A 'Victorian Grace' Afternoon for Erin

Ken's sister, Lois, is his closest in age of his 9 siblings and it turned out that her children were the closest of the cousins in age to Kyle and Trevor. As a result, there's always been a special bond between our families.

Here's Lois with daughter, Erin.

With no little princesses in my all-male family, Erin has always been extra special to me and so I'm probably a close second to Lois in being excited about all the festivities going on right now for the bride-to-be.

Erin is such a joy, especially at parties...always bubbly and full of genuine excitement.

It's tradition in the Frericks family that the godparent do a shower for the bride. Since Erin's godmother, Melissa lives on the east coast, I volunteered to host the shower along with Melissa's Mom, Ken's sister Mary.

Mary actually was the first to suggest we host the party at Victorian Grace.

Since this was the home of my Uncle Elmer Genenbacher and now owned by his grandson Ted and wife Sarah, I had thought about this venue but immediately dismissed because of the original guest list of over 40 people and I thought Sarah only held parties for no more than about 12 at a time. As it turned out Sarah was able to handle more people and Erin was able to pare down the guest list a bit,

... which resulted in a wonderful afternoon tea party for 20 guests.

We started with a summer slush, that was a blend of pineapple, banana and orange, just perfect for a hot summer day.

Sarah then served a chocolate creme brulee topped with a really artistic white chocolate sculpture coming out of the brulee. She added a homemade berry pastry as a side. She had coffee and a variety of hot and cold teas. Everyone having a hot drink could pick from the collection of beautiful china teacups in one of Sarah's china cabinets.

One unique part of a visit to Victorian Grace, is Sarah's telling the story of the house. The house, built in 1876, has a long history of love stories, tragic deaths and hauntings. Click here for the full details.

We were also offer a tour of the home.

The Victorian decor throughout was beautifully organized. The comment I heard most often though was how could someone with three sons keep a house so absolutely neat and spotless! Obviously, lots of Mom's in the group!

The finale for the afternoon was gift opening.

My gift to Erin was actually picked out with the help of Uncle Kenny. He loves cooking with cast iron skillets and it was the first thing that caught his attention in the bridal registry.

One of the most special gifts, of course, and very fitting with the Victorian theme, was the handmade doilies from Grandma Frericks.

Well, Erin's showers are now past but only 7 weeks to the wedding. In the word's of Erin...

'I'm getting really excited!"

Hugs, C