Tea Party Central

Probably you already noticed that lately I’ve been having a whole lot of parties and that’s because lots of people are asking me to bring my Missy Barrett Tea Parties to them, and so me and my we do that.

Last week, the week started with a fantastically fun tea party for the 4th Quartermaster, Company “A” Battalion service members that were stationed in Germany between 1957 and 1960.  You might think that they wouldn’t want a tea party, but they did so we brought them a superly fun Missy Barrett Tea Party and I made all kinds of homemade stuff for them to take home like I make for all my tea parties, and the Sevierville Chamber of Commerce, they put together a really great package of attractions and sights to see while they were here and for when they come back to visit again.  Here’s a picture of some of the people as they were getting settled in the tea party area, waiting for the tea party to begin.

After I took this picture, my camera broke for good and forever, so I don’t have any other pictures from this event.  But you can already see that people there were a lot of people coming to the party, and there were even more that showed up after my camera stopped taking pictures.

Then on Wednesday, we went to Knoxville with author Thomas D. Taylor, and we had another Missy Barrett Tea Party.  This one was a English Garden Tea Party so it was a little more fancy.  Thomas read part of his one book called “Life Is A Journey” and then part of another book  of his called “Ghostly Quintet.”  My mom played songs everybody knew so everybody was singing “You Are My Sunshine” and “Bicycle Made For Two” and songs that my brothers , Aaron and Josh, call campfire songs.  I told some funny stories about my Grandpa Two Rivers, and we then we had a draw for some prizes.  When all of that was happening, everybody was enjoying tea and sweet treats.  It was so much fun.

The handmade surprise was something I thought would be perfect for people to use over and over again.  It was a tea pouch that also doubles as a coaster so tables don’t get marked up when you’re having something to drink and you have to sometimes put the drink down between sips.  I made cross-stitched roses for those, and then sewed them on green felt.  I made a lot of them, and when we left, there were zero zip ones to bring back home so that’s a very good sign that I had a great idea to make those for this tea party.

Then on Friday, there was another tea party and that one was the Missy Barrett Stars and Stripes Tea Party because it was between Memorial Day and Independence Day, and the day after Flag Day (and that’s on June 14 every single year).  This party had more kids than grown-ups at it but there were still lots of grown-ups so you know that means there were way lots of kids, too.  I was so excited to see so many people brought their patriotic selves to the party and worse patriotic colors and some even had stars and stripes on them.

The donuts at Courthouse Donuts were delicious, and everybody got to choose the special toppings they wanted on top of their donuts.  This is just one more reason that Ms. Dyer and Courthouse Donuts won a Missy Barrett Seal of Awesomeness Award in January this year.  Anyway, the take home surprises I made for this party were little notebooks I painted up and decorated patriotic, and at the end of the party there wasn’t even one single book left for me to take back home so that made me superly happy.

Also at this party, we learned a whole lot about how come the flag looks the way it does, and how Betsy Ross told George Washington she wasn’t going to put six-sided stars on the flag, and how she showed the committee how to make five-sided stars super fast and easy just by folding paper a special way and then cutting it with two snips, and other important stuff.  I never knew before that Betsy Ross got told to just make the flag the way she wanted to make it but to kind of stick to the idea of stars and stripes and that.

This week, recording artist and author Artie Q is in Sevierville and Pigeon Forge and Gatlinburg.  If you don’t have a copy yet, you need to download “Artie Q’s Guide To Moving in LA” from Amazon or Audibles or iTunes.  Also, you can buy his music on Amazon and on CD Baby.

So my next blog entry is going to be all about meeting Artie Q and what happened, and maybe there’s going to be a way enough time to do a small interview for my blog.  That would be superly fun I think.

P.S.  All pictures after the first tea party were taken with a camera I’m borrowing right now.  I’m looking for a excellent camera to replace my broken Fuji Fine Pix S 1500 that was majorly old but about the best camera ever.

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Winning With Laughter

There are lots of ways to win at life.  Sometimes it’s the unexpected things in life that make you win.  Things like knowing when to let other people bring the win right to you.  Probably you’re wondering what I’m talking about.  I’m talking about how every time I see a new Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre show, I go home feeling like a winner because of how entertaining their shows are.  Just like their website says, it’s hilarious entertainment in the Smokies.

