A visit to the Carolina Parakeet — and a giveaway for one of you!

On Saturday, I had the great pleasure of being the guest speaker for the morning's "Tea and Topics" program at the Carolina Parakeet, a tea shop in Anderson, South Carolina. After corresponding back and forth with owner Donna Siemen for months, I was delighted to arrive there on Friday evening to meet her and look around the shop.

And I must admit I was almost giddy when I saw my name on this sign. This was definitely a first!


This is Donna, her husband, Wolfgang (what a great name!), and me on Saturday, but I loved that I got to meet them both when they welcomed Alex and me to stop by on Friday evening to say hello and set up early if I wanted. That ended up being a great help, and I was so at ease that all I had to do on Saturday morning was arrive and I was good to go!

The Carolina Parakeet is not a tearoom that serves afternoon tea but rather a tea and gift shop that is well-stocked with their beautifully packaged "Tea Bird" loose leaf teas, and later this week, I'll be telling you more about some of the teas I purchased. I know many of you live near tearooms and tea shops, but I do not, so walking into this welcoming shop with its soothing decor and a vast selection of teas and tea gifts was an absolute delight! And in case you're wondering about the shop's name, here's what I learned: "Carolina Parakeet takes its name from the now extinct bird that was North America's only native parakeet. It serves as our reminder for preservation. Our mission is to offer tea instruction and high quality products to our customers that will assist them in preserving a lifestyle of civility, hospitality and health. These things have been associated with tea for many centuries and in many cultures." I could quickly tell that Donna and her husband are all about using the tea shop to promote "civility, hospitality and health," and I knew immediately that I'd made some new friends.

I was also tickled to see my books so prominently on display!

Of course, I had to look around at the displays in the shop, and this terry cloth tea towel with "Camellia Sinensis" woven into the design immediately caught my eye. Pretty!

I loved the shop's tea packaging, and I so enjoyed getting to do a little in-person tea shopping instead of having to rely on mail order, although I should mention that the Carolina Parakeet does indeed offer mail order for those of us who don't live nearby. (Go here to visit their shopping site online.)

Donna had charming and elegant tables set up for the event, using a variety of pretty blue and white china, fresh flowers, and white tablecloths.

So for her Saturday morning "Tea and Topics," Donna provides a treat and some tea selections, and the attendees get to hear about different tea-related topics. This time, she made Higbee Muffins from my book and served an iced peach oolong and a hot peach tea, in honor of yours truly being from Georgia, the peach state. I shared some of the department store tearoom info from my book Dainty Dining, and Kim, the woman holding the book in the photo above, was singing its praises to the others. As anyone with a book will tell you, that's the best kind of endorsement you can get. And at back is Michelle, an old friend from Newnan who now lives in Greenville, S.C., and showed up for the talk and even treated me to lunch afterward.

The guests were all so friendly and gave me great feedback as I asked questions or shared stories during my talk, and it was truly a pleasure to be part of such a fun morning at the Carolina Parakeet!

So since you all couldn't be there, I knew that something from the Carolina Parakeet would make the perfect August giveaway here on my blog. Now my styling isn't nearly as good as theirs, but I'm giving away one of their Camellia Sinensis tea towels and a bag of their delicious Fig Festival black tea, which I'll be sharing more about on Wednesday. So if you'd like to win these treats I picked up just for one of you, leave an "Enter me" to this post between now and 7 a.m. EST on Friday, August 9, making sure I have a way to contact you if you're the winner, and you'll be entered to win. (US only, please.) Good luck!