Celebrate the Easter season with lighthearted favorites—from lemon desserts and Reese’s egg dupes to festive piano sheet music, teaching tips, and a joyful playlist.
Items Mentioned and Other Related Content
- Support the podcast
- Subscribe to Amy’s email list
- Bunny Activity Sheets Bundle (SusanParadis.com)
- Healthy Reese’s Eggs
- Sheet Music: Risen Today and Lift High the Cross (Leila Viss)
- Lemon Cream Meringues (Smitten Kitchen)
- Italian Lemon Ricotta Cake (Italian Kitchen)
- Classic Lemon Curd Tart (Smitten Kitchen)
- Organize Your Life with Notion
- Digital Organization Retreat
Transcript
When my husband and I were first married, one of the first shows we enjoyed watching together was America’s Test Kitchen on Saturday mornings on PBS. We loved the scientific way they approached cooking and the thought and intention that went into the products they recommended through their equipment testing segment.
This was the start of 22 years thus far of having fun discovering little “favorites,” whether it’s buying 5 jars of peanut butter at the same time to taste test which we like the best—for the record, it’s JIF—or checking America’s Test Kitchen and other reputable sources before buying a new set of kitchen tongs. It’s just a fun little hobby we both enjoy and is so “us.”
Now you know why I started sharing favorites with my teaching friends in one of the first blog posts on Piano Pantry back in 2016. That series, Friday Finds, is still going strong. Since this podcast is about living the teacher life, I try to bring lighthearted episodes like this to the airwaves a few times every year.
Today, we’re covering Easter favorites from teaching resources to recipes to sheet music. I hope you will discover one new thing that brings a bit of joy to you or your students this Easter Season.
I’m Amy Chaplin, and this is episode 157 of The Piano Pantry Podcast.
The first Easter favorite is a worksheet from SusanParadis.com called Bunny Basics. Honestly, you’re lucky this one even made it onto the list because I am not big on seasonal-themed resources. I much prefer resources that are flexible for any time of year. As a digital coach, I believe that having a lot of seasonal resources can be part of why our files become so cluttered. There’s your organizational tip for today—but I digress.
Anyway, this particular Bunny Basics worksheet has students fill in the note names, which then reveals fun facts about rabbits. I downloaded it years ago when it was either free or a single-sheet download. It’s now part of a 14-worksheet bundle on SusanParadis.com called the Bunny Activity Sheets Bundle. I’ll link to it as well as everything I mention today in the show notes.
My second Easter favorite is homemade Reese’s Eggs. Seasonal Reese’s eggs are one of my favorite candies, but as I’ve gotten older, I’ve realized I like them more than they like me, meaning they often give me a tummy ache. Homemade ones are so easy and so much better. There are tons of recipes on the internet. I think the one I have I got off a video on social media, so I don’t have a link to the direct recipe. Total pet peeve of mine—social media and recipes. It’s so useless as there’s no good way to save them—once again, I digress…
The recipe I use calls for 1/2 cup of powdered peanut butter, 1/2 cup of almond flour, 1/2 cup of peanut butter (easy numbers to remember), and then 1/4 cup of maple syrup, 3 T of honey, and a pinch of salt. You mix all that together, roll it into a long log, cut into 3-inch slices, and then try your best to form it into a flat-bottom egg shape. Then freeze them for 20 minutes, and then dip them into melted chocolate and re-freeze for at least 2 hours. Definitely eat them from frozen, as the chocolate can get quite melty.
I’ll put a link to a recipe, but most of the ones I saw on recipe sites use vanilla protein powder instead of powdered peanut butter. While I haven’t tried them with protein powder yet, I’m sure they’ll be just as good as using peanut butter powder.
My third Easter favorite is a couple of sheet music arrangements from Leila Viss—”Lift High the Cross” and “Risen Today”—the latter being my favorite of the two so much that I have a hard time not wanting to play it for church prelude every single year! LOL Do you think people notice when we repeat arrangements, especially if there’s a year between them? I would be curious your thoughts on this. I’m guessing most people wouldn’t remember piano arrangements a year apart. LOL. You can find these on LeilaViss.com (and no, this is not a paid ad.)
My fourth Easter favorite is any kind of lemon dessert. I don’t know what it is about Easter, but it does not feel like a holiday for heavy chocolate desserts. I don’t make the same thing every year for any holiday – that’s just me – but I have made desserts a lot for our Easter gathering.
My husband’s family does an extended family Easter lunch at 1:00 on Easter Sunday at a little country church. Since it’s an hour drive for us after church down to lunch, dessert has always been the easiest thing for me to provide.
I often turn to something bright and citrusy. One year I made these cute little lemon cream meringues that look like a sunny side up egg, one year I made the most delicious light and fluffy Italian Lemon Ricotta Cake, and this year I’m making a Lemon Curd Tart. Again, all the links to these items can be found in the show notes, which are at pianopantry.com/podcast/episode157.
You probably thought I was going to say Hot Cross Buns were one of my favorites, but I have to admit, I’ve tried making them a few times over the years, and I’ve just never found a version I super liked. If you have one, send it my way!
The fifth and final Easter favorite I wanted to share with you today is an Easter music playlist I compiled on Spotify. Compiling Spotify playlists is another little hobby I enjoy at times. I went a little crazy when I first started using Spotify to create favorites lists, and I don’t conjure them up quite as often these days, but I still enjoy the creative outlet every once in a while.
A few of my favorites from the list include “Easter Song” by Jess Ray, “Even the Grave” by Sherri Youngward, “It is Finished” by Passion, “Death was Arrested” by North Point Worship, and “No Body” by Elevation Worship.
So there you have it, a handful of little things that bring me joy during the Easter Season. Do you share any of these favorites, or do you have special things you particularly enjoy this season? I would love to hear. Connect with me on social media. That’s Piano Pantry on Facebook and PianoPantryAmy on Instagram
A big thanks to teacher friend Bernadette Kennedy and others who support this podcast on Patreon. For just $4 a month, you can be a silent partner, or for $7 a month, you can get a few extras, including a weekly power hour, monthly teacher chat, and quarterly presentations. Visit PianoPantry.com/patreon for more.
Registration is now open for the next round of Organize Your Life with Notion, a 3-day workshop put on my myself and Joy Morin. It will be held 3 wednesdays in May – the 7th, 14th and 21st, 2025 from 12:30-2:30pm Eastern Time with a follow-up bonus session on Wednesday June 3rd. Visit PianoPantry.com/notion to register.
Registration is also now going on for the in-person digital organization retreat I host in my home in Indiana. This year it will be held Wednesday, May 28 – Saturday, May 31. Visit PianoPantry.com/retreat for more details.
Lastly, mark your calendar for the summer session for the online version of my digital organization coaching will be held on Mondays, June 2 – July 7, from 11 am-1 pm Eastern Time. Registration will open in May for that event.
