Easter!

I don't know about you, but Easter is one of my favorite times of the year. Dreary winter is gone; in its place comes beautiful days and signs of new life all around us. And on top of all that, we are able to celebrate one of the most important days in the life of a Christian. I am truly thankful to God for what Easter means in my life.
Another thing that I am thankful for is that all of my children will be home for the weekend. We have some fun things planned--eating Mexican together on Friday night after everyone arrives, having a picnic Saturday for lunch, taking all the dogs (6 total) to the local dog park, cooking together Saturday afternoon for a yummy dinner that night, and last but not least going to church together on Sunday. Then, we will come home and have lunch together. The menu will include: standing rib roast, new potatoes with ranch dressing and bacon (thanks to my friend Melia for sharing the recipe!), broccoli casserole, green beans, sauteed corn with red peppers, frozen fruit salad, rolls, and dessert. I plan to share several of these recipes in the coming days.
As you can see, much of our time is spent around the table together. I would think that is the case for your family as well. I had fun today putting together centerpieces for my dining room table where we will eat that big Easter Sunday lunch. For Valentine's Day I did something similar for a luncheon that I had and I thought it was cute, so I decided to go with the same idea only with an Easter theme.
I purchased 5" diameter round cylinder vases at Michael's (I think they were about $2-3 each). Then I found some round 3" vases the exact same height at WalMart for $1 each. My table seats 8, so I use three of these down the center. I placed the smaller vase inside the larger one (I put a piece of double stick tape on the bottom to make sure it stayed in place). For Valentine's Day I filled the space between the two vases with "red hot" candies, then filled the inner vase with red tulips. They were adorable.
For Easter, I bought bags of multi-colored jelly beans and poured a layer into the space approximately 2" high. Then I placed Peeps yellow bunnies in the remaining space.
After filling the entire space with Peeps, I carefully filled the inner vase with water (with a little flower food added). I purchased an assortment of flowers from my local wholesale florist (gerber daisies, iris, freesia, button mums, and tulips) and had fun filling the containers with them. Now, I am not a very good flower arranger, but that is not terribly important with a project like this. One of the most important things is to not leave the stems too long.
Here is the finished project......
And here are all three of them on my table.
I got this idea here.
My mom used to get a kick out of me when I was young because I always wanted to make the table pretty even when it wasn't a special occasion. I still enjoy doing that! It makes me happy to welcome my children home and to celebrate a special day together.
I hope you have a special day with your loved ones!