Alice in Wonderland tea party for New Beginnings

Today I'm sharing the Alice in Wonderland tea party 
we did for our Young Women New Beginnings. 


New Beginnings is a celebration and introduction 
of the Young Women program in our church.  


Here are the invitations I whipped up in Pic Monkey.


Right inside the door was this table with the programs.


I also did the programs in Pic Monkey.  
I mounted them on black and white harlequin paper.
I cut some keys out with my silhouette and tied them to the programs 
with different colors of ribbon.  


Here is our New Beginnings in Wonderland!
(Please excuse the funky coloring in these pics.  A church gym has terrible lighting.)


We held the activity in our gym.  
We used small classroom tables, the (lovely) red velvet chairs from 
the Relief Society room and various fake plants from around the church.  
Who knew all of this "decor" that was readily available at the church 
would support the crazy, mismatched, tea party look we were shooting for?!?


At each small table, we used various colored table cloths and other decorative items 
like white roses that had been painted red with craft paint, 
ceramic bunnies, glittery hearts, tea pots, etc.


For the backdrop where the girls did their skit, we hung a black and white table cloth.  
We also had some nylon butterflies that we found at Goodwill.


The flamingo croquet mallet's were something I was super excited about!!  


They were pretty simple to make.
supplies for 6 mallets:  3 - 1 inch by 4ft dowels, 1 - 3inch by 4 ft dowel (which I had cut into 6 inch pieces), saw and miter box, drill, spade drill bit, sander, wood glue, hammer, paint.

I cut each dowel in half to make 2 ft dowels.  Then I sanded the entire thing paying special attention to the tip of the dowel to make it slightly pointed.  I drilled a hole into the 3 inch dowel with a 3/4 inch spade drill bit.  It was slightly smaller than the dowel, that's why I sanded the tip of the 1 in dowel.  I added some wood glue to the hole and put the dowel into it.  Then I tapped the dowel into the drilled hole with a hammer.  


After I let the mallets sit overnight for the glue to dry, I painted the handles and one side of the  mallet head hot pink.  Then I painted the other side black with a white stripe where the 2 colors meet.  Then I hot glued some googly eyes to the mallet, making them look like flamingos. 


We had a candy bar, with each of the values represented, as take home treats. 
Faith:  hershey kisses
Divine Nature:  butterfly rings
Individual Worth:  red jelly hearts
Knowledge:  smarties
Choice and Accountability:  blow pops
Good Works:  bubbles
Integrity:  chocolate hearts with purple wrapping
Virtue:  rolos


The food table was so much fun! 
One of my co-leaders did a backdrop of a black and white table cloth to cover the carpeted walls.  
Then covered the tables with mismatched tablecloths.   
We served cupcakes, eclairs, veggie cups, and cheese & crackers.  


We used mismatched china as serving dishes.



We served lemonade in mismatched tea cups. 


I made this desert tower from tea pots and plates, stacked on one 
another and hot glued together.  
(Hot glue is not permanent, we only did this to hold the pieces temporarily. Another glue, like E6000 or an epoxy would work better if you wanted a permanent hold.)  


One of our cute Young Women made these darling red velvet cupcakes 
with heart playing card decorations.  


 Here is my daughter as the white rabbit. 

The laurel president wrote the skit.  

Edited to add:  I found a copy of the skit that is incomplete, but it could
 give you an idea of what we did.


Each of the YW were dressed as Alice in Wonderland characters, and had a 
part that talked about the YW program and/or personal progress.  
It was so darling!!   



Here is the cast of characters and the leaders.  
I know it looks funny with all of their faces blurred (privacy issues), 
I just wanted to show the cute costume ideas that the girls came up with.  

It was such a fun night!  I love working with the YW in our ward!