Posted by Ethne~
This
past weekend was the first of our family Easter celebrations, this time
with Shaun’s side of the family. Shaun’s parents always host, and it’s
one of the times of the year when his extended
fam comes together, including all the little cousins who are KD and
Easy Mac’s age. They are in hyperactive-hyperdrive (if you don’t know
that reference, Toy Story obviously wasn’t
your napping movie in college).
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| There were 17 of these shots total of the kids running, taken on my camera's speed mode - you get the idea. |
I’ll
back up to tell you that I had to make a last-minute modification to
the girls’ Easter outfits. I got them twirly dresses from Land’s End,
which are totally cute. Not the frilly things
I put them in for Easters past. These are a little more grown-girl (is
that a fashion style?) but the skirt twirls out full to the waist when
they spin – this is key. The problem is that WEEKS ago, I bought them
adorable pink flower sandals to go with the
pink on the dresses. Surely we would be able to wear sandals by March
24? Nope. So off to the store we went. The caveat, Shaun recommended
that I allow the girls to pick out their own shoes. So I did, and they
came home with black patent-leather kitten
heels. A-DOR-ABLE. Shaun expected I was allowing them to pick out a
new functional everyday shoe, seeing as they fight us every morning with
their current selection, so we clearly were lacking in communication as
to what type of shoes were being purchased.
Fortunately, since these children take after their mother, no broken
ankles have yet occurred. And they love their “high heels”… even at
5:30 a.m., on the wood floors, on Sunday.
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| You can see the heel in this one. KD is a little diva. |
So
prior to shoe shopping, I prepared my dessert for Sunday’s feast, which
was my contribution to the meal. I received a cake-pop iron from my
brother- and sister-in-law for Christmas. They’re
pretty simple to make, and you don’t have to buy the iron to do so –
I’ve seen cake pop kits in the baking aisle at Target - but I haven’t
tested the other options, FYI. The trick is getting your sticks to stay
in the cakes, and I think I know the secret
– it’s the type of icing. You gotta do the Almond Bark/Candiqwik,
melted down per instructions with a tablespoon or two of white
shortening and, in this case, a few drops of gel food coloring until I
had the colors I liked. Stir together till smooth, dip
the sticks in first, insert stick, dip the whole pop in, then allow to
cool, either standing cake up or cake down. Sprinkle with candy or
sugar sprinkles while the icing is still cool.
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| This is what happens when you don't do the right icing - bad. Delicious, but bad. |
I
decided to make my cake pops into a little Easter egg hunt in grass on
my pastel platter (which was broken yesterday BTW), so I dried them cake
down so they would hide in the grass. The
grass is the plastic kind ($.50 from Target) because I didn’t want the
paper kind to bleed onto my cakes, and I also had little candy eggs
hidden in the grass too. Special for Shaun, I hid a few black
jellybeans.
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| Beautiful little Easter eggs |
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| KD eating one of at least two |
Didn’t they turn out just darling?
PS - you gotta check out Pinterest, You Are Drunk right now. They've got an Easter special going on right now with the wacky stuff pinned. It's pretty funny.
