BAKE a love note out of cookie dough. You can use any kind of dough they like best. Mold the dough like letters and bake them.

MAKE the following in heart shaped cake pans: Meat loaf, pizza, meat pie, casseroles, quiche, cinnamon rolls, cookies.

WRITE messages on toast by coloring a little milk, dip paint brush in the milk, write on bread, then toast the bread.

MAKE a big candy kiss by putting Rice Krispie Treats or fudge in a well buttered funnel. (Fudge will need to refrigerate for several hours).

HEART CAKE (Without a special pan) - Bake one 8" square pan and one 8" round cake. Cut the round cake in half. Put the two rounded halves on two adjacent sides of the square cake to form a heart. Frost as normal, or cover with Cool Whip® then spread cherry pie filling in the center of the heart.

SWEETHEART MEAT LOAF: Make your favorite meat loaf mixture. On a lightly greased shallow baking pan form meat into a heart shape about 10 inches across. Build up the edges to form a heart-shaped shell. Bake at 350 for 35 minutes. Prepare mashed potatoes and spoon into meat loaf shell. Dot with butter and sprinkle with paprika. Return to oven and bake 5 minutes longer.
VARIATION: Form meat loaf mixture into a heart shape. Bake until done. Write "Happy Valentine's Day" or "I Love You" with catsup, using a plastic bag with a small hole cut in one corner, or catsup in a squeeze bottle.

VALENTINE BISCUITS: Make biscuit dough using 2 cups Bisquick or other baking mix, or your favorite recipe. Pat or roll 1/2" thick and cut with an open heart-shaped cookie cutter. Bake as directed in recipe.

CUPID CUPCAKES: To make these heart-shape cupcakes is fast and easy. Line your cupcake tins with baking liners. Then prepare a batch of your favorite cake batter and fill the cups half-way. Place a small marble or a 1/2-inch ball of aluminum foil between each liner and one side of the tin. This will push the paper into the batter to form the notch in the heart. Bake the cupcakes at the temperature specified by your recipe (or cake mix) but check for doneness a few minutes early. Let the cupcakes cool, then remove the marbles or foil balls. Frost with white icing and top with colored sugar or sprinkles.

    Pancake Tuesday is a centuries-old traditional holiday. Also known as Pancake Day, Shrove Tuesday or Fat Tuesday, it is the day before Ash Wednesday - the start of Lent.
    Pancake Day originated in 1000 A.D. In England, Abbot Aelfrec, set forth a proclamation that "in the week before Lent everyone shall go to his confessor and confess his deeds. The confessor shall so shrive him as he may then hear by his deeds what he is to do." This proclamation resulted in the wide observance of "Shrove Tuesday."
    In old England, at the tolling of the bell in the morning on Pancake Day, it was customary for the housewife to drop whatever she was doing and hurry to confession. Since this was also a feast day in small towns–eating pancakes–the holiday cakes–soon became known as "Shriving Cakes" because they were made on the day women were "shriven" of their sins.
    For many years eggs were forbidden during Lent and thrifty housewives didn't want to waste any spare eggs, so whisked them into pancakes on Shrove Tuesday. The pancakes were cooked in left-over butter, so that was the end of a favorite food for six weeks. The French called it Fat Tuesday (Mardi Gras) because the last of the fat, buttery, rich foods were eaten up.

Purim is a Jewish festival, which is also known as the Feast of Lots because Haman drew lots to establish the day on which to kill all Jews. Queen Esther saved the Jews, living in the Persian Empire, from annihilation at the hand of the king's vizier, a wicked man called Haman.
Haman's plot was foiled at the last minute and the joyous festival of Purim was proclaimed in celebration. The story is read aloud, then after the service there is often treats, special Purim cakes called Haman's Pockets - Hamantaschen (HAH-mahn-tah-shuhn) and sugared fritters called Haman's ears - Oznei Haman are on the menu.

St. Patrick's Day Games

Magic Green Milk
Pour 2-3 drops of green food coloring (for a 6-8 ounce glass) in clear glasses. When the people come in to eat, pour their milk in the glasses. It will swirl green–like magic.

Green Potatoes
Stir green food coloring in milk you add to potatoes before mashing.

Shamrock Pears
Color pears green by pouring green food coloring into the syrup of the pears and let them sit in the refrigerator overnight in the colored syrup. Arrange them on cottage cheese or lettuce leaves to form a shamrock. Three pear halves will form the shamrock, with the small ends of the pears toward the center of the shamrock shape. Cut a thin slice the length of a pear half to place as stem of the shamrock.

Shamrock Pancakes
Mix green food coloring to the batter. Pour 3 small round circles of pancake mix on a hot griddle, close enough so they join together. Add the stem at the bottom of the shamrock with a small amount of pancake mix.

Green Biscuits
Make biscuit mix biscuits only add green food coloring to the milk before adding to the mix.

