A stylish lady with her teacup

When I was in college, a girlfriend was in cosmetology school and asked if she could practice styling finger waves on my hair. I said sure, but I wondered who in the late 1980s was requesting this style. "No one," said my friend, yet she was required to learn this technique all the same. I don't recall my hair cooperating with this particular styling effort (I've always had strong-willed hair), but when I see photos of a woman with finger waves, I do recall that the style was popular in the 1920s.

So when I saw this photo on the Library of Congress web site (a photo cleverly titled "Woman holding tea bag above cup"), I was fairly certain I could date it, and indeed, it dates to 1929. Through a little online searching, I learned that Max Mayer Co. was located at 2 Park Avenue in New York City. I didn't learn much about the business, but I was happy to see that the building, developed from 1926-1928, still stands in Manhattan. A fun bit of history!

The new issue of "Daphne's Diary"

I had to visit a couple of Barnes & Noble stores before I found a copy of the first issue of Daphne's Diary for 2025, and it is a keeper! First, I think the blue-and-white designs on the cover are just lovely!

Once I started perusing this issue, I found an article on making a tablecloth from vintage tea towels. That's an idea I've not heard of before.

Since this is the January/February issue, it featured some recipes for hot drinks, most of them made with tea.

And there's even a specialty-paper page with a teapot design to cut out. There are also articles on vacationing in a country house in Italy, a Dutch artist who turns old books into works of art, and some clever sewing ideas. As always, there are lots of art pages, stickers, and other "gifts" inside the magazine. If you're a fan, too, this issue is not to be missed!

A new cozy read: "Death Among the Stitches" by Betty Hechtman

So if an uncle died and left you an old schoolhouse and cottage in another state, would you keep it or would you sell it? That's the question facing Annie Sara Hart, a young woman who lives in a studio apartment in LA that is owned by her father, an agent with some superstar movie clients. Never having owned property herself, Annie Sara wants to at least see what she's inherited before she sells it—and thus she finds herself headed to small-town Franklin, Indiana.

There, she discovers she's just become the owner of an old schoolhouse that was home to the town's only yarn shop, a gathering spot beloved by the locals, who are disappointed to hear that she intends to sell it. She learns that the woman who owned the yarn shop died inside the place, but the townsfolk seem to have conspired to keep her from figuring out why. After discovering an old cottage behind the schoolhouse, Annie Sara decides to stay in town for a while and tidy everything up before she sells.

There's one small problem, however. Annie Sara works in a boutique owned by the shiftless LA-princess daughter of two movie stars, and their loyal agent happens to be Annie Sara's father. The daughter, Gray Hanover, can't seem to function in life without Annie Sara as her sidekick, so Gray ends up going to Indiana and becoming a partner in the yarn shop and perhaps opening a new business its former owner had considered—a quaint tearoom in part of the old schoolhouse. The idea certainly has its charms, but why won't the local knitters and crocheters spill the tea on what happened to the previous owner?

Death Among the Stitches was a pleasure to read, and it had touches of all that I love in a good cozy—flaky town characters, an overzealous cop, and other female entrepreneurs. I was particularly pleased that at the local bakery, the owner gets help with the baking from her son, who has Down syndrome. This book was a fun debut to a new series, and I look forward to seeing more of these characters in the future.

(Book courtesy of NetGalley)

Taylors of Harrogate Blackberry & Raspberry Tea

Years ago, when Holly Cottage Tearoom was still operating here in Newnan, I became acquainted with Taylors of Harrogate since the company's teas were served there. I've enjoyed their loose tea and tea bags many times since then, and this week at Marshalls, I came across a new-to-me variety from Taylors.

This blackberry and raspberry blend is just the sort of thing I enjoy each February. In honor of a month I think of as "pink," I sip lots of berry blends, and I was happy to find some berry-flavored tea bags since I can take some with me (if there are any left) on some spring trips I have planned.

And the taste? Excellent! Many berry blends have this tart and vaguely berry taste that could be anything: strawberry, blueberry, whatever. This tea has the distinct flavors of blackberry and raspberry, and the combo was brilliant. Wishing I'd bought another box. Are you familiar with Taylors of Harrogate?

Heart-shaped cake and tea bread

So here's the deal. Those lightweight copper-colored Jell-O molds are a fixture in every thrift store I've ever been in, and though I haven't made a Jell-O mold in, well, ever, I love these molds! I loved them even more when I discovered they can also be used as cake pans. That's why I have about a half dozen of them now, and I seem to find a new heart-shaped one every year around Valentine's Day.

