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Snow White's wishing well, dwarves, single slippers and a carriage fit for a princess (or 60) decorated the lawn Sunday of the Oliver House Museum in Jackson for the second annual Dolly and Me Princess Tea Party.

The event was hosted by the Jackson Heritage Association and attended by at least 65 people.

"We expect at least some walk-ins," said Jackson Heritage Association president Barbie Stroder.

Stroder said she and board member Julie Kuehle came up with the idea for the event last year to expand on their success with the annual Halloween party at the Oliver House.

"We wanted a spring event and came up with this," Stroder said.

Attendees got to bring their dolls and dress up princess-style for an afternoon, Stroder said.

Stroder, dressed in a swirling purple cape and carrying a jeweled scepter, said the Oliver House gardens were perfect for the girls to get their pictures taken, especially since some flowers were blooming and the sun was out amid gusty winds.

Sunday's wind prompted a move inside for the tea party itself, Stroder said, but the other events, including a princess dance party and scavenger hunt, remained outdoors.

Halle Hoover, 5, said she came last year, but she didn't bring her doll this time.

Hoover said her favorite part last year was Belle, or meeting the princesses. She said she was excited about this year, too.

Each girl attending could fill out a "princess card," with her name and her doll's name, her interests and favorite princess. The grand outdoor staircase at the Oliver House served as the walkway for each "princess" to make her grand entry as the announcer read each card aloud.

"We're excited about our events coming up this year," Kuehle said, and added she was glad to see so many people at the tea party.

Attendees also could make crafts upstairs, Kuehle said, including making paper flowers or decorating a tote bag.

Sarah Higgins, 8, said she decided she and her doll should have matching hairstyles -- twin braids down each side of their faces. Higgins also wore a purple tiara and white dress.

Higgins said she was looking forward to the games, and also the food.

Jaden Davis and Ariel Barr, both 9, said they were excited about the afternoon. Davis said her American Girl doll, whom she named Lilly, borrowed her pink flower barrette for the party.

Barr's doll, Alex, wore a tiny tiara in her blonde hair.

Each table was set with glass plates and cups for the girls and tiny plastic teacups for the dolls, Stroder said.

Barr said she was excited about the food. Cupcakes and cookies in the middle of the tables disappeared quickly.

Davis said she most was looking forward to the princess dance party.

"I like to twirl," she said, adding she checks every dress or skirt she tries on in the store to ensure it twirls right.

Davis and Barr said they know each other from dance classes, church, Girl Scouts -- "everywhere," Davis said.

"Almost," Barr said.

"I've always been into princesses," Davis said, and she hopes she always will be.

Proceeds from the event went toward the Oliver House Museum.

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Little princesses turn out for tea party at museum - Southeast Missourian

Onalaska, WI (WXOW) -

More than 400 families participated in the 3rd Annual Mad Hatter Tea Party on Sunday at Valley View Mall in Onalaska.

The party adds a twist to classic Easter Bunny pictures.

Kids did crafts, coloredAlice in Wonderlandthemed pages, and took pictures with characters from the book.

Local titleholders in the Miss America Organization also took part in the tea party.

Laurie Cafe, marketing director at Valley View Mall, said the Mad Hatter Tea Party had a bigger turnout than ever this year.She said theAlice in Wonderlandtheme offers opportunities to grow.

"There's so many elements within that story line that let us unfold into a different theme every year that it's just so easy to build upon," said Cafe.

Cafe said the event is designed for the community to offer families a place to spend time together.

Valley View Mall holds similar events throughout the year, giving families a place to go no matter what the weather conditions.

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Mad Hatter Tea Party brings storybook to life - WXOW.com

Judge Neil Gorsuch

Senate Republicans voted to end the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees Thursday after Democrats refused to advance the nomination of Judge Neil Gorsuch to a final vote, a move grassroots conservatives say had to happen out of respect for the Constitution.

Republicans cited the precedent of Democrats from November 2013, when then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid led a rules change to kill the filibuster for lower-court judicial nominees and executive branch personnel requiring confirmation.

