MAGNIFICENT MEYERS

Why not take in season fruit to create a sweet smelling centerpiece. Display your favorite delectable delights in a clear vase for bright bursts of color. Scatter them down a dining table runner for unexpected desserts to munch on after a festive party.

To create a simple yet elegant display, you only need a few items. First, decide which fruit you want to use as your centerpiece and how you'll display these sweet delights. I really like a simple white vase or urn as the base. Clear vases or any clear bowl work well and can also create stunning displays. One of my favorite fruits is the meyer lemon. These wonderful fruits bring back strong memories of living in California as a kid and baking lemon meringue pies almost every weekend. They are also wonderful because you can eat them alone like you would an orange or tangerine. Their smell is very distinctive and will permeate your room.

To create this utterly simple display, find oranges with their stems and foliage attached, if that's possible. Begin arranging them inside the bowl so they form a triangle design, or close to it. The top of the centerpiece should be one lone lemon. Don't worry about placing them perfectly, in fact they look more natural when you plop them around randomly. Under the vase add a table runner or piece of material to accent the arrangement.


Another simple and delicious way to use a fruit at your next dinner party is with oranges and cloves. Yes, I said oranges and cloves. That's all you need. Begin by poking the cloves into the orange, navels work best because of their larger surface area, and use the cloves to design their first or last initial on the orange. This piece of fruit now becomes their place holder at your next dinner party. The scent of the cloves mixed with the citrus smell will fill the air and can also be used as a partying gift for friends and family. How simple is that?