This one was my latest find. Because it came from an antique mall and not a thrift store, it was a little pricier, $5 instead of $1, but was still quite affordable. What I wanted to know was this: Can you bake a loaf of tea bread in one of these things?

And the answer is yes, yes you can. I didn't overfill it, using three small heart-shaped pans to make mini tea breads with the excess batter, but I think it worked out well. The design would be more pronounced with a batter that didn't have so much stuff in it (this is my Christmas cranberry bread because I had leftover cranberries in the freezer), but I'm still impressed with the amount of the scalloped design you can see. So, have you ever used one of these molds to make a cake? Would you?

A Valentine's Day dessert — for anytime!

Last week, I was busy sharing vintage valentines, but before February is over, I wanted to share the recipe I featured in my column for this month's issue of The Coweta Shopper. It's such a quick and easy recipe to make. Also, I served it in tiny glass goblets as a "two-bite dessert" last week to my little neighbor friends, and they loved it (and asked for seconds), so I may be adding this to my next tea party menu as well!

Pie Filling Cobbler


1/2 cup butter, melted

3/4 cup sugar

3/4 cup flour

1/2 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 cup milk

1 (15-ounce) can pie filling (any flavor)


Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Melt butter in a 9 x 9-inch baking dish (I used a heart-shaped baking dish of a similar size). In a small bowl, mix sugar, flour, salt, and baking powder. Add milk to the dry ingredients and blend well. Pour batter over melted butter in pan. Add pie filling over the batter, dropping it by spoonfuls and evenly spacing it over the batter. Bake for 50 minutes to 1 hour or until golden brown.

The gift card winner is …

 Susan in North Carolina! Congratulations!

The winner of the tea-themed napkins is …

 Mary Boley, via the Tea With Friends Facebook page! Congratulations!

Valentine's Week Giveaway #3

Happy Valentine's Day, friends! The final tea-themed valentine I'm sharing this week is technically a "flash card" I found at an antique mall last month, so the back is blank, but I still think this is a cute design. 

And for our final giveaway this week, I'm offering a $25 Amazon gift card so that you can buy whatever gift you like! (Tea-themed gifts are encouraged but not required!) If you'd like to win, just leave an "Enter me" to this post between now and 7 a.m. EST tomorrow, February 15, and you'll be entered to win. Good luck!

The winner of the tea infuser is …

 Natosha! I've just sent her an email and will soon have this headed her way. Congratulations!

Valentine's Week Giveaway #2

This is another of the tea-themed vintage valentines I've found since last year, and it's one I've never even seen before. It reads, "If you'd be my valentine, we'd have 'barrels' of fun!"

On the back, someone has helpfully noted that this card from Susan L. dates to 1953. Sweet!

For today's giveaway, I've got some of the same cute paper napkins I picked up for myself at Michaels a few weeks back! Would you like to have these for your text tea party or picnic? Just leave an "Enter me" to this post between now and 7 a.m. EST on Friday, February 14, and you'll be entered to win!

Valentine's Week Giveaway #1

As longtime readers of this blog know, Valentine's Day is one of my favorite holidays, so I like to share some of my vintage valentines *and* host a few small giveaways each year around this time. Today, I'm sharing one of my newest vintage valentines, and while it's not dated, I suspect this ship-shaped valentine is one of the older ones in my collection, maybe from the thirties or forties. I love that the young man is serving this passenger her tea from a teapot with a heart on it! It reads, "My heart is anchored fast. It's yours, Dear Valentine."

Maybe this was a card given from one classmate to another since it reads To Birkley Bush frome (sic) Bruce Smith. I think the brad on the back is supposed to make some of the pieces on the front jiggle, but I'm trying to be careful with that to avoid tearing them.

And for today's giveaway, I'm offering a hot-pink heart-shaped silicone tea infuser! I think it's a cute piece of décor even if you don't decide to use it! To be entered in the giveaway, just leave an "Enter me" comment to this post between now and 7 a.m. EST on Wednesday, February 12, making sure I have a way to contact you if you're the winner, and you'll be entered to win. You can also enter on the Tea With Friends Facebook page here if you like. Good luck!

