Wishing you all a great holiday this weekend with your family and friends. Easter marks the end of the fasting season of Lent and the death, on Good Friday and resurrection of Jesus Christ, on Easter Sunday. The egg is seen as a sign of renewed life or resurrected life by breaking out of it…. hence the whole eggs and Easter deal.
The Easter bunny and rabbit connection is a bit more involved. It comes from the hare, an ancient pre-Christian symbol of fertility associated with Spring. But then there is something in mythology about how someone changed her pet bird into a rabbit to entertain a bunch of kids and the rabbit laid colorful eggs for them. There are lots of stories about how all this came to be out there. The chocolate bunny inspiration and chocolate eggs though were inspired by 18th and 19th century mid-European traditions.
What I love the most about this time of year is all of the Sweet Jasmine (pictured above) that is blooming in Los Angeles right now. It’s my favorite thing about this time of year. It only blooms for a short time, and it smells insane!!!! I can not wait to get home to LA to the the Sweet Jasmine that we have planted at our house! I haven’t seen any of this in New York (it might be something that only blooms in California) and I’m dying to get home and smell it! It’s the most gorgeous smell.
I want to share with you some alternatives to dying Easter eggs. I know it’s synonymous with the holiday… but exercise kindness to the animals and the planet! There are other ways to get that holiday feeling.
Get the little colorful plastic eggs… and reuse them every year!! If you must buy them new, buy them new, but you can put an ad on Craigslist to hunt down some used ones, or check out your neighborhood thrift stores. I’ve done a search to find ones made from recycled plastic, but didn’t have any luck. If any of you know about these existing in the world, please let me know. Anyhow, go the plastic-egg route for Easter egg hunts, Easter baskets, etc. Fill them with candy (see some kinder-to-your-body treat options below), coins, trinkets…get creative!!
And here are some cute upcycled eggs from etsy.com (upcycling is the practice of taking something that is disposable and transforming it into something of greater use and value. This process allows for the reduction of waste and use of virgin materials). (they are not real eggs….they are made from plastic eggs) You could get something like this, or use inspiration to make your very own with scraps of wrapping paper and other crafty things you probably have in your house already. Have a little arts and crafts gathering with friends, maybe bring wine, and go nuts!
For Easter baskets, again, I would suggest thrift stores… any place you could find a cute used one. They are perfect for taking to the farmer’s market year round!
For filler for the baskets, try for recycled paper shreds – instead of the shiny faux grass plasticy stuff. Or better yet, forgo paper all together and use leaves from your backyard or other cute things from nature.
If you are craving Peeps… check out these Vegan Easter Marshmallows from sweetandsara.com. They aren’t superhero, just FYI, but they are super cute and super yum.
Lagusta’s Luscious makes awesome bonbons and treats in general. Check them out here: lagustaslucious.com.
Allison’s Gourmet has a great selection of Easter goodies as well. The little chocolate eggs would be perfect to put inside little plastic eggs!
And Rose City Chocolates has an assortment of Easter chocolates too.
I would love to hear about how you make your egg-free Easter. How do you make yours happen? And any other kind practices that you take part in during this time of year?
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