Berry Queens' Hi! Tea 2008

Well ladies, I am just FLAT OUT excited to announce that we will be holding our 2nd annual Berry Queens Hi! Tea on Sunday, August 17, 2008 at the home of our veryown DIVA, Patricia Richard from 2-4 p.m. The event is a fundraiser for Iberia Habitat for Humanity and is the kickoff for 2008 for our First O-fficial Berry Queens' Ball and Pageant event which will be held on Friday, September 19, 2008 from 8:00 p.m.-12:00 a.m. The next day, Saturday, from 10:30~ish until noon, we will have our First O-fficial "Kane You Hang?" Brunch at Clementine. Doesn't that sound like fun, ya'll! Any-hoo, back to the tea info~We are very pleased to announce that Lane Walker has agreed to give us a LEMONDROP Fall Fashion preview at our event this year and once again, the event is BYOH~(BRING YOUR OWN HAT) and I can't wait to see all of the bee-you-tee-ful hats ya'll come in, seein as last year, those of ya'll who came just outdid ya'llselves, truly ya'll did!!!

This year, our Queens will be competing in our Very First BERRY CROCK-A COMPETITION, which ya'll will no doubt get the benefit of. The winner will be awarded at the Hi! Tea and I for one can't wait to see who the winner will be!!!

(Just for clarity, I am including the rule sheet for the Berry Crock-A Competition so you can get the gist, sugahs!)

First O-fficial Berry Crock-A Competition
Rules, Regulations, and Explanations

The First O-fficial Berry Crock-A Competition will be held at The Berry Queens’ Hi! Tea on August 17, 2008 at the Home of our own DIVA~The Queen of Hearts (aka Patricia Richard) from 2-4 p.m. This competition will be held amongst ourown Berry Queen competitors and will require them to submit a Ho-made cake. These cakes will be displayed at our BERRY SWEETS table and will be judged according to the following standards:

Bee-you-tee~fulness
Decadent/Sin~funess
Dee-licious~ness

All non-competitors at the Hi! Tea will vote for their favorite Ho-made cake and the winner will receive the coveted “Berry Crock-A” Prize which will be awarded at the conclusion of the Hi! Tea during the door prize portion.

“Ho-making”: (Gerund) Describes a person’s ability to delegate out a difficult task to someone else who does it better, pay them for it and then take credit for “allegedly” doin’ it his/herownself, since it is legitimately his/hers because he/she paid for it! Now some folks, for reasons I do not understand, will gather a bucket load of ingredients and perform an old, out-dated ritual called “making something from scratch”. Some of the culinarily gifted and overachievin’ queens may decide to make just such a cake and that is also allowed as a submission, though I would not encourage you to do so, by any means, because it is just PLAIN HARD and too much WORK! Other folks, like me, “Ho-Out” such tasks to people who do a much better job of it, have better equipment, a bigger kitchen, and better culinary skills. Do not be offended by the term. It has nothing whatsoever to do with S-E-X, but in queen’s language is a reference to making the most of one’s lack of skills and another’s abundance of skills. It’s a WIN/WIN, hunnies! (Adjective form=Ho-made; Verb form=Ho-make; Other terms include “Ho-Out” which is the act of gettin’ something Ho-made done for oneself.

Each submission must have an “original” name and you must bring your own cake plate to sit it on.

Luv ya’ll, QdB

The Berry Queens Welcome our Newest DIVA's!!!!

On two separate Thursdays night at Le Rosier I met up with Queen Guide-Ance's bunch of excellently kewt, funny, and bodacious friends who have signed up to be our first EVER DIVA's for the BQ Ball and Pageant. We have 21 of them so far and have room for a few more (wink! wink!) I want to give them a shout out now and say thanks for their support and let ya'll know how glad we are to have them because they are goin to be a great addition to our festivities. One of em actually painted herownhouse in her tiara, which made me know right off the bat that she was fit to be a Berry Queen DIVA!!! Don't ya'll luv it!!?? They will not have to do jack, since they are payin 'n all, but they will take on queenly names and dress up and act up and generally make our event much, much better OR NOT, because they get to decide exactly what they want to do and how they want to act because they are, after all, DIVAS! They may even get themselves a float together and ride just for the hail of it in the Sugar Cane Festival Parade and I think that would be too, too kewt for words!!!

