Kimberly A. Cook

Military Romance Author

Easter

Happy Spring Moon!

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True sign of Spring? Wall of flip flops at the store Monday!

Spring! Finally! We’ve had a great couple days of nice weather and it gives me hope the sun will return again this year. For those of you still freezing your body parts off, my condolences. Mother Nature will share the sun again. I promise.

This is my favorite season, to see the daffodils peeking open, the pollen launching itself into the atmosphere and the plants showing up at the garden center. I did prevent myself from buying a five-foot tall metal flamingo the other weekend, but now there are three-foot ones in at my garden store. I might be tempted.

Carnations have arrived at the Garden Center. I did stop and take a whiff.

My yard art needs makeovers, the garage needs a major and continuing muck out, and all I want to do is nap in the sun spots like Spec Ops Cat. And read some good books. Which I have piled on the floor in my office and bedroom. I corral them in the rest of the house. Kinda.

Renewal. Hope. Bunny supplies! It’s time to buy the Easter candy and stock up before all the good stuff is gone. That includes accessories, basket booty and colored plastic eggs. With glitter. I have been in four bunny retail sections this past week. Two of them twice. Bunny bliss.  

Bunny candy! Bunny bags! Bunny cling stickers! Make me stop…..

My craft addiction continues apace and I ordered some Penny Black bunny stamps too. I know I can’t draw, but I can color inside the lines. Of course, I couldn’t stamp until I bagged a bottle of vegetable glycerin to help clean the stamps. Every endeavor requires equipment. I am a go for bunny stamps arriving soon. 

Now I get to plan the Bunny Brunch I am going to host for the family next month. Thought about bringing all my collected bunnies into the dining room for the event. But the living room may not be big enough. I’ve got BUNNIES! Will have to work on that idea. My own personal bunny rodeo.

Enjoy today’s first day of Spring and tonight’s full moon.

Spring is back!

Hug a bunny!

Ready For Bunny Romp?

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by Kimberly A. Cook

Celebrated Spring Break this week by attending a private crochet camp. I flunked. Actually, it was two friends and my Mom with her friend teaching, but private crochet camp sounds so fancy. It confirmed I’m a knitter and got me back to a blanket project, so success.

Spring is my favorite time of year with the flowers blooming, more daylight and bunnies! I have been a huge bunny fan since I was young. We had a wild rabbit sighting in my backyard as a kid and I’ve been bunny bonkers ever since.

So while other folks might be dealing with basketball brackets, I’m enjoying bunny brackets. How about these seven-week-old Rex rabbits who have joined the Oregon Zoo family farm? So adorable!

Bet they are the star attractions for the Oregon Zoo’s Rabbit Romp tomorrow. Remember, don’t give rabbits as live gifts, but do eat your greens like these baby bunnies demonstrate. However, they are eating kale; good for them, but I think lettuce is fine too.

Have a great safe weekend and Happy Quirky Friday!

 

After The Easter Bunny? Spring?

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by Kimberly A. Cook                      (Twitter@  WarriorTales)

Recovering from my chocolate Easter egg binge, so thought I would share some sights of the holiday celebration. All the candy seems to be gone; cannot figure out how that happened.

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This year I decided to pull some of my favorite bunny figurines out of the china cabinet and mix them with some new Fairy Rock Garden items. Loved the look it gave the table.   

 

The day before Easter I met with my fabulous writing support group and my buddy Martha gave me a bouquet of her award-winning camellias. Then her husband gave me my very own bloom picked fresh from the plant. Gorgeous!

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How gorgeous is this pink and white beauty? I’m drying the petals as they fall off to see if I can preserve them for resin jewelry.   

 

When I got back home from the writer group it was time for final preparation for family on Sunday. Got the items together for setting the table, put the flowers in a grand spot and made bunny candy bags.

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The single picked bloom floating in water. Takes my breath away.

 

Hope you had a nice weekend and are making plans for when the sun returns for good and Spring really kicks in this year. In the meantime, it’s finally time to move the fuchsias out of the garage. I think.

Maybe if I put parkas on them just to be safe…… Happy almost gardening!

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Spec Ops Cat helping with the table setting. Not. The bunny and flower wall did not keep him off the table. P.S. Got the bunny napkin ring holders at Goodwill for pennies. Bunny bargain!

 

 

Kitty Bunny Snuggle Dreams?

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by Kimberly A. Cook                   (Twitter@    WarriorTales)

Easter is Sunday and this kitty Sophie can’t wait to dream about her favorite floppy-eared friends. She even uses her bunny as a pillow. Check out this wonderful bunny dreaming kitty. For a bonus watch how she puts herself to bed every night.

