If you’ve read THE UNSELECTED JOURNALS OF EMMA M. LION then you already know how delightfully addictive they are.
When I finished the 8 that are available, I simply wasn’t ready to be done! I had my book club read them, recommended them to a dozen friends, and found more and more people felt the same level of obsession that I did! I decided to throw a tea party for everyone I know that has read all 8, but in my planning and searching for ideas I couldn’t find anyone who had already had one! So here I am making this post so that the job is a little easier for all other “undaunted” Emma fans out there (Virtus apprime).
Invitations:
I definitely considered sending a missive on peach stationary (a la Lady Spencer) but in the end decided I wanted it to be super recognizable, so I used the book cover design. Here’s a blank that you can use as the image behind yours:
If Emma’s blue door warrants the house being called Lapis Lazuli House, then surely mine can be Turquoise House. I also had to throw the party in June despite the heat, so I could use my favorite quote on the invite!
Decor:
Our party was in my garden, because of course, that’s my country seat. The flowers in bloom also really simplified decorations.
We picked Hawkes’ blue with white and lace. Blue candles were a must.
To find enough books for decor, I rummaged my hardcovers to find everything that looked good without its dust jacket. An easy trick here is that if the spine looks too modern you can turn the book backwards. I picked up a couple important titles like TREASURE ISLAND and WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE THE COMPLETE WORKS from my local library. We also wrapped stacks in lace on the table to help “tie” them together.
I cut circles out of an old book and sewed them into a bunting with my sewing machine. It’s funny how something this simple went a long way to making the party feel more festive.
We filled out the center of the table with greens from my garden, and some vases of daisies like Agnes would have done.
Also Ferns! I visited my parents the week before and dug a few up from their property… but since I knew they would might a little sad in my hotter climate, I also picked up some fake fern fronds.
Candles- hobby lobby, but I nearly bought these ones though.
Candlesticks- dollar tree, although it would have be lovely to get them in gold like these on amazon.
Ferns- the Great Northwest! Also, Joann’s (RIP).
Tea cups- a facebook marketplace find!
Food:
My lovely friend Melissa and I had a fun time pouring through the books for food references! We settled on jam dodgers, cream puffs, scones with strawberry preserves and Bavarian cream. I also have a favorite recipe for a honey lavender shortbread cookie. To round it all out, we made some cucumber sandwiches.
Since it was really hot we served iced herbal tea and lemonade.
British Scones (this recipe was really simple to make)
Two Ingredient Bavarian Cream (stupid simple)
Honey Lavender Shortbread Cookie
Activities:
Really this was just an excuse to do a ton of talking about our favorite books, but I did have a couple activities to get the conversations going.
Right as people stepped in I encouraged them to make a tea hat/fascinator. I suggested cutting a circle or teardrop shape out of felt, and then adding ribbons or tulle for shape, and pearls or beads to make it fancy. Mostly this was just to get everyone in the mood that we weren’t going to take ourselves too seriously, but it also served as something to do while waiting for others to arrive. One of the attendees works in rec management and she said that this sort silly of opener activity really helps to get conversations going– I didn’t even know what a good idea it was!
We also gave everyone a chance to guess when book 9 will be published. The winner will get a lovely tea towel that Melissa had a neighbor embroider with her embroidery machine.
Favors:
This was my great labor of love that started a month in advance. I read through the books and pulled out all the Latin phrases used, looked up Latin insults, and made a list of -cides to create an actual LATIN PHRASES FOR THE UNREPENTANT.
I wrote a separate post on how to make your own, and included the printable pdf. You can do it! Fata viam invenient!
Another guest asked if she could bring a gift for everyone as well and I was so excited to see what it would be!
White feather pens! She found them on amazon. Perfect for writing in your journal and setting on top of it when you’re done so that it doesn’t wander off.
EXTRA Ideas:
If you’re feeling a little extra, here are a couple ideas we didn’t quite pull off:
Cello player- I reached out to a friend’s son, a high school senior who plays cello, about coming and playing for a bit. He thought it sounded super fun, but ended up having to go into work. I was more than a little bummed because it was going to be AMAZING! Quod id est id est.
Julius Ceasar- Drama teacher Brandon Kelso has a fun rendition he calls Playing With Plays. He has 3 different lengths, and has it set up for different numbers of actors. I got my kids to act this one out with me on the Ides of March, and it was super fun. I considered assigning tea party attendees parts beforehand, but it just didn’t work with me being out of town the week prior.
Other games- you could bring in other stonecrop activities such as horseshoes, cricket (not as hard as it sounds–my kids played it at a summer camp and caught on quickly), or archery (my husband voted for this but I was unsure about my attendees’ interest level).
Let me know if you throw your own party, I would love to hear about it! Also, just a reminder, I am an Amazon affiliate, so I do get a small percentage of sales if you use one of my amazon links. Thanks!
Kimberly Horch 