Yesterday was Easter Sunday … the time of new beginnings. The promise of warmer weather to come and pretty flowers blooming.

Dennis and I hosted Easter dinner at our house yesterday. I suppose I should really call it late lunch, dinner to be served at 2:00. I made a couple hams, a couple hash brown casseroles, green beans with lemon and garlic, and dinner rolls. My friend, Marie, made one of her wonderful salads and bought a beautiful cake to bring to our celebration. It was called a “Hummingbird Cake” … how appropriate for this time of year … it was fabulous! My friend, Marcina and her husband brought a beautiful bowl of fruit with the best grapes I think I’ve ever had. Kylie and Marcina and Neil’s daughter, Kendra are the best of friends. They enjoyed their day together as well and even studied together, which they do often. It seems you can’t take a day off of studying when you are in college with midterms starting the day after Easter. Today is actually Kendra’s 19th birthday … Happy Birthday Sweet Kendra!

I had so much fun preparing for our Easter celebration starting with putting together Easter baskets for our guests. I always enjoy making things special for those I welcome into our home. This fills my heart with such joy.

After arriving home from church yesterday morning, I got to work setting the tables. Did I mention how much joy entertaining brings to me? This is one of my favorite things to do … bringing friends and family around my table to share a meal. This is how I best know to show my love and appreciation for others.

I found these cute individually wrapped chocolate bunnies to place at everyone’s seat as a party favor. I thought sprinkling jelly beans on the table would be a fun way to scatter some color and sweetness to the setting. Plus, we’d all have a little sweet treat to hold us over until the Hummingbird cake was served.

For the glaze for my hams, I mixed together one 16 ounce jar of honey, 1 cup of orange marmalade, and 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves. I sprinkled 2 tablespoons minced fresh rosemary over the glaze once I put it on the ham. In the recipe below, I am giving the measurements for one ham. If you want to make two hams, double the recipe.

I spooned the glaze over my hams and added two cups of water to the bottom of the pan. I also sprinkled an extra pinch of ground cloves into the water I added to the pan, as well as another 1/4 cup of orange marmalade. I wanted to make sure to have some good flavoring to baste the ham with periodically during the baking time.

I poured some of the pan juices over the cut ham for even more flavor.

I made a side dish of green beans sautéd in butter and olive oil with sliced garlic and sliced lemons, kosher salt and pepper.

Ingredients

• 1 12-15 pound pre-cooked spiral ham
• 8 ounces honey
• 1/2 cup orange marmelade
• 1/4 teaspoon ground cloves
• 2 tablespoons minced fresh rosemary
• 2 cup water for pan

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees.
2. Remove ham from packaging and set into a large roasting pan, cut side down.
3. In large glass measuring cup, mix together honey, marmalade and ground cloves. Pour over ham.
4. Sprinkle rosemary over ham.
5. Add water to pan, along with 1/4 cup marmalade and pinch of ground cloves.
6. Cook ham according to package directions.

Enjoy!

Until next time, Kris