Very accomplished kitty!

Have a great weekend and Happy Quirky Friday!

Now the Easter Bunny only arrives if you go to bed on time, so Sophie made sure she was tucked in! She learned from waiting for Santa from the looks of this video where she is cuddling with Rudolph.

 

Can You Master Lazy Entertaining?

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by Kimberly A. Cook                 (Twitter@  WarriorTales)

Easter is one of my favorite holidays since it’s an all bunnies all the time zone. This past Sunday I hosted the family holiday again but I entertained in full mosey mode. Its been a busy couple months with a surgery, an accident recovery and general chaos in the family.

So my plan was to air lift the vittles from one of our favorite restaurants. I ordered the ham and cheese quiche and the four different pieces of pie online from Shari’s Restaurant on Thursday. Picked them up at 10 a.m. on Saturday and put all in the frig. Since I also picked up lettuce, tomatoes, Hawaiian Sweet Rolls and two bouquets of flowers on Thursday night after work, fini!

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Bunny booty bag, name tag holder and chocolate eggs. Step 1.

 

Since the cooking was done except for heating up the quiche on Sunday morning, I decided to do some bunny table decorating. I always have to make bunny booty bags to go for all my guests; it’s the perfect excuse to buy more Easter candy. Found the name tag holders for the table, the pink tablecloth and the bunny candy dish.

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Add more bunny candy and flowers. Step 2.

 

My collection of rabbits from around the world sits right next to the dining room table, so adding the candy dish with Hershey’s Kisses and the chocolate candy covered eggs in the blue measuring bowl, almost perfect. I added two bouquets of flowers and all was set.

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Years of bunny collecting, hares everywhere!

 

Some folks might call this slacking, but after years of cooking and baking, sometimes a person just needs a break. In the past we’ve tried this for Mother’s Day and it worked out quite well. There’s nothing like zooming past the waiting  line of 10,000 people at The Olive Garden to get lasagna, bread sticks and salad to go. The whimpers from those in the line is always followed by someone saying “Why didn’t we do that?”

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Then right before guests arrive some gate crasher always shows up looking for his name tag on the table. Step 3. There are fewer chocolate eggs in the bowl in this picture. No idea how that happened. That’s my story ……..  

 

So after we had our meal, a nice chat and some folks took a little power nap, it was time to unbox the pie. We had one piece of everyone’s favorite, because you can’t buy a chocolate cream, peach, Marion berry, chocolate silk pie. Plus I sent home a piece of quiche for all to go with their bunny bags of chocolates.

Totally unexpected was a bunny booty haul I made with gifts from my sister and family. A mini bunny baking cake pan, chocolate bunny, chocolate carrots, bunny napkins, bunny marshmallow decorating kit and a bunny centerpiece. Bunnypalooza! Does life get much better than that? I think not.

Sometimes lazy really pays off. Viva la online food ordering! Plan ahead, Mother’s Day is coming….

 

Got Chocolate Leftovers?

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by Kimberly A. Cook           (Twitter@   WarriorTales)

The only thing I like more than leftover chocolate Easter cupcakes is Easter candy on sale! Since we always have candy snack packs for the “big kids” every Easter, I had to stock up ahead of time on treats. The bags were on sale two-for-one before the holiday, so I experimented and found some Hershey’s chocolate covered almonds.

Chocolate covered almonds and chocolate cupcakes; double-decker dessert! Yes, but of course I have pink china.
Chocolate covered almonds and chocolate cupcakes; double-decker dessert! But of course I have pink china.

Weekend before last when I was under the weather, it seemed the perfect time to taste test the new morsels. They were fabulous. Included some in the snack sacks and then shared them on the top shelf of the cupcake dessert display.

Added some of the Dove dark chocolate half eggs in the bunny bowl on the table and all the treats seemed to disappear throughout the meal.

Decided to check out the leftover Easter candy after work last night and the locusts had already hit the store; no Hershey’s chocolate covered almonds in sight. Sigh.

However, I did find some sugar-free dark chocolate covered almonds in the bulk candy section. It’s a miracle! They also have milk chocolate covered almonds too, so I must insist on testing those out.

I always travel with snacks so I must see if these new items are worthy to be added to the peanut M&M’s I always carry when I take a trip. One thing the military taught me, always pack snacks. It’s logistics!

Now all I need to do is put a reminder in my calendar to stock up on the Hershey’s chocolate covered almonds next Easter. Maybe a case. Buying in bulk is always a good idea when it comes to snacks. Got candy?