"Crazy Ladies In Hats"

That's the name of the tea room in League City where my friend A invited me for lunch today, to celebrate my birthday. The ladies who work there don't wear hats, but they do wear rhinestone tiaras, so it makes me wonder why they didn't call the tea room "Crazy Ladies in Tiaras."

They do have a nice menu...... salads and sandwiches and soups and dips, and homemade desserts made by the grandmother of one of the Crazy Ladies. Absolutely the best, best cakes... and you can see and taste that they're all homemade. So we splurged on dessert.... lemon cake for A, carrot cake for me.

A went overboard in the birthday shopping.... a box from Williams-Sonoma filled with those great red spatulas with wooden handles, quick-bread mixes for my bread machine, a new type of measuring cup that lets you see the measurement from the top rather than the side (and it holds 4 cups), and Valentine dish towels. Then there was a pretty shopping bag filled with notecards, stickers, a pretty pen, a little book about cats, my favorite brand of Sweet Orange tea, purple doilies crocheted by her mother, and I know I'm forgetting a couple of things.

We took our time with lunch and talked for two hours, just catching up with day-to-day stuff. The tea room closes at 3:00 and we left there just as they were getting ready to lock the door.
Next time we go in there, I'll have to ask them why they named the restaurant "Crazy Ladies in Hats."