The Table
The photo to the right is my Easter table from 2022 and the one just below that is 2023. You’ll see the difference in the Easter baskets at the place settings. The last photo below is of table number two. I normally don’t use that one during Easter but this year I hosted lots of missionaries from church who didn’t get any invites for Easter dinner. All of their Easter baskets are on the floor behind them.
When I don’t have enough chargers in pink, I alternate with butterflies or something else that looks like spring. I always mix and match to make it work.
Believe it or not, most of my guests had never heard of or tasted Moose Munch popcorn before. It’s made by Harry & David and it’s one of my favorite treats. If you haven’t tried it, you should. I found discounted cases of it for sale at my local Wheeler Dealer store and scooped them up. A little secret about me, I love bargain shopping!
I found some cloud blue chargers on sale at Michaels, along with these yellow and pink plates. I also snap up pastel egg cups wherever I can find them.
The Room
Sadly, the only photo we could find of our Easter decorations was a shot of the stairs. We have some fabulous decorations though, including some fun art, and I promise to get some great photos next season.
One cheap way I like to add color is by adding paper fans to the stairs. You can get them in a variety of colors and they’re easy to hang and take down. Big bows also add bright pops of color. It’s a bit hard to see on this photo but I do have many branches of cherry blossoms in both white and pink threaded through the string lights as well.
I have wreaths that match every holiday season and I keep them safe by storing them in the Sterlite wreath containers. They’re then labeled along with my holiday bins. I print out an easy-to-read page, usually including an image and place them inside the bin to indicate the holiday or theme and face it forward on my storage shelf so each holiday is easy to find.
Like most of you at Easter, we hide eggs for an Easter egg hunt outside. After a friend once told me her family did an adult hunt with fifty dollar bills and lottery tickets, I thought I needed to up my game and started getting larger eggs and hiding such things as gifts cards and ten dollar bills.
Since then, I’ve switched back to gum, candy, and toy cars with only one fancy gift card. I figure I’m spending plenty on Easter baskets and dinner.
Proof of that point is the other game we play. We’ve had a long-standing tradition at my house, where each holiday we play a holiday themed bingo game with a basket full of prizes. Each time someone gets a bingo, they can pick a prize from the bucket. I spend the month collecting fun things I see in the stores. You can find holiday themed bingo boards at the Oriental Trading Company or you can find many online for free.
The Menu
“My weaknesses have always been food and men — in that order.” — Dolly Parton
Easter Brunch 2022
The menu I wrote above on a white board was only half of what I actually did. I had already finished the sweet stuff and it was in the freezer before I took a photo to send to my out of town siblings. This photo on the left was from our 2022 Easter meal. We decided on a brunch instead of dinner but we still had cake as you can see and we still made a baked ham. Any holiday breakfast or brunch in my family always includes biscuits and gravy. It’s a staple in our home. This is despite the fact that when we were teens my sister served up cricket gravy to all of us and didn’t tell us about the buggy addition to our feast until every creamy spoonful was sopped up.
Easter Dinner 2023
For Easter dinner I always try to experiment with making veggies in new ways. Sometimes it works and sometimes it fails. Combining the asparagus, peas, and green beans into one dish was a fail this year. They all cook at different times. The idea was an interesting one (I’d found a really cool looking online recipe) but I couldn’t pull it off.
We had to make two hams as well as a pork loin and two full pans of scalloped potatoes to feed as many people as we’d invited. Luckily I have three ovens and we made use of all of them.
Since we had some with milk and potato allergies, we also did a rice dish as well and I made gluten free rolls in addition to the challah rolls. My gluten free rolls never turn out as nice. I’ve attempted them many times. Desserts I can do but anything with yeast is difficult. If anyone has tips or a good recipe, let me know.
I did carrots three ways, honey glazed, oven roasted with herbs, and pureed. All were delicious. I don’t think you can go wrong with a carrot. It’s difficult to find the baby carrots in rainbow colors with the tops on but they make the prettiest roasted carrot presentation I think.
Indecently, my nephew, one year, decided to make himself a roasted carrot, herbed pork with glaze, ham and chip crusted potato sandwich on a roll and he proclaimed it the best sandwich he’d ever made or eaten. None of us tried it but it did look pretty good.
Desserts
I collect a variety of tea trays and cake stands. I love the petal pink flower stand used above.
In the photo to the right, you’ll see some sugar cookies I made using Easter sugar wafer decals. They’re super easy. You just make your cookie, ice it, then apply the wafer paper when the icing is still wet. You can decorate around the edge with a scalloped piping if you like. I tried one and found it covered up too much of the image so I left them as they were.
Personally, I don’t really like the taste of wafer paper but the images are super cute.
Here you’ll see the same cookies with some flower designs. I was practicing using different piping tips. These are pretty but way too much frosting for my taste and they are destroyed very easily. I ended up keeping most cookies simple and put a fancy one on the top to use as Easter gifts.
Desserts are my favorite. Any time I ask mom what she wants for Easter dessert and give her options, she says, “Yes.” This year I did a blood orange Bundt cake, gluten free raspberry lemon cheesecake, carrot cake with cream cheese frosting, coconut cake with chocolate mounds filling, and then we had assorted Easter petit fours as well.
The photo above was from 2022. I did elderflower fruit tarts, a strawberry lemonade macaron cake, and a chocolate marshmallow peeps cake. Then we had a few gluten free cupcakes. Nothing too fancy for my poor sister.
I almost forgot about them but I ordered the cutest little chick and sheep cookies from one of my go-to stores for tea parties. Sadly, I didn’t get the ladybug truffles before they sold out, but check out The Swiss Colony if you’re ever looking for fancy holiday treats.
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