Easter Grazing Board

Holidays come and go so quickly, don't they!!

Even though Easter was late in the spring, it

is sad to see it over with.  

We had a lovely family dinner, and all

the kids were able to be here.

 I am always looking for something different to do,

and I have loved making Chocolate Boards lately, 

so I decided to do an Easter Grazing Board for our feast.

The huge board in the background was made by my

son and his wife.  They gave it as a gift to my daughter

last year for Christmas, so I asked to borrow it.  I might 

also have hinted that I would like one of my own!!  It

is six feet in length and makes such a fun anchor for

the grazing board.

I gathered most of my MacKenzie-Childs Courtly 

Check for the feast, and that added an elegance to

the more rustic presentation on the board.

These fun chocolate eggs were found at 

Home Goods this year and they were 

the inspiration for the chocolate part of the 

board.

Look at this beautiful pink marbled one.

Fruits and assorted chocolates filled 

the board. 

I decided to place the meats and cheeses 

on a separate board, to keep them away 

from the desserts.

The space between the boards was filled in with 

leaf lettuce.

The green and purple chocolate bunnies 

also came from Home Goods this year.

I chose buttery croissants and fresh bakery 

bagels for the sandwich bases.

Fresh fruit, chocolate, treats and breads, 

how could you go wrong - something for everyone!

The best part is seeing the reaction of the adults 

when they come in.  Truly, I got one of the best

reactions every from them on this feast!  

We were celebrating a DIL's and a SIL's 

birthday, so my daughter asked for 

Cheesecake Factory's Oreo Dream Cheesecake. 

We topped it with some Cadbury Eggs - our

personal favorite Easter Eggs!!

In addition I made Cadbury Egg Rice Krispie Treats,

Easter Churro Toffee (a spring version of 

Disneyland's Churro Toffee),

and candied pistachios.  My little 3 year old granddaughter 

just loves pistachios, so I thought these would be fun. 

My oldest daughter made these Strawberry Macarons. 

They were half gone by the time they got to our house!!! 

Her oldest daughter, who is 14, has been making 

them by herself, but she had cheer tryouts that day.

We had our celebration on Saturday, so the kids could 

go to their in-laws on Sunday.

The grocery store had these gorgeous 

hydrangeas colored in spring shades, so I 

just had to have them.  The ranunculus blossoms 

are from Trader Joe's. 

The bulbs literally opened for Easter,

and the flowering plum tree was perfect too.

We separate the egg hunt into babies, kids and adults, 

as we don't want injuries!!!

It is a mad race and over in less than a minute, 

then everyone gathers in the living room to 

open their eggs.

I hope you had a wonderful Easter too.

Thanks for visiting to see our Easter 

Grazing Board, of course this would work 

for any time of year, and any occasion.

There is nothing like being able to gather 

together as a family.

I will be posting this with

Tablescapes Thursday

Harry Potter Yule Ball

As you know, we have been crazy busy this

last month with Harry Potter activities for our

Young Single Adult Ward.  My husband is the

Bishop of the Ward and I have fun throwing

fabulous parties for them.

To end the month of house competitions, I

decided it shouldn't be just an awards ceremony,

but a Yule Ball.  Now asking these kids who

are age 18-30 to come to a ball, could be kind

of risky, but we knew that if we made it magical,

showed them how pretty it was going to be, fed them, 

and then turned the lights down they might dance!!!

I invested a little money in netting, sparkling

silver tablecloths and runners, and fairy lights,

but other than that, I used what I had.  

Our Ward cultural hall is smaller than most and

carpeted rather than a gym floor.  It also has the

advantage of having accordian walls that can make

the space smaller, so we closed off a third of the 

cultural hall.  Then we strung a wire across the back

accordian wall to hang the fabric and fairy lights from.

The tables were set with my white pinch pleat

tablecloths that I purchased for my daughter's

wedding six years ago.  The vases and votives were

ones that I glittered for a friend's wedding reception.

I purchased new silver glittered table runners.

Then I filled the vases with water beads, submersible

lights and white and silver naturals.

We had electric candles in vases leading up to the

front door of the church and hung netting curtains

at the front to make the entrance inviting.

A chalkboard sign directed them to the right

entrance door.  We had the ball music playing 

in the foyer as they entered.

As they entered the cultural hall, they saw the

final results for the competition in the bottles.  They

also were to put their names in the cup for a special

drawing at the end.

The star of the dessert table was the five tiered

chocolate fountain.  My daughter used to have a

chocolate fountain business where she supplied 

them for wedding receptions and events, but

that changed when everyone got small ones

that they purchased themselves.  I still get a 

thrill seeing a huge chocolate fountain.  

I also filled tall vases with the water beads

and placed two submersible lights in those.

Some of my metallic trees anchored the table ends.

I ordered a three-tiered cake from Sam's Club

(only $65 - such a steal) and then added a

Hogwart's seal that I printed on my edible

printer, surrounded by edible pearls.

