Cedar + Elm at The Lodge

Before I move on to today’s post I wanted to let you know that our home is safe and evacuation levels have stabilized but the fire is still burning.

On Friday September 5th Laura and Katie treated me to tea at Cedar + Elm at The Lodge at St. Edward Park.

There was live music and the artist had a beautiful mellow voice which made for a pleasant background of music.

When we were done with our leisurely tea we walked about the Lodge.

Lady of the Lake of Arthurian legend.

Thank you to Laura and Katie for the nice treat and lovely afternoon together. Thank you, too, to Josh and Laura for always being so hospitable to us.

We spent last Thursday on the road to travel to Bothell then spent the next three full days on the Westside. We met up with friends on Thursday and Saturday. On Saturday morning we attended a conference with Paul Tripp on Suffering. It was such a well spent 2-1/2 hours! On Sunday evening our westside kids treated us to dinner to celebrate Greg’s birthday a couple days early. More about those events at a later date.

It has been a relief to be out of the smoke filled air in Colville for these few days. We are on the road back to Colville today and hope the air quality improves each day to come.

Tea ~Daughter Tea Queen Mary

Welcome to Tea Time 2025. These posts will be about Tea Rooms we’ve been to, Teas we’ve given for friends and family, Church Tea events, and High Tea in restaurants from 2008 to the present. Tea in the U.S.A., Tea in England and Tea in Canada. Many of the Tea Rooms are no longer in business, which is sad.

This post is from December 27, 2015.

Our youngest turned thirty today. We started celebrating yesterday.

We, our daughters and me went to the Queen Mary Tea Room to celebrate birthdays on Boxing day.

Jamie was married into our family in June of 2015.

Laura and Katie have birthdays in December and Jamie, Dan, and Josh have birthdays in January.

“Such items, if properly prepared and portered, jingle and tinkle, twinkle and shine, as if to announce their approach, and all the cups and saucers, the silver spoons and the sugar bowl, the steaming hot water and the shining strainer, the teapot and the plate of delicate sandwiches – all seem to combine and say as one, “Let your worries cease for now; the world is aright again!” And in the welcome pouring of the tea and the delightful crunch of the cucumber and cress sandwiches, not to mention the promise of the coming cakes and the possible surprise of strawberries and cream to follow, all else is held at bay: the past is forgotten, the future does not exist, and all is peace. ”

Toad Triumphant ~ by William Horwood

It was Jamie’s first time to enjoy a formal tea. Pinkies up!

This is the last in my series of Tea Time 2025 where I’ve gone back and reposted all the fun tea experiences from the past. If by chance or by will we end up in another tea room this year I’ll share the experience but until then I say toodle pip to our Tea Times.

Tea ~ Fullerton

This post was from October 17th of 2009. That was sixteen years ago!

Southern California is having a weather event and we are HOT HOT HOT. Back in April of 2009 my family planned a nice afternoon at the Rose Tree Cottage in Pasadena for my mother’s 85th birthday. It was a disappointing day for my mom because she fell on an uneven sidewalk when she arrived and had to spend the afternoon and evening at the hospital instead of having tea.

My mother giving us some words of wisdom at her birthday tea in 2007.

We decided it was high time to get together for tea again and thought we’d have some nice Fall weather for our get together. Well it’s Fall but we are having some summer weather. This time my mom, all my sisters, a SIL, nieces, and little grand niece are gathering in Fullerton. We’re praying for an accident free day!

Half the ladies in my family met for tea yesterday in Fullerton, California. We had the Senior member of our family, our 85 year old mom and the youngest member of our family, our 1 month old Grand Niece/Great Granddaughter in attendance.

The venue was the Spring Tea Garden in Fullerton, California. We were treated well during our time there.

Avery was born September 17th

This venue is still open for events.

That was 16 years ago which means this Fall our Grandniece Avery will be turning 16!

Tea ~ Queen Mary Katie’s Birthday

This post was from a day long celebration of our daughter’s birthday in 2013. Her birthday is December 27th but the post didn’t go live until December 28th.

Our first stop for our Celebrating Katie day was at the Queen Mary Tea Room in Seattle which is located close to the University of Washington.

The waiter popped by our table and asked if we were celebrating anything special and we said, “Why yes, today is Katie’s birthday”. He asked if she’d like to wear a crown…

We said yes!

A long time friend of ours lives in the neighborhood and was able to join us for breakfast.

Queen Katie and Bridget

Bridget’s sister Jamie was Katie’s Maid of Honor. Jamie has been gone for over a year now on a trip around the world. We talked about Jamie and wondered if she’d be back home by next Christmas. Bridget is going to meet Jamie in New Zealand for several days in February before Jamie heads to South America.

Back to the Queen Mary…

The traditional tea sipping shot!

