Easter Sunday with my Peeps

I hope that you all have had a marvelous Easter day. with nice weather, a few flowers (or buds) in the garden, family and/or friends, great food and most of all, serenity knowing that however you celebrate this Spring holiday is the "right" way.

This is the first holiday we've celebrated in our new home. We did the traditional things with the usual suspects family members but in a new setting. It's been an awesome day!

For Easter dinner, I made what my kids have always called "Good Lasagna" ( as compared to "Everyday Lasagna"!)  Forgive me, Easter traditionalists, that I don't do the usual baked ham, etc. but we've had lasagna for Easter for over 20 years now.  I use the recipe in the Better Homes and Gardens cookbook that I received as a wedding shower gift in 1971. Every layer is made from scratch and it takes over 2 hours to prepare, assemble and bake, but it is sooo worth it!  I only make it for Easter and when someone requests it for a special celebration.  

After our Easter lunch was finished, we got ready for the Second Annual Peeps Olympics!  Daughter Tessa started this last year and it was so much fun that we repeated it again this year.   Last fall, we were at the Mall of America in MN and visited the Peeps store there. We got this giant stuffed Peeps bean bag to be the traveling trophy. Her she is sitting on her nest of Cadbury chocolate eggs (one of my personal favorite Easter candies, the other favorite one being the Lifesaver fruit-flavored jelly beans. Don't tell anyone but I have an extra bag stashed away for the future LOL), surrounded by all the participating Olympic teams.  As you can see, I am the yellow team--Nana.  Bear with me as I show you pix of the Olympic events and the overall champion of the day and winner of the traveling trophy.  

The first event is the sprint. You have to blow your Peeps the length of the dining room table and here daughter Jo, also known as Auntie Jo, competes with granddaughter Lily.  Lily won that round.

Next came the Peep-apult.  We had to catapult our peeps off a wooden spoon into the pot on the floor. We each had 3 tries and needless to say, none of us got a Peep into the pot.  So we decided that whoever was closest to the pot was the winner of that event.

The third event was the swimming race.  We had to blow our peeps across a large basin of water and whoever came in first was the winner. I was so excited watching the races and cheering on the Peeps that I forgot to take any pictures!

Now we have Peep Jousting.  Here you see two competing Peeps with their toothpicks jousting sticks on the plate, waiting to go into the microwave.

Before the microwave

After the microwave

 We set the microwave to no more than 30 seconds--no one was brave enough to see what would happen if we zapped them longer--no one wanted to have to clean up the mess if they exploded in there.  : p)

We also turned off the turntable so the Peeps couldn't move while they were in the oven.






As they were zapped, they began puffing up to enormous size!  I've never seen anything like it! The winner is the one whose jousting stick touches the other Peep first. The "after" pix gives you an idea how huge these things can get.








Each person got a score for each event and then we added up the scores to get the "grand Champion."  Tessa and I were tied for first place so we had to do an additional event that we called "Peep in the Pot."  Here Tessa is trying to get her green Peep in the pot behind her but she missed. I didn't miss so I'm the Grand Champion!

And here I am with my traveling Peeps trophy!  And I see that Don is "peeping" around the corner.  Could he be a little jealous over my amazing victory? ? ? 

And, lastly,  I have to include a picture of the Peeps cheerleaders in a Peeps pyramid!

As if that wasn't enough excitement for this beautiful, sunny, warm day, we went for a 1.6 mile walk on the local trail. It was very refreshing and helped work off some of the thousands of lasagne calories I consumed at lunch!

All the Peeps shenanigans sound so silly but they're good fun and the entire family had a great time! And isn't that what holidays are for--to celebrate our families. I hope your day was as much fun as mine was. Tomorrow, I quilt.