Mad Hatter Tea Party - Part 1

It was my turn to host our monthly ladies social for our neighborhood. Every month, the hostess gets to pick a theme or activity. I chose to have a Mad Hatter Tea Party. (I didn't even realize that "Alice" was coming out this month but it was perfect timing!)

The only requirement for the ladies was to wear a hat. Any hat would do. I wanted to have a few extras on hand just in case some one forgot theirs.

So I brought out my vintage hat boxes, full of vintage hats. Of course I had to have an extra special one for me since I was going to be the Mad Hatter.
I thought this one was a little quirky, but it didn't look as "special" as I wanted.

I thought this one would be funny with all the little dingle balls on it. But, believe it or not, it wasn't as silly as I thought it would be. It was really cute on, but not "mad."

I started looking for a black, top hat at antique store, but the few that I found were $175 and up!! Then a friend and I found a beige hat in one of my favorite stores and it was only $35.00, and then the owner lowered it to $27.00 out the door. Wooo Hoo!

It's all custom/hand made. The photo isn't that great, but those are hand done stitches around the top there. The hat's a little beat up, but I think it just added to the "mad" look.

I didn't want to leave the band black as this looked a little manly to me. So I added a soft pink band and finished it in the back with vintage shabby pink roses.

I didn't remove the black band because I wanted to keep it original. I just hot glued the band to itself and pinned the roses on. It looks way cuter in person than in the sad photo (I was losing sun light fast).

And here are my hats, just before the party. Every one who came did wear a hat except for one gal who picked the blue hat. It's SO cute on! It reminds me of the hats the girls from Pride and Prejudice wore. More on the party on the next post.

Blessings,

Patricia :o)