Easter Segment, Winner of necklace, and life as you know it!

I have finally randomly picked a winner! Congratulations:

Kathryn! You won the necklace!!!

I will email you and give you the details on when you will get it!!

I have had a few readers email me and saying they are having problems leaving comments on my blog. If my blog won't allow you to leave a comment ... please email me @ skierdouglass {at} gmail {dot} com. 

Man I am hoping life will slow down a bit to catch my breath! WHEW! Today me and the boys slept it,  ate waffles, played outside (okay I pulled weeds ... really ... MARCH ... I am not excited for weed season. Weed season has come much too early if you ask me!) Then had a picnic, went to the library, got suckers at the bank ... all the things I have neglected to do the last few weeks. Felt nice to spend good quality time with my boys!

Lots of fun things have happened in the last week. We sent my nephew off on his LDS mission to Bolivia! (MTC in Peru). Prepared another fun segment for Studio 5 about ways to dress up your meals on Easter. Got to visit with Adam's younger brother, our sis-in-law, and our new nephew who flew in from Chicago and Adam's parents who drove up from Kanab. Date night tomorrow with Adam, and fun night in with the kids tonight. It has been a week full of crazy fun, however today was so fun to relax too!

Here is the segment and details for you. Hope you enjoy

Making Easter Meals Marvelous

Regardless of whether or not your Easter feast will be for brunch or dinner, you can make it a special occasion with some really unique, and eye catching ideas. 

Starting out with

Easter explosion just for kids!

Enjoy your dinner out of those darling plastic eggs.

Picture: Mandy Douglass

idea source click here

If your kids are anything like mine, I am sure you can relate when I say they don’t eat fancy dinners really well. So leave the fancy food for the adults and place foods kids will eat, individualized in plastic eggs. Some ideas of what to put into your eggs are:

– Graham Cracker Bunnies (Annie’s Bunny Graham organic crackers)

– Petite carrots

– Flower Sandwiches – flower cutter found at Wal-mart

– Duck pretzels – find a tutorial here (http://www.stoplookingetcookin.com/2012/03/ladybug-duck-and-bunny-pretzels/)

– grapes

– mini cucumbers

– grape tomatoes

– Egg Rice Krispy

– cheese – cut into flowers

– crackers

- Chocolate covered strawberry made to look like a carrot – white chocolate dyed orange.

Don’t be afraid to double up on your child’s favorites!

Another favorite is wrapping your utensils up with an orange napkin to make them look like a carrot!

Take a green napkin and fold it accordion style. Then fold it in half and thread it through 2 prongs of the fork (works better with plastic utensils). Wrap remaining utensils in orange napkin and then wrap with orange tulle for a finished touch!

“HOP” Letters for your centerpiece.

My boys are all about recognizing their letters lately, so I thought a darling centerpiece would be the letters “HOP”

Letters found at Hobby lobby and painted with acrylic paint.

Jelly Bean Topiary is a great addition to your table. The tutorial I found online suggests putting toothpicks in each jelly bean to make it edible, but because of time and not wanting to serve my guests jelly beans that I have handled with my fingers, I chose to hot glue them! Check out the tutorial I found here:

Be sure to download the Printable Egg Placemat here.  

The egg “chick” cup was cup found in the dollar section at Target. Wrap your crayons with some ribbon and place your roll of crayons in the cup instead of an egg.

(sorry for the low quality pict!)

While the adults are busy chatting, and the kids are done with their fabulous dinner, be sure to send them on a fun Springtime Scavenger hunt to keep them busy! Click here to download printable!

Enjoyable Garden themed Easter table

My garden is on my mind, and what better way to get excited than to create a theme all surrounded by the garden.

Use "garden/plant markers" as food markers.

(yes this is the name of that purple plant)

With a little chalkboard paint, your guests won’t have to question what food you’ll be serving.

-       paint sticks from your local hardware store

-       large popsicle sticks

Place settings

-       Cloth folded napkins to look like bunnies. Here is a great tutorial on how to fold one for your Easter table!