We said farewell to Santa and our breakfast buddy and headed to Destination #2. I’ll share that next week.

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Tea ~ Marysville

This was originally posted on December 2, 2015.

We chose Attic Secrets in Marysville for our tea on the Saturday after Thanksgiving (2015) since we planned to shop at the Navy Exchange Complex afterwards.

We each chose our teacups and brought them to our table and selected our tea.

We were so pleased to see a gluten free tea choices for Letty on the menu, too.

My sister Lana, Sister-in-law Letty, Me, DIL Laura and daughter Katie.

After our lovely leisurely tea we headed to the Navy Exchange to do a little tax free shopping. We made a couple more stops to Cost Plus, Hobby Lobby, and a grocery store before heading back to Josh and Laura’s to see what the guys accomplished. Besides their construction project Josh managed to make a great pot of chili and a pan of gluten free cornbread for us all to enjoy.

This Tea Room is still open!

Tea ~ White Heather Tea Room

This post is from April 6th 2011

On Saturday we walked many miles around town and ended up for an afternoon tea in the Oak Bay area of Victoria. It was a wonderful authentic English High Tea that was recommended to us by Pondside who lives on Vancouver Island. She graciously made our reservations for us including instructions not to be seated in the middle of the restaurant. We had a delightful experience at the White Heather Tea Room and would recommend it to you. Later I will post about meeting Pondside on Sunday and what a wonderful day we had together.

It was so delightful to meet Pondside face to face on this trip.

We visited this tea room on a Sister weekend the four of us enjoyed in Victoria B.C. for my 60th birthday. This tea room is still in business!

We stayed at the Beaconsfield for our weekend.

Back to the present: Yesterday was the first day of Summer and we got a nice rain shower and today we are expecting some more rain. Lots of heat forecasted for many areas in the U.S.A. the next few days. Colville is supposed to be 55 F today with rain starting at noon. How are the temps where you are?

Tea ~ MGCC Cookbook

Seventeen years ago today the Mennonite Girls Can Cook Blog was launched by Lovella.

The Mennonite Girls Can Cook Blog began on June 7, 2008. I’m adding links to the beginning of the blog and to some of the anniversary blog posts from Lovella.

Here is Lovella’s post from our 1 year anniversary.

This was our third year anniversary.

Ten Year Anniversary Post.

The ten year anniversary post announced that we would not be publishing a recipe a day anymore on the Mennonite Girls Can Cook blog. Since 2018 recipes from the past have been refreshed and published.

This next Tea Time post was for our MGCC Celebrations book photos. It happened in July of 2012. There wasn’t a post about this tea because it would soon be featured in our 2nd Cookbook, Celebrations.

We gathered in Bev’s garden and set a tea table. We had all prepared several of the dishes that would be featured in our new cookbook to enjoy together.

It was a photo-op for the cookbook and for the promotion of the cookbook.

All the recipes for these tea delights can be found in our cookbook.

This time in our lives was a continuation of a whirlwind of activities stemming from the launch of our first cookbook and then our 2nd cookbook. We had book signing events from Abbotsford to Chilliwack and Manitoba and more events that stemmed from the Mennonite Girls Can Cook Play in Indiana and Ohio.

Our last major publication was our devotional, Bread for the Journey, which was published in 2016.

My posts about this new journey publication are here and here.

Our day to day new recipe postings have ceased but our friendship our ‘Tenship’ continues. We have experiences and ties that will continue to connect us for the rest of our lives. Thanks be to God for His Providence in bringing us together seventeen years ago.

Tea ~ St. Ives

This post was originally titled As I Was Going to St. Ives and posted on November 4th 2013

As I was going to St. Ives,
I met a man with seven wives,
Each wife had seven sacks,
Each sack had seven cats,
Each cat had seven kits,
kits, cats, sacks, wives,
How many were going to St. Ives?

There are differing views as to which St. Ives this nursery rhyme/riddle was referring to but many believe that St. Ives in Cornwall is a good choice because it was a busy fishing port and they would need many cats to help with the rats and mice destroying the fishing gear.

We took the advice of our friend who lived in Cornwall to take the train to St. Ives because it could be hard to find parking in this busy port destination. The day before had been so gloomy and rainy so when we woke up to beautiful sunshine on September 18th we let Jeeves lead us to the railway stop. We met up with quite a crowd who had the same idea as us and were ready to enjoy the seaside in the sunshine. Thankfully we found the last parking spot in the train waiting area.

Here we are waiting in the que for the next train to arrive.

We had beautiful views of the sea as we rode the train on the short trip to St. Ives.

When we arrived our first order of business was to find the Tea Room where we had decided to eat a meal and enjoy our first Cornish cream tea.

