Decora-TEA (Part Two)

The tea room, located on the first floor of my home, is of course decorated with tea pots, tea cups, tea frames, tea collections and on and on, several of which have already been posted on our blog. As was shown earlier, our garden also features whimsical tea related objects. I love looking out my kitchen window to see the tea pot and cup planter set (a Big Lots find a few years ago) and the tea pot wind chime (from an Arts & Craft show). But today, let's take a look in a corner of my private world! Amazingly, decorating with tea has managed to work it's way upstairs! This is a corner of my living room, and if you look closer....
you'll notice two antique tea chests. The larger chest, labeled Choicest Hoo Chow, Gunpowder Tea, Produced in China, 80 lbs. net. was spotted in an antique mall by my mother while on a Rosemary House Traveling Bus Seminar. Since the bus was full of herb enthusiasts and their luggage headed to herb farms and gardens which sell plants and other fun herbal souvenirs, she felt she couldn't purchase it as any available space on the bus should be reserved for our travelers souvenirs. But, when she returned home, she promptly asked if I would return to WV and buy that tea chest. One Saturday afternoon, a friend and I headed back to Berkeley Springs, WV and tracked down the tea box she so anxiously wanted. I'm glad I did, as I now enjoy the chest as much as she did!

The little Tulip box is also a wooden tea chest, however, this is from Japan. The writing on the box reads Choice young leaf, pan fried, 20 lbs. It was in my mother's collection, and now resides in my home. It is loaded with smaller tea tins, boxes, and other tea stuff that just hasn't found the perfect location to be displayed providing even more opportunity to decorate with tea, all throughout the house!