Easter

I can't believe it has been almost two weeks since I posted.  I had to go out of town for a week for work.  Add in preparing for Easter & taking Addy girl to Disney on Ice & we have been busy bees.  For Easter, my family all came over...cousins, aunts, uncles & all.  It was a full house, but those are typically my favorite days.  All of the family was bringing food, so I worked mostly on the dessert table & I made a squash casserole.  A friend of mine used to make a delicious squash casserole years ago & I got her recipe & have started making it for pretty much all the holidays.  If you ever want to make a delicious squash casserole, here is the recipe.  It's amazing.  I mean, it has Cheez Its in it, can you really go wrong with that?  Anyway, on to the dessert table...

For parties, I try & reuse as many decorations from previous parties as possible.  I have a closet in my guest room devoted to boxes of party stuff.  For Easter, I used one of the crosses from Addy's Pink & Pearl Baptism Party, the crate from the "Ahoy! It's a Boy!" baby shower, and the same candle holder from Addy's nursery that I used at her "Look Whoo is 1!" birthday party.  The backdrop was the same tablecloth I used at Addy's 1st birthday & the tablecloths were just fabric I had laying around.  The cute pink pedestal tray was one that I bought for the Pink Diamond & Damask Baby shower & have used again for Addy's baptism & pretty much any other party where I can get away with pink trays. : )  You can't really tell  in pictures, but the pink pedestal tray has cutout little hearts around the edges, which worked perfectly for tying the Easter eggs around.

So, I have a confession.  I totally bombed a Pinterest experiment.  Totally bombed.  I don't know if it is that the idea doesn't work or if it was user error, but I really sucked it up.  So I saw on Pinterest where you can make these great little "cookie bowls" & fill them with stuff.  You make them by turning over a muffin pan & putting the cookie dough right on the bottom of the muffin cup.  Here is what the dough looked like.

 Then it started melting down like this.

Hmmm.  So I tried to take the bowls off of the muffin pan before they got too hard & they were too mushy & started to seem like they were going to break apart.  So I let them harden...and then when I tried to remove them, they totally broke apart.  We then had cookie crumbs.  It was ridiculous.  If any of you out there have successfully made these cookie bowls, please tell me how.  I beg of you.  I have made little cookie bowls by pushing the cookie dough up against the bottom & sides of the inside of the muffin pan & that worked out pretty well.  I will stick to that from now on.  I had this idea to fill the sugar cookie bowls with icing & then top them with the little Whopper eggs to look like a little nest or something.  Well, that obviously didn't work so Easter morning, my sweet husband was at the grocery store buying me some decorated Easter sugar cookies to throw on some serving dishes.

Luckily, the cookie bowls were the only thing that turned into a total disaster.  My flower cupcakes, chick cupcakes & butterscotch "nests" all turned out pretty decent.  Here is what they looked like.  You can click the links below them & see how I made them.

Flower cupcakes

Chick cupcakes

Butterscotch "nests"

Add in the store-bought sugar cookies & the glass jars full of Candy & our Easter dessert table was complete.  Easter is one of my favorite holidays & although it can be stressful preparing for 20+ people to come to your house, it is also really nice to have everyone around to celebrate those special occasions.  I hope everyone had a wonderful Easter with those you love most.