DIVA 1~Jamie Nelson-Hebert

DIVA 4~Lisa Dugas

Queen of Sold~Tessie Dore

Queen of Disney~Anne Spears

Queenie in a Bottle~Monique Romero

Queen High Maintenance~Roxie Boudreaux

Queen of Fine Arts~Judy Vaughn

Queen of Hearts~Patricia Richard

Queen Cruiser~Sandra DeRouen

Queen Big Sistah~Margaret Simon

Queen of Dippity Doo~Elaine Drago

Queen Camil Feaux~Suzie Charpentier

Queen Catin Dure~Angela Langlinais

Queen of de Road~Jill Langlinais

Queen Mumm~Brenda Langlinais

Queen Prim & Proper~Peggy Meyers

Queen of the Scene~Amy Allen

Diane Musson

Cheryl Barras

Kim Holleman

Jodie Suire

Martha Girouard

Anita Lantier

Scotty Hebert

Becky Kennedy



and we welcome one DIVA Queen, as well, Katherin Bordes!

The SPQ Weekend is over and We're Baaaaaaack!!!

There were 13 of us, includin my mama and Bibba who headed out on Friday to enjoy the festivities at the 26th Sweet Potato Queens Festival and St. Patty's Day Parade in Jackson, MS. We had a rippit of a time, girls and I brought some pictures back to share. Friday night was the SPQ Ball at Hal & Mal's, complete with Kacey Jones, great food, and a pole for dancin on, which was somethin this queen has definitely not seen cept on color tv. Then it was on to the Hilton for the "Afterglow" party, which was Hi-ly entertainin to say the LEAST!!! Saturday was the annual parade in downtown Jackson where Queens from all over the United States and everywhere else paraded and had a fine time. From there, we went back tot he Hilton for jello-wrasslin (which I did not watch nor participate in due to myown aversion to jello products as a whole and the fact that wrasslin is waaaaaaaay to close to bein exercise, anyhoo-)and the BIG ASS BBQ, which was deeeeeeelicious to boot! That evening, we went to the Pearls and PJs Ball at the Hilton. I have decided that Jill Connor Browne is a genius just for comin up with this thing because I have never been so comfortable at a ball in my whole life!!!! PJs--what a great idea!!! Sunday, we all came and listened to JCB and ate the most fantabulous food ever for the Bathrobe Brunch where, you guessed it--we lounged in our bathrobes and ate and ate and talked an talked and when ALL that was over--WE DID NOT WANT TO GET IN THE CAR AND LEAVE, but we had to, so sadly, the weekend came to a close!!!! Overall it was a wunderful time had by all and we met soooooo many interesting groups, like the Breaux Bridge queens and the Lafayette Queens who rode their Harleys all the way from home to be there with us and looked deevine at that!!! We are invitin them to come be with us in September cause they are just too kewt for words!!! Hope you enjoy the pics, girls and please--try to come next year--It was soooooooo much fun!!! Ya'll take care and be sweet!!!

Berry First Artwork...

Since our budget is let's say...SLIM...and we do not have the money for hirin an artist to do the artwork for the posters and such, Queen Em Cee suggested that I use CLB (Cutest Little Boy--myveryown son) to design and paint the art, cause he is pretty good for five years old and works for Airheads and Icee's, which is good for the Berry Queens! I wanted to show you his canvas that will be used for many of the things we hand for the ball/pageant and will also be used on the programs. If anyone out there has the ability to put this canvas in digital format or knows someone who can do it out of the goodness of his/her heart and for a good cause, please let me know!!!!

Be sweet!

QdB

How the Berry Queen Thing Came About...

Once upon a time, a few years ago, a woman in THE BERRY (New Iberia, LA) had a dream…

She stood at THE SUGARCANE FESTIVAL parade and watched as various floats went by, toting around many BONAFIDE queens and small children wearing large sparkly tiaras AND as flatbeds and tractors passed by full of drunken people carrying plastic cups waving to the crowd as music played. She watched the sequined and blinging dance girls; saw all the people from New Iberia out with their families enjoying the celebration, when suddenly—she had a light bulb moment!

