Spring Sunday Brunch

First let me just say that we are so blessed with two amazing families.  To have family at our house is the most incredible gift, and not one that we take for granted.  It feels so special to be making memories in our first house.  The emotional aspect of that is not lost on us — we worked so hard for this, and our families had such a huge part that they played by supporting us to create opportunities for this to happen for us.  Being homeowners is so huge for us…to the point that little annoyances like a slightly overgrown lawn or a bunch of dirty dishes after an elaborate meal for just the two of us raises reactions like, I’m so glad I have a lawn to MOW! – My husband, and We’re so blessed to be having dinner in our HOUSE!  Can you believe we have a HOUSE?! — the dishes aren’t even noticed.  We truly feel just completely overwhelmed at this point with our blessings.  Our cups are overflowing, and we’re taking opportunities all day long to give the glory to God and thank Him for all of this.

To have our families at our house, to putter and nest, to fill our house with flowers and plants, to cozy up on the sofa together and watch movies, to occasionally have a pizza night in our pajamas… It’s a wonderful time.  🙂

So we invited our family for a Spring brunch, and we wanted to make it fun and festive.  I made this egg casserole (so good), my mom-in-law made some lemon danish-type treats and a cinnamon roll French toast bake, and my sis-in-law brought this awesome fruit salad with blackberries, grapes, mandarin oranges, etc. — delicious.  All yummy stuff.  🙂

Tabletop snacks included mini Cadbury eggs which are ridiculously addicting, and Trader Joe’s trail mix because it is seriously my favorite.

Not like our living room needed any more plants but I found the hydrangeas and the mini orchid at TJ’s and fell in love.

I set up a coffee bar on a table in our kitchen — that way everyone could get what they needed and I just stayed in charge of refilling the coffee pot.  😉

We had cranberry and orange juice at the ready and my in-laws brought over a bottle of champagne for mimosas.  The straws were a little too long when I bought them so I just snipped the ends so that they would fit inside of the mason jars at a good height.

A blog that I love, A Thoughtful Place, was where I first saw the idea of using wrapping paper as a table runner.  LOVE that idea so much and I’ve done it once before for a birthday party.  It’s inexpensive and easy clean-up.  It’s also fun to use that as a starting point for the table design.  I decided to go with gold accents and those blue flowers were a Target Dollar Spot find.  They have adhesive backs so I just stuck them where I wanted them and was able to save them for another purpose — they’re in a craft bin now.

Which brings me to the beads.  🙂 These were my Gramma’s, and I’ve used them here, too.  I’ve been missing her a lot lately and these beads remind me of her.  She loved to decorate and make spaces pretty, and she made everything special.  She was a beautiful entertainer and I can still remember her putting fresh mint in lemonade and letting me pull the leaves from the stems.  Having this little pop of red added a splash of personality to the table — and reminded me of her wild and free personality that I loved so much.

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