all the tea you can drink. and then some

seven got ahold of me during the week to give me a heads-up that she was coming home for the weekend - a quick visit to see her folks and friends, and a little getaway from the grind.

of course, her "grind" involves santa barbara, the beach, and much nicer weather than ours, but whatever, i'm not jealous. hmph.

anyway, i'd suggested that we do tea - we girls sure do love our tea time. to make it easy, i made reservations at an old standby - four seasons tea room in sierra madre. we've been here quite a few times, and the food is always really good and reasonably priced (for tea service, anyway).

seven and the teen have a special bond. when the teen was a wee little baby, seven was around quite a lot to help take care of her at my grandma's house while i worked hard for the money.

4S doesn't have high chairs. we learned this during our last visit - which was quite a while ago, now that i think about it. when i called to reserve, i confirmed that this was still the case (it was), and so i got the tie chair accessory from the grandparents'. baby bondage. sweet.

the menu and place settings don't change much during the year. see what i mean? reliable and predictable. that's a good thing.

as we poured our tea (holiday berry - seems out of place for summer, but then again, we were drinking hot ass tea in july), i handed the bean a sugar cube to watch her reaction.

she was amused by it for about 3.25 seconds, and then she put the soggy cube down on the table and forgot all about it as our sandwiches arrived.

i asked for some ice water, and the server came over with this stuff. it looked pretty, but damn - it tasted like ass. flowery, decorative ass water.

as we chatted away and munched, we noticed that the two servers were incredibly...conscious of how many times we poured our tea. it seemed like they were coming over to check if we needed more every five freaking minutes. at first, it was comical, but after about the third or fourth time of scurrying over, lifting the lid, and dashing away, it just got old. i know they were trying to be attentive, but come on - back up off my nuts, ladies. we had plenty of effing tea.

it didn't take long for us to demolish those sandwiches, and then all that was left was the giant, heart-shaped strawberries. i handed one to the bean, who wrinkled her nose and dropped it right back on the table.

she pointed and said "flower!" - well, she said her version of it. i knew what she was saying. she twirled it around between her hands, smelled it, and then that was that.

yeah, her attention span is similar to that of a gnat. but hey - she's a toddler. what do you expect?

my favorite part - piping hot, fresh scones. these are served with the traditional devonshire cream and preserves, and i shared mine with the bean, who at first recoiled and said "hot!" but her curiosity soon overtook her and she leaned in to take a bite. and another one. and another one. heh.

by the time the dessert tray arrived, we were spent. the bean did partake in the shortbread cookie - maybe 1.5 - and the rest we boxed up and sent home with seven. i knew brother seven would dig it - that boy eats everything.

somehow, the teen managed to jam her finger on something. i don't even remember what she did, but we did giggle a bit at the thought of her going out for a sport. i mean, come on - the girl gets hurt having TEA.

as the server brought our check, i handed her the point-and-shoot and got her to snap a quick photo. after all, we need to keep "operation get seven on blog as much as possible" alive.

there's always time for a photo op. besides, i think seven likes having her picture taken almost as much (if not more) than i do. of course, the teen wiggled her way into the shot, too. would you expect anything less of my girl?

as we walked back to the car, we admired seven's cute sandals and bright orange toes. "i got these in the homeland," she said. "soooo they were, what, about $.50?" i joked.

heh. i wasn't far off, apparently.

the bean, happy to be free to roam around, toddled in front of us and took some time to stop and smell...the foliage.

after stopping for yet another free slurpee at 7-11, we dropped seven off at home and then headed back to BFF's, where the teen was disgruntled to find that she was asleep. gah, that meant she had to come home and be boooooorrrrrrrred. horrors!

she kicked it at home with us until BFF called her a couple of hours later, and to her relief, she was invited to come back over and have another sleepover. i dropped her off, stopped at mcdonald's to grab a quickie dinner, and by the time i got back home, the bean was fast asleep.

and stayed that way until 7:00 the very next day. it was a nice, quiet evening for me, and i ate junk food and watched "16 and pregnant" to my heart's content. does it get any better??