The move came after a 55-45 vote to end debate on Gorsuch, five votes short of the 60 votes needed. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell then moved to consider the Gorsuch nomination under the rule change instituted by Democrats. His motion was denied, but McConnell then appealed the ruling of the chair, and the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees was killed in a party-line vote.

While Democrats call the move an attack on democracy, Tea Party Patriots founder Jenny Beth Martin told WND and Radio America its the Democrats who took an extreme position with their filibuster.

When it comes to Supreme Court nominees, never in the history of our entire country have we had a partisan filibuster of a Supreme Court nominee. It just hasnt been done. What the Democrats are doing right now is breaking the tradition and the practice that weve had in this country for over 200 years, said Martin, whose group has been aligned with the Judicial Crisis Network in pushing for the confirmation of Gorsuch.

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The Tea Party Patriots isbest known for advocating smaller government and lower taxes, but Martin said the Supreme Court fight is very much in her organizations interest.

We understand it is critically important that if we want to have constitutionally limited government, then we have to have a Supreme Court that upholds the law and judges laws based on the Constitution, Martin said.

Listen to the WND/Radio America interview withTea Party Patriots founder Jenny Beth Martin:

She is convinced the Democrats dont really have a case against Gorsuch but are still bitter over 2016.

They are just frustrated that its not their person, that they lost the election in November, that it is President Trump who won the election and, therefore, won the ability to nominate Judge Gorsuch, Martin said. They are doing all they can to resist what President Trump was elected to do.

What do YOU think? Sound off in todays WND poll on Senate confirmation of Gorsuch to Supreme Court.

Martin said the public is engaged on this issue and overwhelmingly in support of Gorsuch, but she said Democrats arent listening to all of their constituents.

Democrat senators are listening to their base. Theyre not listening to the whole of the American people, but they are listening to their base, Martin said. So they are doing what they think their base wants them to do.

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She believes the effort to filibuster Gorsuch will backfire on red-state Democrats like Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., in 2018.

She has said that this would be a very political maneuver if they filibustered Gorsuch. Thats what shes doing, and shes doing it out of pure politics, not out of whats best for the country, Martin said.

I know that it is a political job and they are going to look at things through the prism of politics, she said. Sometimes you need to do whats best for the country because you have taken an oath to uphold the Constitution.

And Martin is firmly convinced fidelity to the Constitution will be a hallmark of Gorsuchs time on the Supreme Court.

He looks at the law, and he respects the law as its written, she said. He doesnt intend to make law and create law out of whole cloth from the bench with his decisions, and he is going to look at the law through the prism of the Constitution.

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Tea party cheers GOP nuking of 'partisan' Gorsuch filibuster - WND.com

Fri, Apr 7, 2017 at 1:22 am CST

House budget night typically doesnt get fun until the liquor emerges and the ghost of legislatures past comes out from Sam Rayburns old inkwell, but a few things happened during the daylight part of the session that bear some mention.

First, state Representative Abel Herreros successful bid, early in the day, to bar the use of state funds for private school tuition, which passed 103 to 44. The practical meaning of the amendment is negligible, but it sends the strongest message so far this session that Lieutenant Governor Dan Patricks school choice initiatives are dead. Importantly Republicans care about this stuff more members of the House GOP caucus voted for the amendment than voted against it, so no one can say this was simply the work of House Speaker Joe Straus and his Democratic cronies.

In the history of Herreros amendment, it is possible to discern a second message. Herrero offered a similar anti-voucher proposal during the debate on the House budget in 2013, where its passage was seen a somewhat surprising declaration of the Houses true feelings about vouchers an unlikely victory from the Democratic minority that passed 103 to 43. And one that put Republicans in a tough spot.

On House budget night in 2015, he intended to offer the same amendment. But a protracted series of behind-the-scenes negotiations prompted Herrero to pull it down. The word was that, though vouchers had no chance in the House, members felt it was better to make that plain in private, and not, perhaps, to enlist so many Republicans in poking Patrick in the eye.

