Tea Time!

“There are few hours in life more agreeable than the hour dedicated to the ceremony known as afternoon tea.” – Henry James

At Laura’s Tea Room, afternoon tea really is a ceremony. Carol and Eleanor, a mother-daughter team, opened a tea house 7 years ago and recorded their aha moment in 2009. They were later chosen to become a commercial for Mutual of Omaha. Watch their moment, here.

This year, we reached out to this sweet team to catch up and see how they were doing 6 years later. They kindly invited us to tea.

Now, I don’t know what you imagine when you think of a “tea room” in a 400 person town (Ridgeway, SC) where almost everyone is homeschooled and every business is family owned…but needless to say, I didn’t really know what to expect...

But as I stepped foot into the teahouse, I was drawn into a whimsical world of beauty and elegance. Tea cups, tea pots, precious aprons, finger food cookbooks, darling jewelry….WOW. As I walked up stairs, the walls were lined with hats of all shapes, sizes and colors. We were each instructed to pick out a hat for afternoon tea.

Pause, is this real?! Am I in London? Are we seriously about to have “high tea”? Can I speak in a British accent through this entire afternoon?

Throughout the meal, I continued to think of my sweet grandma. Oh how I wish I could have been there with her. She was a beautiful woman who appreciated elegance, beauty and simple joys. I imagined her giggling with me as we tried on various hats and picked out our favorite tea cups. We could have easily sat together for hours chatting about life sitting near the big open windows in the sunshine. (If you know my grandma, she hates being cold...just like me)

Walking out of Laura’s Tea Room was like walking out of a dream…a dainty, elegant, classy and whimsical dream.

Sweet Grandma, you would have loved it.

Miss you.