I also created a Yule Ball Chocolate Board for 

the dessert table.

The dessert table was anchored on the other 

end with a candy selection and in the center

The Triwizard Cup (which I purchased recently

at The Wizarding World of Harry Potter).

My niece had given me a set of Harry Potter

Cookie Cutters from Williams Sonoma, and I

made shortbread cookies and dipped the bottoms 

in chocolate.  

Our final item on the dessert table was Golden Snitches

made by a member of the Relief Society Presidency.

On a side table we served sparkling apple cider

in plastic goblets from Dollar Tree.  I have used

and reused these a dozen times - I just throw them

in the dishwasher.

I came as Hermione with the side pony tail and pink 

ruffled skirt, and hubby came in his dress robes.

The invitation said, 

"Dress to impress!"  This was a ball, after all.

It wasn't required, but we had quite a few who 

dressed up.

Ravenclaw was the winning house with over 

15,000 points!  The closest competitor had 7,000 points.

It was a huge success and with the help of some of 

the Young Adults, we had the whole room transformed 

in about a total of two hours.

I will be posting this with

Tablescapes Thursday

Dishing It and Digging It

Sources

Water Beads (I used 1 lb)

Submersible Tea Lights

Curtain Fairy Lights (I used 2)

Silver Tablecloths

Table Runners (I used 10)

40 Yards of Tulle 

(I used 3 but more would have been nice)

Silver Cake Platter

(I have had mine for years, but this is similar)

Harry Potter Cup Competition for Young Single Adults

This is our second Harry Potter competition for

the Young Single Adult Ward my husband is

the Bishop over.  We did another one a couple

of years ago, and you might remember it.

I transformed the cultural hall into the Great Hall

with each house having a table in their own color.

Electric candles and banners were hung over the

house tables.

We dragged all of our Harry Potter paraphernalia 

over to create the Great Hall.  Hubby is Dumbledore,

and I am Professor McGonagal.

I blew up a picture I had taken of

the podium at the Harry Potter Studios in

London to make the owl for the podium.

I borrowed some very cleverly made

spell books from a friend for some decor.

I have to make some for myself.

Everyone came in through a maze of hanging letters

in the entry of the building

to find Ollivander and to choose

their wands. 

 I had made 80 wands from two sizes of chopsticks

and hot glue and beads.  They were then spray painted

and placed in a foam block to dry.

Of course, if you are a Harry Potter fan, you know 

that you don't choose the wand, the wand chooses you, 

so I had them pick a number between 1-4, and then

a number between 1-15.  The first number determined

the drawer they would open in my little old desk,

and the second number was counted from right to left,

thus choosing the wand.

After being sorted by the Sorting Hat and

Professor McGonagal, they were led down

the hall by one of the professors or staff.

If they wore a costume from their house, they

were automatically sorted into that house.

This is our Bishopric, Ward Clerk and High Councilor

and their wives.  You might notice Ollivander, Professor Umbridge

(boo), Professor Trelawny, Hagrid and Snape.  They took turns

escorting the kids down the hall into the Great Hall.

The lights were turned low so that the candles

all glowed.

This year we were lucky enough to borrow

someone's slushy machines to have Frozen Butterbeer.

I have also made it using my ice cream freezer,

but this machine can produce a lot.  I really

would love one of these machines.

I had printed off stickers and placed them on

plastic mugs for the Butterbeer.

You could choose to top it with the cream or not.

The meal served was a breakfast of pancakes

and sausage (or bangers) and baked beans (very

authentic and served at the Three Broomsticks

with breakfast.)

The month proceeded as shown above while

we tried to make everything Harry Potter related

throughout the month.  

We had the ward over for egg rolls one night

after ward prayer.

Even the kitchen was decorated for that,

and house totals were shown in the jars. 

The jars kept reappearing with the levels

changing as the house points changed.

We made over 100 egg rolls.  The kids really loved this.

Once a month I serve a brunch to the Ward Council,

and I chose to try Toad in the Hole.

It is Yorkshire pudding or popover batter with

sausages baked in.  You could have it with

syrup or onion gravy.  I really loved the onion gravy.

Throughout the month the

Young Single Adults could log onto to a web site

set up by one of the kids with specifications

on how many points they could earn and for

what, and house totals.  This really encouraged

them to do a lot of service and activities.

Points were given for all kinds of activities,

focusing on service and getting to know one another.

The kids could log onto the site to get ideas and

then post their points and even pictures of 

some of the things they had done.

The most points were awarded for the Scavanger hunt,

because it was the most intensive, but each person could

earn 250 points for participating.

So you can see I and my alter ego, Professor

McGonagal have been very, very, very busy

this past month.  

Our closing ceremony was the Yule Ball,

which turned out so great, but I will

save that for another post.

Hope you or your group can use some of

these fun ideas.  This was so much fun for

the kids in the Young Single Adults Ward.