This year there were no such qualms. The amendment appeared and passed by almost the same margin it did in 2013. For what its worth, this session, the House seems very willing to cut off further debate on Patricks education policy proposals, and they were willing to do it loudly.The other major source of daytime ruckus was a series of measures by the Houses tea party faction Observer favorites Jonathan Stickland, Briscoe Cain, Tony Tinderholt and others to muck up little parts of state government they dont like, to derail other members amendments, and to shame the cabal they say runs the House.

This is not a new dynamic in the House far from it. But it seems to get weirder every year, and its degenerating into a kind of sputtering rage thats transfixing to watch. Last year, Stickland in particular hinted darkly and repeatedly about the blood that would flow if the House didnt start listening to him and his friends. Nothing happened. This year, something did happen with Stickland, though Im still trying to figure out what it was. (He made his first-ever personal privilege speech more here scoring what is likely to remain the highest Stickland Number ever recorded.)

The House Freedom Caucus particularly its most colorful members are weaker than ever. But its unsurprising that theyre ineffective. Whats strange is that theyre so bad at messaging. Its possible to glimpse an alternative universe in which theyre driving an effective, visible opposition to Straus, but this is not it.

Part of the problem is the targets they pick. In one memorable episode last session, Stickland tried to kill an uncontroversial and uncontested bill that would have decreased the use of euthanasia at San Antonio animal shelters. Today, he tried mightily to end state funding for smoking cessation programs. He also has a fixation with defunding state programs to kill feral hogs. At one point, Briscoe Cain, pint-sized fighter of tyrants, rose to offer an amendment that would have eliminated a state advisory council on end-of-life care, which he termed a death panel. Then he accidentally called a rep John Zerwas, the chairman of the god-powered finance committee Mr., and the chamber swatted him down like a pesky gnat.In other words, theyre against puppies and hospice care and for cigarettes and hogs. Hogs everywhere. Instead of focusing on real examples of government corruption and incompetence, they putter around, doing nothing and getting repeatedly sonned. In a way theyre even helpful to their enemies, moderate Republicans, because they suck up oxygen and attention and are as formidable as a paper target.

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The House Tea Party Caucus is Mad as Hell, Weaker Than Ever - The Texas Observer

Officials at a mosque have answered the "hatred and division" of an English Defence League (EDL) rally by hosting a "best of British" tea party.

The open-to-all gathering at Birmingham's Central Mosque, which saw the building decked out with Union Flag bunting, was organised in response to an EDL event being held on Saturday in the city centre.

Originally earmarked to take place in the East Midlands, the EDL demonstration was switched to Birmingham after the Westminster terror attack to highlight what the group describes as a "continued increase in Islamic terrorism" linked to the city.

The rally condemned by Birmingham's political leaders in a cross-party statementis also said by the EDL to be a reaction to the city's so-called Trojan Horse schools inquiry.

Speaking to more than 100 guests at the tea party, which started two hours before the EDL event, Birmingham Central Mosque's chairman Muhammed Afzal said local people would remain united irrespective of their religion or race.

In a Facebook message posted prior to the party, Mr Afzal said: "When the English Defence League is protesting and trying to divide the community, we are holding this party just to prove to them that Birmingham is a multicultural, multi-ethnic and multi-faith community.

"We are all united and they will not be able to divide us and create hatred."

The West Midlands' elected Police and Crime Commissioner, David Jamieson, also attended the party.

Claiming the EDL was bringing "little more than division" to the region, Mr Jamieson said: "We are here today to celebrate the things that Brummies and English people hold in common.

"The English Defence League are spreading a message of hatred. They have come from outside Birmingham and they don't understand our values."

Birmingham Hodge Hill MP Liam Byrne also addressed those who gathered to chat over cake, tea and coffee at the mosque.

The Labour MP told party-goers: "Today this is how we protest by celebrating the quiet miracle of a normal life and the things that we love most about our city and about our country.

"Getting together as friends, getting together as neighbours, breaking a bit of Victoria sponge and having a cup of tea. That is a potent, powerful message that we will send to those who seek to divide us."

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Muslims in Birmingham defy EDL rally with 'Best of British' tea party - The Independent