First Easter Egg Hunt
My playgroup friends had to explain it all to me… You see, where I come from, Easter is not called “Easter”. It’s “Semana Santa” (Holly Week), a time to reflect on Christ’s sacrifice and perhaps do some sacrifices of our own. Not a time to be running wild and crazy, looking for eggs filled with delicious sweet treats. We don’t have seasons either, so there’s no glorious coming of spring to celebrate. The egg thing was completely strange to me. The Easter Bunny is just freaky. Again: Jesus is dying nailed to that cross! There’s no bunnies, or chocolate, or eggs, or all that heretic nonsense. But now I’m the mother of a little American toddler, and since I’ve never been a fan of ritualistic sacrifices and I don’t really practice Catholicism any way, things have to change for me. I have to embrace this new tradition, and heck I did!
A few weeks ago, my playgroup organized a little egg hunt party for our four babies. I told Joey about our plans, and he got us some plastic eggs and a basket at the grocery store. I had never seen these egg artifacts before, and I have to say: I thought they were hideous… I mean, yesterday I saw some other plastic eggs, and those were bright, and richly colored, and nice. Ours were some kind of poopoo discolored tones. So I did what I had to do: I embellished them.
And then I went all over our house looking for a better basket. The one Joey got was not terrible, let’s be fair. But I wanted something shallower and wider so Joaquin would have an easier time manipulating his harvest, and my pretty eggs would show more. Of course I waited to do all this until the very last minute, and I finished the eggs the night before, and the basket lining just a few hours before the party.
I’m not sure why we decided to have the party on Saturday, but that’s when we did it. And unfortunately it was a rainy day, so we had the egg hunt in the basement of our hosts. It was fine, and although some sunny pictures would have been more memorable, we didn’t have to worry about the dog eating the eggs, or the babies falling on the pond, and we could sit comfortably on the new carpet without fearing getting our nice pants dirty on the grass.
Babies had fun. I saw some running, some proud waving, some stopping to enjoy the treats before all eggs had been collected. I have to admit: This is a fun tradition.
Today is sunny and Joey had thought we could do a new egg hunt at home. I guess we could, but Joaquin didn’t collect too many of his mommy–handmade eggs. We only got four back. So I guess we could still do it, but we’ll have to use some of the ugly plastic eggs that were left over. Of course Joaquin won’t care; they’ll be full of delicious sinful treats. I went a little crazy shopping for snacks… After all, this was my first Easter egg hunt too.