More Easter Photos

Beautiful Colors!

Crafty, huh?

Messy?  A little bit. Fun?  Oh yeah!

Wife and the boys after church on Saturday.

Happy Easter!

Like Peter Cottontail, just wanted to hop in to say Happy Easter!

We've been busy making cookies [eggs, bunnies, tulips, crosses], pickled eggs and beets [a family tradition] and other Easter goodies.

And we've been cleaning house too.  All the family members are pitching in to make this chore quick and easy.

What do you have planned for Easter?  Leave a comment, won't you?

A Busy Easter Weekend

It's early Sunday morning and it's already been a busy day. Crafty Mom supervised the traditional Easter egg hide (the Easter Bunny did all the work, you know). And then it was chop the vegetables (for our lunch guests, NOT the Easter Bunny). I love the smell of fresh cut celery. Something about it.....smells like home. It's a comfort smell (if there is such a thing).

Here's a sampling of what we've done so far.

{Click for a larger view}

The lamb cake turned out nice. This is the first time I've used the star tip to decorate a cake. I should have practiced before I frosted Lamby, but he turned out okay. His jelly bean eyes and nose almost makes him too cute to eat. You can see the two-piece cake mold filled to the rim (yes, it ran over in the oven and made a mess). [NOTE TO SELF: put a cookie sheet under the pan next year to avoid a house filled with burnt cake smoke.]

The boys colored eggs last night after we got back from church. It was a great service. Great music, great music and a good time to celebrate the whole reason there is an "Easter". Upper left-hand corner is a shot of some bunny and egg candies I made. I was going to make lollipops, but didn't have any Springy or Easter-y molds. These turned out just fine.

Enjoy your day!

An Easter Tradition

Pickled Eggs and Beets

Every Easter my grandmother made pickled eggs and beets. I just found out that one of my co-workers makes them every Easter too. My co-worker is Polish; my grandmother was not. I'm sure this recipe has some ethnic origin, guess I'll have to do some Google research. [Thank goodness for Google he/she is my best friend when it comes to answering questions.]

Here's the very simple recipe if you're interested:

• 12 hard-boiled eggs (peeled)
• 2 cans of red beets (liquid included)
• 2 cups of sugar
• 2 cups of white vinegar
• 1 big GLASS (no plastic please) container to keep them in

In a large pan or stock pot, add the beets, sugar and vinegar. Boil this concoction for a few minutes stirring pretty often. Be careful! The mixture is prone to boiling over so keep an eye on things.

Put the eggs in a glass container and CAREFULLY ladle or pour the beet mixture over the eggs. Stir gently and allow to come to room temperature before putting the lid on. Stir the mixture every few hours to make sure all parts of the eggs become nice and red.

I make them a day or two ahead to allow time for the red to penetrate the eggs all the way to the yolk. To serve, just slice them in half and sprinkle some salt and pepper on them. Yummy.

As you can see from the photo, I use a very large jar with a screw-on lid. This was my grandmother's jar and I cherish it. You can also use a glass cookie jar or other large glass container. DON'T use plastic as the hot sugar-beet-vinegar mixture gets poured on the eggs.

Okay, gotta get back to work. My wife is working again today (poor thing). April 15th is just around the corner and her office is buried with work right now. So..I'm in charge of housework and de-cluttering this morning. If the clutter was less, the housecleaning would be much easier. Wow...now I'm sounding like my wife. Yikes. Must be all the vinegar I used in the eggs and beets.

Happy Easter Weekend

Photo from last year's trip to Toledo Zoo (Butterfly House)

Hey bloggers, just wanted to pop in to wish you a very Happy Easter. It's been awhile since I've posted (which makes me very unhappy). Life has been a bit crazier than 'normal'. I'm never quite sure what 'normal' is these days. But...anyhow there just seems to be too many things to do and not quite enough time to get them done. It's a constant struggle, isn't it? Geez!

We're having a small Easter dinner gathering with my dad, my sister-in-law and her daghter and three grand-kiddos. Dinner will be somewhat atypical (we're not doing ham this year). My boys have decided they no longer like ham. Hmmm, whatever! So..we're having Sloppie Joes, green bean casserole, homemade macaroni and cheese, along with some veggie snicky-snacks. I'm going to make a batch of pickled eggs (my grandma's recipe) and I'll bake the traditional lamb cake. The Wilton cake mold works great. If you haven't tried it, don't be afraid -- go for it. Just make sure you grease and flour the top and bottom pieces. Or you can cheat (like I do) and use Pam or Pam Baking with flour already in it. They work great. There are way too many nooks and crannies in a lamb cake mold for me to brush vegetable shortening all over.

If I get real creative (read: have time) I will dig out my pastry bag and large star tip and make the cake look extra nice. If I'm feeling lazy or don't have the time, I'll just frost the littel guy with my offset spatular and we'll call it 'done'.

My wife and I are going to cut back on the candy we put in the boys' Easter baskets this year. They just don't need all that sugar. My wife (the Tax Accountant) has to work tomorrow, so ... if I wake up early enough (note to self: wake up early tomorrow) I might whip up a pair of boxer/sleep-shorts for the boys. We'll just see how things go. And..I really was planning on cranking out a baby bib for Ava (our niece). I really appreciate my day job, but darn! sometimes it gets in the way of my creative side. By the time I get home each night, my butt is dragging. Sorry for venting on you like that. Does anybody else have that problem? Caffeine only works for so long. If you have the magic answer to get more things done, please share them with me and the blogosphere.

