Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Easter Inspiration

The community garden near my house never fails to produce a breathtaking display of tulips in the spring. I try to walk through often during this time of year to appreciate the day to day changes that unfold, especially on these warm spring days. The garden is exuberant, informal and beautifully wild.
This year the joyous range of colors and shapes inspired the styling of my Easter baskets. I tried to use very different baskets with lots of personality, and I decorated them with brightly colored bits of ribbon of different lengths and textures.

I save all my ribbons in a box for just such an occasion. I keep anything from hand dyed french silk ribbons, to mere clippings of grosgrain -- you never know when you might be inspired!

Monday, April 9, 2012

Sweet and Swedish

My friends came to visit last week from Sweden, and they brought a cheery Easter gift for me: a decorative paper egg box filled with a selection of their favorite childhood Swedish candies. We had a lot of fun munching on sweets. They shared their candy related childhood memories, and I tried their Swedish treats for the first time.


Then, on Friday while meandering down Bleecker Street, we saw a sparkling white Swedish candy store and we stopped to inspect the goodies.

Image via Sockerbit
Image via Sockerbit

The shop is called Sockerbit and has a huge array of imported Swedish candies, including some of the same ones my friends had given me, and the very same Easter egg boxes. It was a double whamy: first my friends' handpicked gift, and then a store right here in NYC where I can continue to indulge in brightly colored gummy pacifiers, tiny boxes of candy, and salted licorice.