The Easter Bunny

We ventured into new territory this year. The Easter Bunny made a stop at our house. When the family was coming for Christmas, I checked with my sister to see what Santa's traditions were. I wanted to make sure Santa was consistent between Ohio and New York. Santa does not wrap presents in NY, so I had to make sure he didn't wrap them in Ohio either.

I forgot to ask my sister what was expected of the Easter Bunny. I bought plastic Easter eggs, and a roll of stickers and some fun size packages of M&M's. But I didn't know if the Easter Bunny was supposed to have a gift for her here too. I wrapped all their Easter gifts before my family arrived. I asked my Mom, but she didn't know either. So I asked Sydney about the Easter Bunny. She told me he would bring Easter eggs and hide them, and she had to find them. Ok, I could handle that!

I forgot that Sydney is her mother's daughter in so many ways, one of which is that she's a snoop. When I was cleaning in preparation for their visit, I hid the packages of plastic Easter eggs in one of the drawers in the dresser in the guest room (aka Syd's room). I had cleared out the bottom two drawers for Sydney's clothes, and I didn't think she'd look in the other drawers. Like I said, I forgot she's a snoop!

Tuesday night we colored Easter eggs. I had looked at all the egg coloring kits at the store, and there were too many options. I couldn't decide. So many kits had glitter, and I knew I didn't want glitter all over my house. So I decided we would color eggs the old fashioned way: with food coloring, vinegar and water. I had neon food coloring, as well as red, green, and yellow (for Christmas cookies). I cooked 8 eggs, but one shell split while cooking so the dogs enjoyed that. Sydney loved creating her own colors. She took a drop of this, and a drop of that, and was like a mad chemist as she mixed her colors. I thought they were going to be the ugliest eggs, but they turned out very pretty. She did each one a different color. Erich helped her color the eggs. He was so patient, and so good with her.

On Tuesday night I realized Wednesday was their last day here, so I went into her room when she was occupied, took the Easter eggs out of the drawer, and put them in a bag in my room. I told my mom I'd take them downstairs to fill that night. A few minutes later, Sydney and I were playing in her room. Out of the blue she said 'There's Easter eggs in one of those drawers!' I played dumb, so she decided to show me. She stood up, opened the drawer, and let out a gasp. "They aren't here!" She turned and looked at me accusingly, "Where did they go?" I told her I didn't even know there were eggs in there. She looked like she was trying to decide if she could believe me. I told her if there were eggs in there, the Easter Bunny must have come in and taken them.

At this point, Sydney excitedly fell to her knees on the floor, and squealed 'I see bunny prints!' She pointed to imaginary bunny footprints on the carpet, and tracked the bunny through the room. I was trying, without much success, to keep a straight face. Tears were filling my eyes. She lost the trail of the bunny in the hallway, and came back in wanting to know why his prints didn't go down to the front door. 'How did he get in? How did he get out?' Her imagination is so active, and she's such a smart child, it's hard to stay a step or two ahead of her. I told her 'He must have hopped in through your window'.

She spun around to the window, and decided that yes, he had come in through the window. But wait! "The window is closed". She looked at me with those piercing blue eyes again, her hands on her hips. "Why in the world would he close the window?" I told her "The Easter Bunny is a very neat house guest. He comes in, does what he needs to do, and leaves. He leaves everything the way it was, so you'd never know he was here". This explanation satisfied her, and she went back to playing with her toys.

That night, after she had gone to bed, I sat up stuffing Easter Eggs. I took the roll of stickers and cut it into smaller parts, so I could fill most of the eggs with stickers. I had two different sizes of eggs- 24 in all. I filled six eggs with packages of M&Ms (I didn't want to give her too much candy). Then I was at a loss. I had 6 eggs left to fill, and nothing to put in them. I remember my mom putting money in eggs for Syd a couple of years ago. So I put 50 cents into four eggs, and put a $1 bill in the remaining two eggs. I put all the eggs in a bag, and hid them from Snoop, Jr. The next morning, before we left to go shopping, I handed the bag to Erich and asked him to assist while we were out.

We were planning to see Hop on Wednesday afternoon. I checked movie times online, and the first movie started at 12:45. We went to Kohls, and then to the movie theater. We got there at 12:30, and there weren't any other cars in the parking lot. I didn't think that was odd- the theater isn't busy, and schools here were not on spring break. We got out of the car, Sydney skipping to the door as she held my hand, and on the door was a sign that said the theater opens at 4:30 M-W, the first show is at 4:45. We were crushed. Well, Sydney was crushed and we had to try to explain it to her.

We came home to get lunch. She was barely through the door when she spotted an Easter egg. The dogs were barking like crazy (as they always do when someone comes in the door). The Easter egg lifted her mood, and then she saw another. She went into orbit. 'The Easter Bunny came! The Easter Bunny came!' I handed her a basket that had conveniently been left on the table, and she started filling it. She had to open each egg as she found it, and then she put it into her basket. I told her 'this must be why the dogs were barking so much' and she said 'ya, cuz they saw the Easter Bunny!' There was an egg 'hidden' in the picture window behind the couch, and as she reached for that egg, she squealed and pointed outside 'Look! I see Easter Bunny prints!' Erich had gone to the store, and he came home in the middle of the egg hunt. She knew Erich had been here when we left, so she asked him if he saw the Easter Bunny. Erich said he didn't. She decided the Easter Bunny must have been waiting for all of us to leave so he could come hide eggs. The Easter Bunny did a good job, hiding eggs all over the house, even in the upstairs bathroom.

Sydney wanted to know why we were having an indoor Easter Egg hunt. I told her it had rained so much lately it wasn't nice to be outside (which was true!). In her bed, her doll Ruby was snuggled up with an egg in her hands. Sydney picked her up and said 'Ruby? Did you see the Easter Bunny?' She then asked my dolls and bears if they all saw the Easter Bunny. She was absolutely giddy. After she collected all the eggs, she came downstairs to look over her loot. Each egg had to be opened again, and everyone had to watch to see what was in the eggs. As she opened the eggs with money, she yelled 'Yay! Money, money, money! I love money!'

The Easter Egg hunt sort of took her mind off HOP. She told her mom she didn't get to see it, and Laura told her that her daddy wanted to see it, so he would take her (and he did, on Friday). After she found all the eggs, we had to hide them again and find them again. We did this for hours. Then we played egg races, where we held an egg on a spoon and walked around. I did ok with plastic eggs, I never did well using real eggs. She entertained herself all afternoon with those plastic Easter eggs.

She also felt we needed to hide eggs for the Easter Bunny. She said you hide the eggs you colored so the Easter Bunny could find them. She took the egg carton full of colored eggs out of the frig, trying to hide them, and I kept having to create reasons why she couldn't hide them, and struggled to get the carton away from her and back into the frig. I was afraid she would hide an egg and not remember where it was, and we wouldn't find it until it had started to smell! I also didn't want the dogs eating the eggs. They love eggs, and I know they would have eaten the shells and all.

I'm getting very good at this Aunt thing. First Santa, now the Easter Bunny. I guess the next thing we'll have to address is the tooth fairy! Hopefully, she won't have to visit Ohio!