Blessing of the Easter Food

This Easter season has me posting a lot more frequently!

Here is my basket.

My church did something we had not done before. We had the Blessing of the Easter Food this morning.
I had heard about this. It's a tradition dating back over 1,000 years and practiced quite a bit in Eastern Europe. In Poland, it's called Swieconka. On the day before Easter you assemble some of your Easter food and take it to church for the priest to bless. The basket is traditionally lined with a white cloth and is decorated with boxwood. It was a rainy morning here, so my basket was rather small - I didn't really want to carry a ham with me anyway! Attending the blessing was fun and definitely a new experience for me. Apparently in parts of the US, people make butter lambs to include in the baskets. Maybe a thought for me for next year...

Here's the scene of the blessing of the baskets at church. We managed to wish each other a Happy Easter in many, many languages.

Other than that it has been a sleepy day here with all the rain. Maybe I'll work on a quilt for awhile before it gets too dark. Happy Easter!

Easter Week

Easter Week has been a busy one for me. Just so I don't forget, I'm wishing you a Happy Easter right here at the start!

On Tuesday, my quilt guild met and we were wonderfully entertained by Cathy Miller, the Singing Quilter. If you have seen the YouTube with "You Can Quilt That Out", that's Cathy Miller's song. Also, I couldn't resist taking a comfort quilt packet home with me. Once it's stitched, I'll return it to the guild and it will be given to someone. Our guild makes quilts for so many deserving groups.

Are you a Snoopy or Peanuts fan? I think this is going to turn out really cute.

On Thursday, I attended the Lexington County Master Gardeners meeting. We had a speaker who provided information on that wonderful plant - the Hydrangea. I won a door prize and here it is! Look at the size of those hydrangea blossoms!

 

Arrangement with dried hydrangeas

So what did I do today? First time ever, I made pierogi (a traditional Polish dumpling type of food.) My husband helped. Some batches of the dough worked better than others. The fillings were one of two types: sauerkraut with mushrooms and onions - or ricotta cheese with onions. The recipe says to use farmer's cheese, but I've never seen that sold around here. I added some seasoning to each.

The bad part was when I got to the cooking instructions and it said to boil each one individually for 5-8 minutes. We made over 2 dozen! Anyway, we ended up putting them in boiling water 2-3 at a time and it worked fine. I thought we did pretty well considering I had not attempted this before. Here's a picture. As you might guess, it's supposed to look like a half-circle. This was photographed after the "taste tester" checked it out!

We have rain arriving today and apparently it's going to continue to be wet through to midday on Easter.
However, the Easter eggs have been boiled and dyed. I think I'll be ready for Easter Sunday!

Little Girl Things

I've found that after that beautiful granddaughter arrives, you develop a special interest in "little girl things."
I'll start out with a newer picture of my darling granddaughter, Miranda.

With Easter coming up, I had to get this cute little bunny hat for her. It's not listed on Etsy right now, but comes from the shop https://www.etsy.com/shop/HookedByNurseSharon.

As you may recall, I am captain of two teams on Etsy. The baby girl items have caught my attention. I think Miranda needs all of them!  Here are some cute items from 2HeartsDesire First of all, look at this pretty card to welcome a new baby girl.

 

 Then there are these adorable teething ring rattles. These work for a boy or a girl.  :-)

 And how about this beautiful pink wooden Easter to celebrate Baby's First Easter?

Check out all of these items at  https://www.etsy.com/shop/2HeartsDesire

Miranda might need to be a bit older to appreciate something like this, but one day she will simply have to have an American Girl Doll. Look at this cute outfit:

This dress and many other outfits for American Girl Dolls can be found at DonnaDesigned.
https://www.etsy.com/shop/DonnaDesigned

And we can't forget Dr. Seuss. In fact, Miranda was born on what was Dr. Seuss's birthday!

 This print and others as well as photographs can be found at SoupDimples:
https://www.etsy.com/shop/soupdimples

Well, I think Grandma needs to stop shopping now. Enjoy the Springtime weather if it has reached your area by now. We've had a few really beautiful days and my plants are responding.