This review is about “The Biggest Little Show On Earth” and just like the poster says, it’s LIVE-ON-STAGE.  I don’t know why they had to put that on the poster because it would be silly to have the show not on stage and even sillier if it wasn’t live and the audience had to imagine a show was going on.  But it probably makes sense to other people, so I’m just going to say it’s a very good thing “The Biggest Little Show On Earth” is LIVE-ON-STAGE and even better that it’s a Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre show.

This show has some new (to me anyway) people alongside Christopher L. Sullivan, Chris MacPherson, and Stephanie Butters, and they’re Emma Lesniewski and Tim Coleman.  My brother Aaron says that Tim is a repeat comic offender so I think that means he’s been a Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre cast member from before and now he’s back.  That’s great because he’s superly hilarious just like the rest of the cast!  Everyone is so fantastic, and all the skits are side-splitting fall-down funny.  Emma is a brand new cast member and she’s superly hilarious, too.

I don’t want to give too much away in this review but I can tell you this:  There’s the very popular sing-a-long everyone loves (and we would all be sad if it got cut from any of the Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre shows), and there’s Ollie the Clown (it just wouldn’t be a Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre show if Ollie the Clown wasn’t part of the show).

One of the skits I really enjoyed a whole lot was the one-man show by Chris MacPherson.  It’s not the costume changes that makes the audience think he’s a bunch of different actors, it’s his acting and plus the faces he makes.  This is where he does a excellent job of being Dr. Frankenstein, Igor, a lady that works with him, and a surprise I can’t tell you because maybe that would wreck this bit for you.  Also, he plays himself, so that’s 5 different people all at the same time and you feel like it’s five different people, so just that part all by itself is a 5-star performance (one for each personality).  Yes, it really is that excellent of a piece.

There’s musical comedy from Christopher L. Sullivan and Stephanie Butters and Emma Lesniewski (that name is just crazy hard for me to remember how to spell right so everybody needs to learn how to say it right and spell it right so Emma doesn’t think people don’t like her because totally we love her).

There’s old-timey songs from Cole Porter (that’s what my one grandpa told me and he should know because he watched all the old-timey movies with song-and-dance men in them) and dancing that goes with those old-timey songs from Cole Porter.  I think I almost knew one of those songs they sang but I couldn’t remember all the words.  Maybe I was just remembering the old-timey fancy suits and top hats.

I laughed really hard when the school teacher character kept coming out on stage.  I was kind of scared but also kind of laughing too hard to not be scared.  I just hope that school teacher never substitute teaches at my school next year … or maybe ever.  But it would be okay if she substitute taught at my brother Josh’s high school because then it would be superly funny.

Also, there’s the “World Famous Classical Paper Dance” and if you never saw that before, I can tell you that even if you watch it with your hands in front of your face like my one grandma does, you’re still going to laugh really, really hard.

This show has a new announcing voice.  I’m used to hearing the lady with the beautiful accent announce skits and players, but this time it was this guy making the announcements.

I don’t know his name, but he sure looks like he belongs at Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre because his smile says he likes to laugh a whole lot, and that’s what Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre shows are all about:  Making people laugh a whole lot.

I rate this show a 35-star review.  That’s a 5-star for everyone in the cast, and bonus stars.  This is how it works out.

* 5 stars for all 5 of the cast members (25 stars)
* 5 bonus stars for the Frankenstein bit by Chris MacPherson
* 1 bonus star for the man selling tickets at the window
* 1 bonus star for the man selling popcorn
* 1 bonus star for the best popcorn ever
* 1 bonus star for the sound guy
* 1 bonus star for the announcing guy

And here’s the collage of pictures I put together for this show so you can get a idea of how much fun and how hilarious “The Biggest Little Show On Earth” is.  Probably you need to go online right now and get your tickets for the next show, so check out the link just below the collage.

Because there’s two shows happening at the Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre and plus the Jessica Jane Magic, Comedy, and Variety Show, just CLICK HERE to see the schedule so you get to see the show you want to go see.

In a couple more weeks, I’m going to write another review, and that’s going to be for “Lady Fanny’s Nitwit Revue” also playing at the Sweet Fanny Adams Theatre in Gatlinburg.