I am super excited for this week as I have been waiting oh, so patiently to share with you these amazing picnics! Just for the record I may begin running contests like this ALL THE TIME just because I adore opening my inbox to see your lovely photos each morning. Thanks to everyone who participated and submitted your picnics for the contest! I wish I could show all the entries, we had over 50:)

I have narrowed it down to 4 finalists and am thrilled to share them with you. One of these picnics has already been chosen as our grand prize winner and will be announced on Wednesday. Today and tomorrow you have the chance to vote for our second prize winner by leaving comments of love.

Look through all four of them, each entry will be open for comments for 3o hours from posting- vote for as many as you like! I hope you will enjoy these as much as I have!

Finalist number one-

This first picnic comes to us from Anneliese. I instantly fell in love with all of her crafty and sweet picnic details.

In her own words: I wanted to have an intimate family celebration on my birthday. The girls and I went to the zoo in the morning and in the afternoon I pulled together some of my favorite things for a backyard picnic. Audrey had been saying she wanted to have a picnic on a blanket and I thought what better way to spend the evening as a family on my birthday!

And, for dessert, Audrey helped me bake Banana Cupcakes with Peanut Butter Frosting. Though¬¨‚Ćit was a casual family picnic I put a little party around these too with this great cupcake paper template and some scrapbook paper I had on hand. So easy to use pretty papers to quickly dress up the food!¬¨‚ĆAnd for some reason I can’t get enough pink and orange…

The backyard family picnic: the best birthday celebration yet!

• 1 ¬¨Œ© lbs Campanelle pasta cooked & cooled
• 12 cherry tomatoes (quartered)
• 1 large broccoli crowns & 1 bunch asparagus blanched and cut into 1‚Äö?Ñ?? pieces
• ¬¨Œ© cup toasted pine nuts
• One large ball fresh (buffalo) mozzarella cubed into ¬¨¬?‚Äö?Ñ?? pieces
• ¬¨?¶ cup roasted red peppers cut into 1‚Äö?Ñ?? pieces
• ¬¨¬? cup chopped black olives
• Salt & pepper to taste
• Bernstein‚Äö?Ñ?¥s Restaurant Italian dressing to taste (I used about ¬¨Œ© a bottle)

Happy Picnicking- you have until 2:30pm Tuesday to vote for this picnic.

blessings.