Play School - Easter

I'm having a hard time comprehending that Easter is on Sunday!  It seems like 2013 is truly flying by.  I find myself still writing 2012 sometimes....but that could be because I rarely write out the date.  SAHM problems.

But the weather is beautiful and Spring is in full force here and I'm looking forward to a nice Easter with the kids and their Grammy and Papa.  I'm so glad to have family here in Nevada.  Hey Mom!  Sure you don't want to move here too??? Please!?  :)

For our Easter Play School I decided to try something new.  A Pre-K pack from Over the Big Moon.  I've seen "packs" on Pinterest and the boys are getting to an age/level where I think they are ready to do some of them.  Read on for more.....

Books - 

What is Easter by Michelle Medlock Adams  

This is a GREAT book if you are interested in teaching your kids about the religious meaning of Easter....but are ok with celebrating with the bunny too.  Before I had kids I said, no way no Easter bunny.  But I found that I couldn't take away that experience from my little guys and I am confident they will learn to know that the most important part of Easter has nothing to do with egg hunts and jelly beans.  This book is a great first step for the youngest of kids.

It's Easter, Little Critter! by Mercer Mayer

I love these books, they are nostalgic for me.  And the boys love looking for the mouse and the spider (Yuck! says Aaron) on every page.

Owen's Marshmallow Chick by Kevin Henkes

A cute little book about a mouse who enjoys his Easter candy but cuddles his marshmallow chick.  Very sweet.

And Most Importantly!!

We are "trying" to read the Jesus Storybook Bible by Sally Lloyd-Jones.  My inspiration (I had never heard of this Bible before) came from In Lieu of Preschool.

I love the book.  It is a great "Bible" written in more of a story-telling type fashion.  Every story points to Jesus in a very enlightening manner.  But, admittedly, I am getting more out of reading this than the twins.  I try to read a chapter a day and sometimes they listen, and sometimes they don't.  But that is ok.  We are going to make a tradition of reading it each Spring and I know that they will come to enjoy it and take away a lot from it as they grow.

Activities -

Over the Big Moon Easter Pre-K pack  - I really like these packets.  They are free and easy to download and this one is huge!  It has 31 pages.  I was able to choose a lot of different activities to do with the boys that I thought were at a good level for them.

I printed out my favorites and laminated most of them.  I laminated two puzzles, the size sequencing baskets, and one of the pattern sheets and attached magnets to the pieces so the boys can use them on their large magnet board in the playroom.

I also laminated and cut of some of the vocab cards to play memory and matching games.

Watercolor E is for Egg craft - In doing our Easter craft I decided to go about it a little differently than usual.  Instead of doing the whole thing at once, this time we are doing a little every day.  My kids get very excited when I ask them if they want to paint, color, use stickers, etc....but they don't stay at the activity for very long.  So I decided to finally learn from their cues and just separate the activity into steps.

For this one we are decorating an Easter egg to put in our alphabet books. The first day the boys painted some paper with watercolors.  This was their first time using watercolors and they did great!

Once the paintings were dry I cut them each into a large egg shape.  Over the coming days we'll continue to decorate them with stickers, stamps, whatever the boys want, then I'll glue them to cardstock and label them, E is for egg, for the books.

Easter Egg Dying - We are doing this today with Grammy!  We are going to use an egg spinner I picked up in Target that I thought the boys would enjoy at this age.

Easter Egg hunt - Just a small one in the backyard on Sunday. :)

So that is about it!  No church for the boys, unfortunately they still can't handle it.  But I am excited to be able to go with my MIL while Papa and Daddy watch the boys.  Hopefully they'll be watching them play, not watching them eat too much candy.

Have a very happy Easter everyone!  Or if you celebrate Passover and made it this far....Happy Passover too.  :)

Easter Idea Roundup

I'm a pretty bad food blogger when it comes to the holidays. Instead of trying out recipes and sharing them with you before the actual day arrives, I just scope out ideas and whip them up day of. Making the winners a little late to share with you. Another negative side effect of this habit is that I may end up with a dud on my Easter/thanksgiving/etc table. They tell you never try anything new for a holiday meal but Mr. Pears and I have a very hard time restraining ourselves.

So I confess, I want Easter bread on Easter and turkey on Thanksgiving and so on. Maybe next year I'll do better. But this year, instead of giving you the tried and true I'm just going to throw out some of the things I'm making or thinking about making this weekend. Maybe you'll be inspired to try something new too.



I am definitely making this Easter Bread. It looks so pretty and delicious! And it will be a good use for some of those eggs I'm going to dye for with my little guys today.

photo from The Italian Dish

And I'm for sure going to make Julia Child's Madeleines. Those have to be tried and true right? Plus madeleines are very simple to make. Just don't put them in a closed container to store them, they'll get mushy.

We've decided to go with lamb as our main course for Easter dinner and I'm pretty sure we are going to use this recipe from Food and Wine...substituting the lamb shanks of course. We've actually made this one before (with lamb) and it was really good. It's an easy one too.

I'm thinking about going with these Spring Peas as a side...possibly with some fingerling potatoes.

Oh and lastly I'll probably be making these strawberry muffins to take to the breakfast potluck/egg hunt we are going to on Saturday.

Did I mention I also have dinner and dancing with my best friend who is visiting this weekend, an egg hunt, a chocolate factory tour, and attending Easter service with two rambunctious toddlers on my weekend to-do list? I am going to be busy. But I'm betting it is going to be a great weekend.

Happy Easter!  From me and my little bunnies

Obviously our first attempt at this year's bunny ears pictures didn't go well.  Don't worry, I will try again!

Easter Baskets

I just finished up the boys' Easter baskets and I think they are going to love them. Here is what I included for my little lovies.

Stuffed Bunnies (made by Mom!)
Homemade Cherry lollipops
Plastic eggs filled with fishies and animal crackers
The Gruffalo movie for Alex and Lady and the Tramp movie for Aaron (that kid loves dogs)
Melissa and Doug Pet Handle Stampers (the stamps fit in large plastic eggs)
Duplo building plates (no more battles over the one that came with their blocks...hopefully)
Coloring books


And so as not to deprive my poor children out of a little chocoate, I made some chocolate bunnies with a mold I found at Target. I just melted down some (amazingly delicious) 60% cocoa by Ghiradelli and poured them into the molds. The molds had space to add lolli sticks so I used the ones I had leftover in hopes that a handle will make the chocolates a bit less messy for the boys (a girl can wish right?).

So there you have it! A little home-made and a little store-bought...all in hopes of seeing two little boys smile on Easter morning. :)

Stuffed Bunnies, crocheted with love

I recently learned a new skill from my mother, she taught me to crochet!  I had been wanting to learn for a while now because I thought it might be a fun way to keep my hands busy and to relax at the same time.  So the last time she visited, my Mom brought a crochet hook and some yarn and we sat together as she showed me the basics.  It was fairly simple to pick up and I've really enjoyed doing it!  It is fun to see something new created from a little ball of yarn.

I decided my very first project would be these bunnies to put in the kids' Easter baskets.  Stuffed toy?  First project?  It sounds complicated but I swear it was really easy and though these little guys aren't perfect, I think they are super cute and I'm sure my boys are going to love them.  (For about 2 minutes before they move on to the lollipops.)

If you know how to crochet this project would literally just take an evening's time.  If not, I'm betting you could learn from an online tutorial and still have one of these done by Easter.  I never thought I could learn crochet from a book or video but it seriously is simple stuff so if your Mama's not close at hand and you've been wanting to learn, go for it!

Here's a link to the pattern.  And of course some photos..... Lots more Easter stuff to come this week!  I hope you are enjoying the holiday.