The Pagoda Blue Tea Set

I guess you could say that a funny thing happened on the way to Wormsloe. I'd already breezed in and out of six state park gift shops by that point, but as a popular tourist stop, Wormsloe has a magnificent visitor center and gift shop, and this blue transferware tea set immediately caught my eye. I loved the shape of the teapot and that tray best of all but figured they would be too pricy for me. A teacup, maybe? I picked up one and it said $31.99, which seemed a little much for a single teacup. Then I looked again and realized it said $131.99. For a teacup? Have they lost their minds? But then I realized that was the price for the whole set! I stood there and dickered over it and decided I would make up my mind as I toured Wormsloe. And you can see what I decided, especially after finding that blue teapot in the Wormsloe museum.

Blue-and-white tea wares never go out of style, and every Fourth of July, I wish I had more. Plus, I'm planning to write a cookbook about all the patriotic holidays, and every piece in this set could make an appearance next to one of the vintage recipes I'll be including. I loved the shape of this sugar and creamer.

The teapot lid was a real "wow" item for me.

And my favorite piece is the tray. The full set is too small to display on the little skirted table where I set it for this photo, so after Valentine's Day, it may end up on a sturdy table in my living room. It's the perfect memento of my visit to Wormsloe, but more important, it's also something that will be quite useful in my work in the years ahead. And when I got home, I looked online and found the set available at several sites but never for as good a price as I got. So I'm choosing to see this not as a splurge but as an investment! (And a beautiful one.)

Finding tea wares at Wormsloe

I was in college when I first visited Wormsloe, a famous historic site in Savannah. I remember this because our journalism advisor on the trip, Joe Cumming, who had served as Atlanta bureau chief of Newsweek, made us go. Joe loved history and thought we should too. And he laughed when I told him I liked the name because I imagined those worms were low. (I've apparently been taking words literally for a long, long time.) So I remembered that incident when my friend Tammy and I took a tram to the property on Saturday morning. The gate here is an iconic Savannah image.

So is the avenue of live oaks, which is simply a spectacular view. You can get a nice hike in while exploring the area as well.

We drove to the museum on the property, and the first thing that caught my eye was … a blue teapot! Now that's my kind of historic artifact.

Of course I had to snap photos of that as well as the tea information.

I'm very drawn to tabby for some reason, and the home Noble Jones built at Wormsloe in 1793 was made of tabby. Its tabby ruins are said to be the oldest standing structure in Savannah. And if you're not familiar with it, tabby is "a cement made of lime, sand or gravel, and oyster shells and used chiefly along the coast of Georgia and South Carolina in the 17th and 18th centuries," according to Merriam-Webster.

As I checked out this display in the museum, I was delighted to learn that portions of blue china have been found in the tabby.

And check out this handleless teacup and saucer! I wasn't expecting to find tea wares at the Wormsloe State Historic Site, but surprise, I did! On Friday, I'll share why that blue teapot at Wormsloe influenced my decision to buy a new tea set while I was there.

Finding tea on a hiking trip to Savannah!

My hiking pal Tammy, an old high school and college chum, is trying to hike every state park in Georgia and lacked some of the ones in the southernmost part of the state. So, I just got back from joining her for three days of hiking at eight parks and historic sites. We had a great time, and the scenery was amazing. Even more amazing? We had sunny skies and seventy- and eighty-degree temps every single day. Yay!

I was praying I would be able to keep up with her, and I did, so let’s all take a moment and thank the Lord for answered prayer, else I wouldn’t be here today.

After our first full day of hiking, we were quite hungry and headed to the Pirate’s House in downtown Savannah, a place I last visited when I was in college, so it’s been a minute. The Pirate’s House is located seven blocks from where General Oglethorpe landed in 1733 and is a legendary historic site in Georgia. It is said to have been a meeting spot for pirates, and the servers dress in pirate costumes, which the little kids just love.

For dinner, I had a pasta dish featuring shrimp and alligator sausage (which is delicious, by the way), and I was happy they served Arnold Palmers.

I certainly did not expect to find any tea stuff on this trip, so I was delighted to come across Pirate’s Rum flavored black tea in the Pirate’s House gift shop.

It contains black tea, pineapple pieces, calendula and sunflower and safflower petals, and natural flavors. I was expecting it to taste like a rum cake, but if there’s rum flavoring, it was very mild. I did taste a nice brisk black tea and the pineapple, so I was quite happy with my Pirate’s Rum tea. On Wednesday, I’ll be sharing another unexpected tea find at the oldest standing structure in Savannah!