Bliss! I have to admit it wasn’t easy to find the tea room in this bustling humanity filled town. With narrow cobbled streets filled to the brim we made our way to the end of the sea walk. When we finally spotted “the Tea Room” and got our seats we could finally…”Keep calm and carry on”

It’s amazing how a satisfying meal can make your outlook so much better and the crowds so much easier to coexist with.

The tea room was at the far end of the town and the next photo shows the view of the harbor with the tide out looking out from the tea room. I’ll be sharing photos of the harbor after the tide rolls in soon with more of the great views we enjoyed in St. Ives along St. Ives Bay.

I’m heading outside in the brisk sunny weather to try to gather up some of the leaves that fell over the weekend. The rains are headed our way again soon and I want to take advantage of this dry window before the leaves get real soggy. I’m hoping to get more creative mojo this week, too, with some final preparations for a get together at this old house on Sunday November 10th.

Blessings!

Back to the present here in June of 2025. We are getting things accomplished on our property and I’ll have an update, soon. Instead of fall prep we are in the middle of summer preparations. It is warming up. Have a great Friday, everyone!

Tea ~ Queen Mary

This post was originally from April 28th 2011.

Since Friday is the big day, my Friday’s Fave Five are all about the Royal Wedding! I know some people are yawning or even mocking the event but I choose to embrace it with hopes and prayers that things will go differently for this young couple and that their marriage will last as long as Queen Elizabeth’s reign. She’s been around a long time people!

On Wednesday after booking Katie and Andrew’s wedding venue we decided to have tea at the Queen Mary Tea Room to get in the mood for the upcoming wedding of William and Kate. The Tea Room is getting ready for the big event and is hosting a viewing party from 1:00 A.M. till 4:00 A.M. They have a special Royal Romance Tea for the occasion and a signature bubbly.

Katie wore her Princess Di ring. Well it’s not really a Princess Di ring but it is very similar and it’s fun to see Princess Di’s ring on Kate Middleton’s finger. Our Katie got her ring several years ago passed down from her Aunt Lana.

We enjoyed Cornish Pasties with salad and a very lovely carrot ginger soup with coconut.

Of course there were souvenirs that you could purchase commemorating the Royal event

I was tempted to get this mug to commemorate my Royal event this year!

I hope your week was a calm one instead of one filled with panic!

Are you going to watch Prince William and Kate’s wedding? We just gathered up a few of our British souvenirs and set them out for the wedding day. We even included the Black Knight from Monty Python and the Holy Grail. The Beanie Baby is the Princess Di Bear called Princess.

Back to the Present:

This post is a fun memory of many things, the Royal wedding, Katie and Andrew’s wedding and our time living in the Seattle area. Today is Friday May 30, 2025. It’s been mostly quiet this week. On Tuesday of this week my heels were injected with cortisone so we’ll see what relief I receive from that treatment against my Plantar Fasciitis.

In case you are wondering: Plantar Fasciitis is an inflammatory condition involving the plantar fascia, a thick band of connective tissue found on the bottom of the foot. This thick band of tissue extends from the heel to the ball of the foot and aides in support and stabilization of the foot (especially the arch) during walking and running.

Have a great weekend!

Tea ~ Three Cups of Tea

This post is from December 6th of 2009.

The girls in my extended family have started a Black Friday tradition of shopping at Goodwill and then going to Tea. We were so happy to find this relatively new Tea Room in Bothell, Washington. Three Cups of Tea has a well rounded combination of great teas, really good food, and a wonderful ambiance. We would all highly recommend it!! Lea Miller, the “Tea-preneur” has the perfect personality to run this Tea Room.

There is a main eating room with gift items displayed all around in great cabinets and then there are two specialty rooms divided from the main area.

The back of the business card reads;

First cup of tea as a guest

Second cup of tea as a friend

Third cup of tea as family

This is the Alice in Wonderland room. So delightful. We took our tea in the more formal room with the fireplace and it was lovely.

Letty, Katie, Katy K, Me, Lana, Grandma Wilma, Pat and Laura.

This was close to Laura’s birthday so it’s fun to honor her.

The ladies with their tea. That’s my sister Lana in the center photo. She treated us all on this day. She is so generous. Thank you Lana!

We were all happy with our food choices. Everything was excellent. Our tea included fresh scones with clotted cream, jam, and lemon curd, Soup and 1/2 Sandwich of our choice, and a dessert. Most of us had to take our dessert home.

Three Cups of Tea is worth a visit. You can pop in for breakfast, quick lunch or plan a more formal get-together. We’ll be back!

Thank you Lea for treating us like family. We appreciated you and your great staff!

We had a second visit to this tea room with a smaller group on Black Friday 2010

Again we were close to Laura’s birthday and it is always fun to enjoy something special with her.

We enjoyed this tea room twice and I think Laura and her mom visited another time, too. It is no longer in business.

The Happy Wonderer ~ ellen b.

To honor and encourage

Category Archives: Tea Rooms