-     Below a glass plate (found at Target), cut the center out of a fresh artichoke and press all the leaves toward the table. This will create a very fresh placemat that you can see through your plate! Works better when the artichokes aren't super cold. 

Serving Dishes

 

- Terracotta pots - put your serving bowls in the pots, so it looks like you're serving your entrée or side dish right out of the pot!

Broccoli Pasta Salad

Southern Living 
SEPTEMBER 2011

            1 cup chopped pecans

            1/2 (16-oz.) package farfalle (bow-tie) pasta

            1 pound fresh broccoli

            1 cup mayonnaise

            1/3 cup sugar

            1/3 cup diced red onion

            1/3 cup red wine vinegar

            1 teaspoon salt

            2 cups seedless red grapes, halved

            8 cooked bacon slices, crumbled

Preparation

.    1. Preheat oven to 350°. Bake pecans in a single layer in a shallow pan 5 to 7 minutes or until lightly toasted and fragrant, stirring halfway through.

.    2. Prepare pasta according to package directions.

.    3. Meanwhile, cut broccoli florets from stems, and separate florets into small pieces using tip of a paring knife. Peel away tough outer layer of stems, and finely chop stems.

.    4. Whisk together mayonnaise and next 4 ingredients in a large bowl; add broccoli, hot cooked pasta, and grapes, and stir to coat. Cover and chill 3 hours. Stir bacon and pecans into salad just before serving. 

Name plates

Make your nameplates out of edible items.

Nest made out of alfalfa sprouts

Fresh egg with interior blown out. Poke a hole in the top and bottom of egg. Blow in top of egg like you're blowing up a balloon!

Name written with crayon before dying, or with a paint pen after dying.

Put a piece of paper with a great quote, or thing you love about that person in each egg. When the meal is over, crack the egg.

Colorful Deviled eggs

 You can find a great tutorial here on how to color these wonderful eggs!

My favorite part of the segment they didn't show much on camera of because I came up with the carrot idea the night before my segment. They are little bundt carrot cakes, with brown butter cream cheese frosting, topped with Parsley to make them look like carrots. Super cute dessert idea if you ask me!

Carrot Cake Bundt Cakes with Browned Butter Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger
• 1/8 tsp nutmeg
• 1 cup packed light-brown sugar
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 2/3 cup vegetable oil
• 1/3 cup applesauce (or an additional 1/3 cup vegetable oil)
• 3 large eggs
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1 1/2 cups finely grated carrots
Brown Butter Cream Cheese Frosting
• 1/2 cup salted butter
• 6 oz cream cheese
• 2 1/2 - 3 cups powdered sugar

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg for 30 seconds, set aside. In a separate mixing bowl, using a wooden spoon, blend together brown sugar, granulated sugar, vegetable oil and applesauce until smooth. Add in eggs and vanilla extract and mix until well combined. Pour in half of the dry ingredients and mix just until combined, then add remaining dry ingredients and mix just until combined. Fold in grated carrots. Pour into a buttered 13 by 9-inch baking dish and spread into an even layer. Bake in preheated oven 30 - 32 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into center comes out clean. Remove from oven and allow to cool completely before frosting with Brown Butter Cream Cheese Frosting. Cut into bars and store in an airtight container.
• For the Brown Butter Cream Cheese Frosting:
• Brown butter in a small saucepan over medium heat (for how to brown butter see link here. Be sure to brown it long enough to get the good brown butter flavor). Remove from heat and pour into a heatproof airtight container, cover with lid and chill in refrigerator until butter has cooled (if it's too cold when you go to prepare the frosting you will have to let it rest at room temperature for several minutes until soft enough to blend. The butter should be soft like room temperature butter). Scoop butter into a mixing bowl, using an electric hand mixer whip butter and cream cheese until smooth and fluffy. Add 2 1/2 cups powdered sugar and mix until well combined, Mix in an additional 1/2 cup powdered sugar to thicken if desired.

Place little stems of parsley to top off each cake!

• Recipe Source: Cooking Classy

We have lots of fun activities planned for Easter. Hope you have a wonderful Easter Sunday!!