RE: Garden party - what to serve?
Most of my favorites have been mentioned already :)
For chicken salad, I love it w/ fresh chopped tarragon, grapes, etc. added to it. Yum.
You can cut sandwiches w/ a cookie cutter into shapes too.
Along the same lines as other things that have been mentioned, but tiny, bite sized desserts of any kind are great! Petit fours, cookies, pound cake, quickbreads, scones. Fresh fruit salad.
If you are feeling ambitious or like to cook you can do something like a carrot ginger soup.
An easy appetizer we do for different things, and is fitting for tea w/ the ladies is to take a cucumber, slice it (can drag a fork down the outer skin lengthwise all around the perimeter, which when you slice it will then make it look pretty :) ) , and top w/ a little whipped cream cheese, a tiny bit of smoked salmon, and a sprig of fresh dill. Super easy but cute and yummy.
Mama to DS-2004
DD-2006
and a new addition-ds born march 2010