Green Honey Butter
A perfect topping for your green biscuits. Combine in a food processor, 1/2 cup butter, 1/3 to 1/2 cup honey (to your taste) and green food coloring to make it a pretty green.

Shamrock Pizza
Use your favorite recipe for pizza or my recipe and shape a shamrock on a large pizza pan or baking sheet with three circular pizzas and one thin, rectangular one for the stem. Mix equal amounts of green food coloring and water and brush on outer edges of crust. Shake grated cheese with remaining food coloring mixture in a closed plastic bag or container. Top with family favorites (each leaf can be different) and bake as usual.

Hide pennies or butterscotch candy pieces. Attach a note to each one with a clue to help find the next "piece of gold". The last clue could lead to a "Pot of Gold". Fill a black pot with pieces of candy.

Pot of Gold party game – Place green Easter grass in the bottom of a small black pot. On the top of the grass add butterscotch candy pieces or chocolate coins. Put a sticker on 1 of the pieces of candy. Pass the pot around to each person. Give the one who received the piece of candy with the sticker a "Cup of Gold" candy bar, or other prize.

        Was Johnny Appleseed a real person or a legend, like Paul Bunyan?    He was a real man and his real name was John Chapman. Not much is known about is early life except that he was born in Massachusetts in 1774 or 1775.
        Apple seeds were brought from Europe by the early settlers and planted in the eastern colonies. Johnny Appleseed carried apple seeds from these colonies into what was then the wilderness of western Pennsylvania and Ohio. Wherever he found settlers, he planted his seeds so that in a few years the people would have apples to eat. He crisscrossed the frontier, planting new seeds and returning to tend the orchards that were growing up.
        Everywhere he went, Johnny Appleseed was greeted with joy. Not only were apples a valuable food used for cider, cooking, and just plain eating, but the trees and blossoms reminded the lonely settlers of the homes they'd left behind back east.
        Throughout his life Johnny Appleseed traveled a remarkable distance on foot. According to a number of accounts, he was seen as far west as Missouri and the Badlands of the Dakotas. He planted orchards in Michigan, Indiana, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Kentucky.
        He must have been a strange sight. His clothes were ragged and he was usually barefoot. He slept outdoors and wore his cooking pot on his head to keep his hands free to hold whatever book he was reading as he walked. Strangest of all, he never carried a gun in a time when people lived by hunting and were always prepared to defend themselves. He was renowned for never taking a life if he could help it, even an insect's. People said he talked to the animals and they responded by being his friends. And he made friends of settlers and Native Americans alike.
        Johnny Appleseeed lived to be more than seventy years old–perhaps his odd way of life was a healthy one. He died on March 11, 1847, and that is the date now celebrated as Johnny Appleseed Day.
        Even without modern inventions like the telephone, radio, and television, word traveled fast about this strange but peace-loving man who brought the gift of apple orchards where they never had been before. A ragged stranger with few possessions who preferred camping out to sleeping in a house was an oddity even then, when there was lots of open space for such a man.
        Lots of stories grew up about Johnny Appleseed, especially after an article about his life was published in 1871 in Harper's New Monthly Magazine. It's hard for us now to know how many of the legends are true.
        Johnny Appleseed was never without a sack of apple seeds and also never without a book. This too was a little strange out on the frontiers, where many people had no schools and never learned to read. Everywhere he went, he read aloud to people and encouraged them to read themselves. And one story says that a book actually saved his life. During the War of 1812 he warned the soldiers at a fort that Indians were about to attack a settlement nearby. He himself wouldn't lift a gun against either side, but he tried to help the wounded. As he did, a stray bullet hit him in the chest, but the thick book he was carrying inside his shirt stopped the bullet before it touched his skin.
        In addition to apple trees, John Chapman planted herbs wherever he went. Most of the medicines we use today were unknown at that time and people relied on homemade medicines concocted from plants and herbs. Horehound was used for coughs, pennyroyal for fevers, and catnip for stomach pains and bruises. The Native Americans he met on his travels considered Johnny Appleseed a great and knowledgeable medicine man who could help them cure their illnesses.

• Recipe for Soft Marshmallow Easter Eggs
  
• Easter Crafts and fun - on my craft site

Dessert, Cookie and Candy Recipes
    Calico Cat Cookies
    Chocolate Spiders
    Ghost & Bones Meringue Cookies
    Jack O'Lantern Cookies
    Owl Cookies
    Spider Crackers
    Spider Web Cookies
    Spider Web Cake
    Tombstone Brownies
    Witch's Hats Cookies
    Yummy Mummy Cookies
    Marshmallow Pumpkins
    Chocolate Marshmallow Cats
    Halloween Pretzels

Recipes:

• Mincemeat Cookies
• Pumpkin-Nut Cookies
• Turkey Cookies