It was then that the idea of THE BERRY QUEENS began to form. Having been an honorary member of The Sweet Potato Queens since her late 20’s, she suddenly could envision a group of women “of a certain age” dressed in sequins, big hair, and enhanced costumes of amazing flamboyance and sparkliness dancing and sashaying on a float playing most excellent and “sugar-filled” music and whipping the crowd into spasms and frenzy. At the top of the float stood the HEAD QUEEN of them all—HER ROYAL HI-NESS, Queen of THE BERRY! She was a vision of LUVliness—Hair big enough to make a grown woman from an Alabama trailer park weep with envy, dress shining brighter than the sun on account of all the sequins and such, breasts and buttocks standing proud and large—showing all the under 30’s women what a REAL WOMAN is actually made of! She was extra-ordinary in her bee-you-tee-ous-ness and her pageant wave and scepter motion were simply
A-MA-ZING!

But how, she asked herself, would such a being be found to ascend to said float and represent The Berry in such a fashion? She could not answer this, and so the dream was put away—temporarily forgotten—and she went back to her daily routine of mommyhood.

Two years later, the same woman found herself on the Board of Iberia Habitat for Humanity and LO and BEHOLD! She was asked to be on the Fundraising Committee. It was then that the IDEA began again, coaxing her into thinking about meshing the two—the quest for THE BERRY QUEEN and raising money for Iberia Habitat. A WIN/WIN situation was in the making!

After a lot of planning and a lot of begging, pleading, threatening, coaxing, and sucking up—she secured her queens, the location, the favor of the Mayor and the City Planner, and the date was set. She will gather queens from all over the Queen City of the Teche and have a competition to find HER ROYAL HI-NESS, Queen of THE BERRY in a Ball and Pageant event to be held Friday, September 19, 2008 at The Evangeline Theater in downtown New Iberia. Once the queen is found and crowned, the queens will ride on a float in The SugarCane Festival Parade and represent Iberia Habitat for Humanity and The Berry and her dream will finally be realized!




First O-fficial Berry Queens’ Ball and Pageant
Friday, September 19, 2008
8:00 P.M. until 12:00 A.M.
“He-e-e-y sugah!Be sweet!TellyourmamanemIsaidhi!Whodyathinkuhlwee-un?”
http://berryqueensunite.blogspot.com

T-shirts are HERE!!!!

"Say to yourself, 'I'm beautiful, I'm bubbly, I'm marvelous,' and pretty soon you will be.":--Jacque Mercer

Queen de Bling, her travelin' hair and MAA(Miss Attitude America)

The back of our shirt!

The front of our shirt!

The Berry Queens' T-shirts are in and they are soooooo kewt!!!! They are available for purchase for $16.00 and come in ladies sizes S, M, L, and XL. E-mail me at MsJerre@aol.com if you want one!!!

Back From Baton Rouge and Jill Conner Browne!!!!

The Berry Queens pose with THE BOSS QUEEN herownself!

THE I-DA-HO Queens

THE BOSS QUEEN

THE BOSS QUEEN WITH CUTEST BOY IN THE WORLD

Whoo-Hoo! We got back from Baton Rouge last night before 11 p.m. and boy was it a hootenanny! Jill Connor Browne is HE-helarious and the queens bout busted a gut listenin to her and meeting Cutest Boy in the World, who, thought VERY type A, was pretty fun, too, and kewt in a married boy way! There were a pile of folks there, but we managed to get ourselves on up and get a copy of her new book, THE SWEET POTATO QUEENS GUIDE TO RAISING CHILDREN FOR FUN AND PROFIT. The Berry Queens asked her a few questions, left her a little sussy from THE BERRY and we met some wunderful queens from St. Francisville called THE I-DA-HO Potato Queens. There motto is "U Not Da Ho, I-Da-Ho!!!!" There symbol is the Flamingo and sum of them wore some flamingo glasses that were quite extra-ordinary! They were a downright mess and a half and we promised to look them up at the SPQ St. Patty's Day Parade on the weekend of March 14-16 when we are headed to Jackson once again to represent our fine Berry as THE BERRY QUEENS!!! We did get a picture of us in front of THE BIG A$$ BUS, but Queen Em Cee hasn't sent them to me yet so I can load them up for ya'll. Hope ya'll can join us next time we have a road trip! Til then, BE SWEET and tellyermama'nemwesaidHI! P.S. For those of ya'll who want to learn more about the trip and bein queenly, you can go to my Queenly Blog at http://msjerre.blogspot.com, but you must NOT be easily O-ffended or you should probly just stay on this page, where it is Disney friendly on account of Habitat 'n all!