Our Japanese Tea Party -- Exploring Japan with Tea Parties Around the World

Disclosure: Tuttle Publishing gave me copy of this book free of charge for this review. All opinions in my review are my own and I did not receive any other compensation. As in all my reviews I am providing links for your ease, but receive no compensation.


So last month our plan was to have a Japanese tea party for Tea Parties Around the World, but life interfered and our tea party happened in May instead, but this is perfect since it is Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month. So through April and into May we have been exploring Japan. Now Japan is known for its tea ceremony. It sounds so fancy and has an interesting history. To learn more about the tea ceremony we read Tea Ceremony by Shozo Sato. 


This book covers everything from a brief history of tea and the types of tea in Japan to the history of the tea ceremony itself. It also gives steps on how to have a tea ceremony at home. We did not try this because I am a bit intimidated by the tea ceremony and I do not feel like we have the right space for it. I had hoped to find a local place that offers them, but I couldn't. The process of the making the tea is a huge part of the Japanese tea ceremony. It is about finding peace and harmony with one's guests. In Japan how the food and drink look is as important if not more important than how it tastes, so presentation is a huge thing in the ceremony. There are different supplies and displays for a traditional tea ceremony.

The book goes into the various utensils and types of them often used in the tea ceremony. There are also various steps to the ceremony with various spaces of each one. There are also various steps to making the actual tea. This book gives beautiful photograph tutorials to them. 
It is a fun book to learn about this amazing tradition. It provides kids with what they need to know to try their own. 

To learn more about Japan we checked out some DVDs from the library and of course turned to our favorite resource All About Japan.  Unfortunately I can't seem to find the photos I took of our DVDs. We took the ones above as well as some folktale ones. We love to get the culture of the country through stories. In the past we have had the pleasure of reviewing The Last Kappa of Old Japan, The Peace Tree from Hiroshima, Once Upon a Time in Japan, Japanese Children's Favorite Stories and Yuko-Chan and the Daruma Doll

Plus another favorite resource for us is The Magic Tree House series.

Now we know a bit about Japan and its culture so we will tell you about our tea party and our Japanese craft. For our tea party we went to David's Tea and asked our friend there for a good Japanese tea. He sold us Sencha Ashikubo.

He gave me the warning of not steeping too much because it will get a very grassy taste. It was too grassy for us, but we tried it. I used our Chinese tea cups and a tea pot I felt looked a bit Japanese. (It was a gift, so I do not know the history of it.)

We also found some instant Japanese soups to try. Since we were a bit busy we did not try to make anything from scratch this time.


We put a little of each soup into our regular tea cups so we could each try it. We liked the udon soup better than the miso.


To go with our tea party I wanted to do a craft. We found a fun craft making kokeshi dolls in this book.

 They are usually simple wooden dolls.  
Kokeshijapan
Kokeshi By Kimivanil (Own work) [CC BY-SA 4.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Ours are made from origami paper (ours is from Tuttle Publishing), a toilet paper roll and a ping pong ball. I made one but Hazel has not gotten around to making hers yet.

Hazel loves how mine came out though. What do you think? Now I also have sewn a kimono for Hazel's 18-inch dolls. 


So that is our exploration of Japan with a Japanese tea party. This post is part of the Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month Blog Series and Giveaway!!

Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month Blog Hop 2017 | Multicultural Kid Blogs 

 Welcome to our fourth annual Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month Blog Series and Giveaway! Follow along all month for ideas about sharing with kids the rich cultures of this vast and varied region. Also, be sure to enter the giveaway below and link up your posts at the bottom of the page. For even more ideas, visit our blog hops from last year, 2015 and 2014. You can also follow our Asia and Australia & Oceania boards on Pinterest.
May 12 Kori at Home

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1 comment:

  1. What a fun way to learn about Japan! I love the idea of exploring geography with tea parties around the world. #CreativeKidsCulture
    http://www.multiculturalmotherhood.com/2017/06/bilingual-language-activity-finger.html?m=1

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