Saturday, April 23, 2011

Easter treats!

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Here's my gumpaste/fondant cake topper for Easter! Of course...there is no cake yet...I am hopeful there will be time to get one made!

I spent my morning baking cookies and making Krispy Treats for my kids' baskets. My daughter's food allergies only allow so many purchased items and it ends up being a nice touch to have homemade goodies!

I also really wanted to make an allergen free Easter Bread this year. Trying to shape it into a ring is difficult so I just poured the dough into a well greased bundt pan.

My daughter can't have eggs so instead of using painted eggs...I painted the bread! :)

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I diluted icing colors in vanilla like I do with fondant painting and it worked pretty well!

This is a great alternative for people who still want something festive without eggs!

Blessings for a Holy Easter!

Reusable Easter Calendar

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I had ALL of these eggs leftover from my daughter's birthday party. We had a strawberry hunt using all of the pink eggs! I decided to make use of them for Easter too!! Each egg came with tiny holes already in the top. So if you decide to make this calendar be sure to make sure there are little vents at the top of each egg!

I used a black sharpie and wrote the numbers 1-50 for every day of Easter. Be sure to write on the bottom of the egg so you can turn the number around as you count down. Then take some pipe cleaners...any color or size you want...and thread them through the hole.

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I twisted mine on the inside of the egg to make a tiny loop at the top. Please note I found it easiest to do this as I attached the egg to the ribbon. Stringing them all on after the fact is a little more complicated as the ribbon is very long and I had no idea how much room I needed until I finished!
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The finished product turned out well! If I was YOU I'd use a prettier ribbon, but again I'm trying to work with what I have around the house...hence the black ribbon! Although our Alleluia sign is on the same ribbon, so perhaps it will match nicely!

We plan to fill each egg with a small treat and scripture passage, but you can do anything you want and reuse this idea each year. I can even take it apart and change the ribbon to something prettier next year as each egg is it's own little loop and piece. After opening an egg we will turn the number around to show that day has passed.

Wishing you a Blessed Easter!

Holy Week

Here are some pictures of our Holy Week Activities...
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I wanted to make a Holy Week Banner, but decided to work with what I had for this year so we hung them on our decorative wreath.
The bread and cup for Holy Thursday and the black cross and red felt in the middle for Good Friday. On Holy Saturday I covered the wreath with a black piece of felt.
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I didn't have any nice purple fabric for Passiontide, but I covered up the statues and images using purple felt and some of my purple shirts...it's my favorite color so I have 3 I found to use. For the Wall Hangings I used dark purple pillowcases.
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Nothing like improvising! :)

A Happy and Holy Triduum to you!

Tuesday, April 12, 2011

Unexpected Places

Lent has been different for us this year.

I had these goals these ideas of how I wanted it to go and with illness and travels things had to change. So now I find (as we are nearing the end of our journey) that I am grateful for Lent being not of my own making but one of a deepening of our prayer life as a family.

Overall I have found a restless peace this Lent. One of hope and waiting mixed in with trust and love. I know God is doing great things and I want to do everything I can to pray and be conformed to HIM..to HIS image. My own struggle to feel worthy of the tasks He asks of me...simple things...is a sign that I am being stretched to more than I could be on my own. God is good at opening our souls to grow beyond our own selfish view. So I hope to allow Him to live in those unfound spaces.

I hope your Lent is going well!

Blessings!