Have a GREAT weekend!

Happy Easter !

The tradition continues:











From all of us at the Crafty Dad house to all of you:

HAPPY EASTER !

More Easter Preparations

Water + vinegar + color tablets + 9 coffee mugs + eggs = F.U.N. !

[Note: Son No. 2 on the right is not six feet tall.
When you're small, a kitchen chair is a handy thing.]

As always, the boys had a good time coloring eggs this year. But...a word of warning. My wife picked up the egg coloring kit at Target this year. Nine colors seemed like a great deal. Well...we were slightly disappointed. The instructions said to NOT add vinegar to three of the colored tabs. There was a packet of three tablets and a packet of six tablets in the kit. We assumed the packet of three contained the colors that were supposed to be sans vinegar. We were wrong! So...there were a few colors that turned out horribly. We will never buy the Dudley brand again. I guess when your name has "D-U-D-" in it, it means something. It was truly a dud.

But...we overcame the obstacles and still had a successful time as you can see from the eggs in the photo.

P.S. I searched the web for the kit we used, and CANNOT find it. I found several other kits by Dudley, but not the one with the nine color tabs. Hmmmm, maybe Target got a good deal on these crappy things.

Easter Preparations

Last night was a busy time. We boiled 36 eggs and made pickled eggs and beets (have you heard of them? Recipe to follow.) The boys made Easter Bunnies for me to take to work so I could decorate my cubicle for Easter. How thoughtful! Need some quick bunny (or kitty) whiskers? Recipe to follow!

Easter Tradition: Pickled Eggs and Beets

You know how it is, there are just some things that you expect at each holiday -- a tree at Christmas, hearts for Valentine's Day, shamrocks for St. Patrick's Day, etc., etc. Well...for us it just wouldn't be Easter unless we had pickled eggs and beets. It's a treat that my grandmother made for all the Easter dinners I can remember (and there were a bunch of them). She passed away several years ago and I vowed to keep the tradition alive.

[Boiling lots of eggs, making pickled eggs and beets.]

Here's the (simple) recipe for Pickled Eggs and Beets:

2 cans of sliced beets (including liquid)
2 cups of sugar
2 cups of white vinegar
10-12 hard-boiled eggs (peeled)

In a large non-reactive pan, cook the beets, eggs and vinegar. Bring them to a boil and stir occasionally. If you feel the mixture is a bit too vinegar-y for your taste, you can add another 1/2 cup of sugar and continue to boil and stir for about 10 minutes.

Place the peeled eggs in a large glass container (we use Grandma's jar that has a screw-type lid.) You can use a class cookie jar or canister, as long as it has some sort of lid that fits nice and tight.

Carefully add the beet/sugar/vinegar mixture to the eggs. Beet juice stains, so be aware!

Stir the mixture to make sure the eggs are as far down in the jar as possible. You want them to become nice and reddish-pink. Leave the lid off until the mixture comes to room temperature, then stir again and place the lid on. Open the jar and stir the mixture every hour or so to make sure all surfaces of all the eggs has a chance to become dyed.

We like to make them a day or two before we eat them as the 'pickling process' takes awhile to penetrate the eggs.

When your ready to eat them, just slice the egg and give it (and the beets) a sprinkle of salt and pepper. Try them! They are WAY better than the rubbery ones you see in the deli counter at the supermarket -- trust me.

Easter Bunnies for Dad's Cubicle

The boys wanted something to do while my wife and I boiled eggs, so I suggested they make some Easter bunnies for me to take to work. They took the idea, hook-line-and-sinker. We figured out a really fast way to make whiskers: run a plain piece of paper through the paper shredder (sorry folks, cross-cut shredders won't work). Our shredder made perfect little whiskers that only needed some trimming. (See them on the table below?) A little bit of rubber cement (I love that stuff) and the boys had some great-looking rabbits.

[The boys making Easter Bunny decorations for my cubicle at work.]

[Son No. 2's Creation - The Easter bunny in his bedroom.]

[Son No.1's Bunny Rabbit - A Basic Bunny]


Edited 4-18-07: The boys' artwork is now on display in my cubicle at work. Click here to see it.

Happy Easter !

Hey everybody...wishing you all a happy Easter weekend. Have a great time with the kids - coloring Easter eggs, hiding Easter eggs, and finding all the eggs you hide. We're going to have a fairly quiet day. My wife and boys will be sharing Easter dinner with my dad (who is doing SO GOOD these days).

We're coloring eggs tonite. And I'm baking the traditional lamb cake. The cake pan set is apparently no longer available from Wilton, but here's the instruction sheet. The boys will get their Easter baskets on Sunday, but we're cutting back on the candy. Too much of a good thing!

My Easter treat this year comes in the form of a vintage Singer sewing machine. Yes, I was at the thrift shop earlier this week (with NO pre-conceived ideas, mind you). But....as I was leaving I saw what appeared to be a sewing machine case on a table. So I just HAD to go look. And I looked. And I took! Here's a picture and review of this model from PatternReview.com. It's a beautiful Singer Model 237-MA. Made in Italy of all places. I took it home and fired it up. I adjusted the bobbin tension and it works like a charm. It is flawless. No scratches, no dings. Amazing! And it weighs a TON. It's all metal except for the part that covers the head. I'll try to get a few pics of it posted soon. What a find!

Have a great weekend.


UPDATE: Click here for more on the sewing machine, including a photo.