.

I love the satin ribbon around the waist.  Its so feminine!


Tea Party Art!
 
I found this Victorian illustration on Fashion Era.  They look so beautiful, charming and well-mannered!


I hope You have enjoyed this spring TeA  ParTy! 

Merci de votre visite !

SHOW OFF YOUR COTTAGE MONDAY

Join me today at Show off Your Cottage Monday hosted by Cielo at The House in the Roses:

As well as Metamorphosis Monday hosted by Susan at:

Not everything in a cottage home need be an antique! If you love it, use it! Many a sweet find can be discovered not only at antique malls but also at flea markets, garage sales and thrift shops. I always keep an eye out for collectible cottage treasures wherever I go. You never know what you might find.

Now that the house is sunnier I've been feeling more motivated to do lots of little decorating projects. My decorating budget is still non-existent, so stay posted for lots of easy changes you can do that cost next to nothing. Most of these involved things I had lying around already, so it helps if you already have things like leftover paint from other projects etc.

The first thing I've done is add more shelving in our kitchen. The wall over my table was completely bare. We made some shelves (with the help of IKEA).  Originally I had planned to just put a bunch of stuff  that was cluttering up our countertops on the shelves, but after I'd added a couple of ceramic pieces I decided to add some hooks to hang beautiful cups.  Some of the cups came home with me a few nights ago from our local Home Goods store. They had been marked down to $2! What were they thinking? I know what I was thinking! What a great thrifty find!  I love visiting flea markets.  I'm especially excited when I find something beautiful, for very little money for which I can find a new home.   Have a look at the shelves and the cups:

I'm still not sure about the red butter dish yet.  I'm quite liking the aqua, green, blue and yellow ceramic containers.  Have a look at the cups I found:

Some I received as gifts and the two last ones with flowers I found at the thrift store.  I find the effect quite pleasing.  Each time I have a cup of tea now I treat myself to a beautiful cup as before they were collecting dust in my cupboard.

My friend was given a desk by her mother.  When I first saw it I figured it was not too attractive.  I was given similar furniture in the past and I'm sad to say that I just gave it away.  She told me she was sending it to a wood finisher in our area.  She took a  "before picture".  I could not figure out how she could make it more attractive.   She sent me this picture via e-mail:

I could not believe my eyes!  She told me they carefully sanded, repainted with several coats of white, and decorated with  delicate  rose appliques. The result is a stunning and beautiful piece! All the hinges, drawers, legs were changed.  It looks like a brand new piece of furniture!

I have so many projects on the back burner I'm not sure which one I will do next. For now,  I think I will just make myself a cup of tea using one of my beautiful cups.  Hope you can join me!

I wish we could sit down together
And have a cup of tea
But since we can’t
When you have this one
I hope you’ll think of me.