In celebration of spring and the upcoming Easter weekend, Smock’s creative director Amy Graham Stigler shares a few of her favorite things about spring with us today. We’re feeling completely inspired to start our spring cleaning and planting now. How about you?

Spring is my favorite season (when it cooperates) so its hard to narrow the field of things I love best. So here are a few things: I LOVE the light and early blooms and freshness of the air. I LOVE that I can run outside without worrying about ice and snow and frigid temps. I LOVE that the markets resume (flea and farmers). I LOVE that my kids are either on a bike or in a tree. I LOVE our magnolia and apple trees that absolutely explode with flowers and fragrance.

For Easter, we always start with an Easter egg hunt. The kids each get a basket with a few goodies and then go searching for sweets and eggs, which we dyed the night before. If weather permits the hunt continues outside. And we always do brunch with the Easter bunnies that the kids still adore – even though they are ‘on to them’.

We start to reclaim our yard and prepare our vegetable and herb garden. We start frequenting the farmer’s markets for herbs and flowers to plant and early edibles. We start our weekend family hikes on the many trails in our area. And my husband and I try to fit in a ‘date trail run’ at least once a week.

Casual dinner parties with friends and their kids is our favorite way to entertain so in the spring we just tweak the menu and decor to fit the season. The vases are filled with tulips and daffodils and other happy spring blooms, the menu gets a bit lighter, such as a seasonal soup and a salad, and we always hope that some portion of the evening can be spent outdoors. Of course, decorating cupcakes or sugar cookies with pastel candies is always a sweet way to end the evening.