Keep Calm and Make Tea

This cute tea bag holder was a recent TJ Maxx find.  It came in a pack of two and unfortunately there were only two packages left.  I snapped those up - one to add to my collection and three to attach to Christmas gift bags).  These “tea bag tidy” sets are made by Creative Tops - Bright Ideas for Creative Living.  There is a lovely website here. 

The tea bag holders are a nice match for the cheerful mugs (also by Creative Tops) that I purchased at TJ Maxx a while ago.  I believe the mugs also came in white with red lettering.  

The tea bag holders are a generous size, with large, flat centers and can be used for coasters as well.

 

 

Frozen Tea Treat

On a recent grocery run to Kroger I found this So Delicious Green Tea frozen dessert.  I liked the fact that it is made with coconut milk and soy free.

A half cup serving is only 130 calories - it is sweetened with organic agave syrup and not overly sweet.  It contains green tea powder and I found that the delicious green tea flavor really stands out.

One day I may try making homemade green tea ice cream with Matcha powder, but until then this is a nice alternative.

Williamson English Breakfast Tea

Williamson tea is grown on farms in the highlands of Kenya.  These company farms are all Fairtrade and Rainforest Alliance certified.

I’d never tried this brand of tea, but when I came across one of their elephant tins (containing English Breakfast tea bags) at TJ Maxx, I couldn’t resist.

You can order a limited selection of elephant tins online at Amazon for around $20.  There are many other lovely tins on the Williamson website. 

I’d like to try their Lifeboat tea.  A portion of each sale goes to RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institute) to help save lives at sea.  This sounds like a robust black, single estate tea that I’d enjoy.

The 40 English Breakfast teabags in the tin are packaged in an airtight silver bag.  The tea is “rich and refreshing” according to the package and I agree – perfect for my morning cuppa.

I hope to add more of these unique tins to my tea tin collection, starting with the Jubilee tea.

Royal Standard teacup

My friend Debbie surprised me on Sunday with this beautiful Royal Standard bone china teacup.  She found it at a thrift store in Massachusetts and thought I would like to have it.

The pastoral scene and colors on this cup are so soft and pretty.

I like the pedestal base on the cup and the lovely broken loop shape of the handle.

Royal Standard was a well known trademark of Chapmans Longton Ltd.  It was in use from about 1949.

This is an embroidered tea towel that I found recently.  It is pretty and colorful, but I did find one flaw with it.

This reads “teatine” to me – maybe I’m a little too fussy.

As usual you can check out the beautiful Teatime Tuesday posts at Terri and Martha's blogs. 

Disney Hilton Head

I've been enjoying the deck here at our unit at Disney Hilton Head Resort.  It has a wonderful view of the marsh and is unbelievably quiet and peaceful.  The tide is out in the above picture and you can see the path that we walked along on our "Secrets of the Marsh" tour.  It was very interesting, although a little unnerving when your heavy knee high rubber boots would sink six inches down into the mud without warning.  

 

The 1940's Lowcountry vacation lodge decor is perfect, with interesting light fixtures, photos, tile, carpet, etc.

The base of the floor lamp above is made with three canoe paddles and the photos are what you would expect to see at a fish camp.

We've rented bicycles for the week and when we feel like a change of scenery, it is a pleasant ride to Disney Beach House with it's twelve mile stretch of beautiful sand beach.

Well, I think I'll go sit in one of the rockers on the deck, breath in the fresh salty air and read my Kindle. 

Tovolo Tea Infuser

Stopped in to TJ Maxx yesterday to see if anything new had arrived in tea ware.  I found a couple of boxes of Yorkshire Gold tea bags on the clearance rack and snapped those up.  I also saw this interesting tea infuser.

This looks like it would work very well in a teapot or for brewing a cup of loose tea in a mug.  I like the three prong green top with the matching stand.  Handy to hold the used tea leaves upright (maybe for another infusion) and to catch drips.

A quick search showed me that the Tovolo tea infuser is available at Stash tea online at a slightly higher price.

I’m not sure that I need another tea infuser, but I was tempted to buy this one.  Has anyone tried it?

Teaopia Tea For One

As I mentioned in a previous post, I purchased several tea items on my recent trip to Canada.  One day my brother had some work to do, so he said he would drop me off at the huge Vaughan Mills Mall.  Of course, my first stop was the store directory to see if there were any tea shops and I was happy to find that there was a Teaopia store.

I learned that their shops were soon merging with Teavana and their logo merchandise was being sold off at a 70% discount. 

One of the several items I purchased from Teaopia was a pretty tea for one set.  I’ve never seen one as delicate as this and with a combination of glass and china. 

   

The china filter basket matches the teacup and the tiny holes are perfect for containing smaller tea leaves.

This set is perfect for brewing myself a special cup of green tea, like this Bouteaque Jade Sword.

You can go to the Teavana website and find a 20% off discount.