THE GYPSY TEA & TAROT PARTY....A GREAT SUCCESS!

Finally, it was time for the party. After weeks of gathering goodies, some from me and many from a lot of lovely ladies on Etsy and Blogland, the baskets were made, the food was prepared and my studio was turned into...

...a Gypsy Tea Room!

It looked really magical and lovely. Daisy was exhausted after it was all put together. Rufus on the other hand, a typical male, was no where to be found.

I set each reader up in their own little corner for privacy. The tables looked great, I reused a lot of things I had made for our son Zach and Natasha's Alice In Wonderland Wedding Party, like the tableclothes, they gave everything a very whimsical feel.

We had lots of food, I am a big believer in more is better, you can always use it later but it is terrible if you run out. I came up with a new little goodie by mistake. I was making sweet turkey sausage tarts and they just did not look interesting enough so I put cranberry in the bottom, ground turkey with onion, and topped with turkey gravy. Voila! Turkey dinner in a tart.

We had some lovely Giveaways too. I wll thank everyone who contributed at the end of this post, but one lovely Etsy shop owner sent enough gorgeous earrings and phone charms with bags and Fairie Catchers to use in the Giveaways. I also had some nice red agate buddha necklaces, red agate pheonix pendants and spell candles with little pentagram charms I bought from the lovely Rosa of The Veil on Etsy and necklaces I made. Everyone loved their little giveaways. I had the guests write their names on the backs of their tickets which were quite large and fanned them out like a deck of cards while my lovely assistant, Natasha, picked the lucky recipients.

Everyone got a little gift when they left too. I ordered healing stones in their natural state ( Natasha said that was the purest way to have them work) and everyone got a healing stone in a little bag with the meaning on a thank you note and a card from DOGS RESCUE MATCH so hopefully people stop by for a visit and meet the pups.  And Brenda set up a lovely display for people to see the adopted babies and the ones still looking for forever families and volunteering information.  There will soon be a PayPal Button on the website so everyone can donate there too.  Every little bit helps.

The gift baskets turned out amazing. With the contributions from all of you lovely ladies, the great things Brenda brought and a nice basket our delightful Angel Card Reader, Allison, contributed, there were some incredible gifts. I had five witch themed baskets, one spa basket, two cooking baskets, which were actually together but the sweet lady who won them, Carol, donated one back.

We had two cute witch tins and the tickets for the witch baskets went into one and others went into the other tin so if you won you could choose the basket you wanted. Can you believe that my daughter-in-law, Natasha, who never wins anything, won 3 of the witch baskets. Of course the sweetie donated two back. For June we are doubling the amount of baskets because we will have more time to prepare and gather goodies.

Everything was absolutely wonderful with one little glitch. About an hour into the party, I plugged the kettle into the socket for tea, I already had a coffee maker in the other socket, and the power in the studio blew. I panicked because the same thing happened at the Wedding Party only it kept happening all night. My husband and son had just left with our granddaughter to visit my brother-in-law and I rushed to see if it was the breaker and it did not work. Being the good witch that I am I always have an abundance of candle. I grabbed everyone I had all over the house and lit the studio with candlelight. Thank goodness everyone was so understanding and it gave a mystical glow to the room. The wonderful readers, Brenda, Unity and Allison were able to start their readings until my husband came back, thank goodness he was not far yet. Problem was corrected, thanks honey, and the evening went off without a hitch.

• So, we had a wonderful evening, a very satisfying night for all. I spent yesterday in front of the fire doing nothing, I waited to post until today so I could do it justice and not be too tired. I have some thank yous now to some very wonderful people. First of all there are the wonderful readers who donated their time for such a good cause.
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• BRENDA WHO IS ALSO THE FOUNDER OF RESCUE DOGS MATCH.
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• UNITY J. SHMIDT AN INCREDIBLE TAROT READER.
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• AND ALLISON OUR BEAUTIFUL ANGEL CARD READER WHO WAS JUST DELIGHTFUL.
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•  Now for the beautiful ladies from Etsy and Blogland who sent such wonderful things for the Giveaways & Baskets.
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• ROSA FROM THE VEIL, LOVELY!
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• AUBREY FROM BRANDAVIR JEWELRY, AMAZING!
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• AUTUMN FROM AUTUMN DAMIANA, FABULOUS!
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• GINGER FROM ABERRANT AFFIxMENTS, DELIGHTFUL!
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• JESSICA FROM HANS MY HEDGEHOG, A TREASURE!
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• MANDI FROM LEIGHS WICCAN BOUTIQUE, A JOY!
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•  CHERIE FROM GREEN OWL CURIOSITIES, A HEART OF GOLD!
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• SUZANNE OF DRAGONS MOON, DARLING!
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• DONNA FROM TWINKLE TOES TUTU, MY SHOPPING BUDDY!
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• MINA, MY WICCAN SISTER IN HEART & SOUL!
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• And a very special thank you to my DARLING NATASHA MY DAUGHTER-IN-LAW FROM CLOSET OF AN ECLECTIC GYPSY  your help on the night was incredible.
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•  We met a lot of lovely people and some great ladies who are interested in helping the Rescue. It is all for the pups and that makes my heart full.
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• And we raised a total of $815.00.  I think that is pretty amazing for our first time.
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•  Thank you all so much, this was a group effort and I truly could not have done it without all of you and my patient husband and my furry babies Luca, Stella, Layla, Rufus and Daisy who did not get all of my attention for a few weeks but they will get lots of love and hugs now.

As you can see, we all just sat by the fire yesterday and enjoyed the day. We are already preparing for June but right now all that is on my mind is............HALLOWEEN!