ON A SUNNY AFTERNOON last July, about two dozen girls (and one boy), their mothers, and a couple of big dogs, gathered on the sloping lawn outside the Chatham cottage of Rachel Nickerson Luna, autho of the Eel Grass Girls book series. Each young guest had her picutre snapped as she arrived, outdoors games were played, berries and bird feathers were gathered in a scavenger hunt...and then it was time for tea. In true Alice in Wonderland fashion, wonderful things seemed to magically appear in the tree-shaded yard, tables for four or six, each with bunches of wildflowers,
mismatched china, and cloth napkins, platters of scones, and tiny cucumber sandwiches, and , of course, pots of tea and plenty of milk to temper the “adultness” of the beverage.
“When it is tea time. all that really matters is that you stop and enter this enchanted moment”, says Heather Smith Labbe, who orchestrated the Eel Grass Girls affair with Luna, a dear friend since childhood. Growing up, the two were among a group of girls who helped out at church functions, pouring tea and apassing cookies. Once, actress Shirley Booth showed up. Reverned Carlyle Smith, Heather’s father, was minister of Chatham’s Congregational Church in the 1950s and 1960s, and because of his prominent position in the community, his children learned proper manners at a young age. “Parishioners often took my family out to dinner,” recalls Labbe, emphasizing how important the children’s dining etiquette was in such instances.
Today, Labbe has made tea parties an adjunct to her career as an artist. After years of catering the functions for adults and children, for special occasions or just for fun, in her own 1840s house or elsewhere, Labbe and her husband will open their first teahouse, The Chipper Merchant in Limerick, Maine, this spring. “As soon as all this snow melts,” Labbe sad in early March. But she will still take her show on the road and plans to spen time in Chatham, with freidns and family, again this summer. Her hometown holds great memories for Labbe, who is also an accomplished floral designer. Looking back, she says one of her fondest times were the years she had legendary Cape potter Harry Holl as her art teacher, both in public school and at the Cape Cod Conservatory of Art.
Even though Labbe has mastered the art of the tea party and is an expert in etiquette, she doesn’t take it all too seriously. “No one really has to instruct you as to how to have a tea party,” she says, “You just seem to know that you must.”
Janice Randall Rohlf
Infused with fun
2007 Outdoor Entertaining
Cape Cod Life Publications
Clipper Merchant Tea House 58 Main Street Limerick, Maine 04048 207.793.3500
