The plan was to visit my parents and sisters in Salem for Easter, but since we were still getting over the virusey stuff we opted to stay home instead. We started the weekend off by going to the Yreka Egg Hunt at the city park in the little downtown area. I'd read in the paper that you need to get there early, but despite our best efforts we made it there barely on time. We didn't realize how many cars and people would show up for the event and had to park a few blocks away. There were two large areas (baseball diamond size) that were "roped off" with tape/streamers on the ground and hundreds of candy filled plastic eggs scattered in the middle. Lining the two rectangles were hordes of kids and parents with buckets awaiting. We approached a small opening along the tape just as the police sirens went off to signal the start of "the hunt". What followed was an interesting study in social behavior. Parents and kids, toddlers on up, began scooping up eggs as fast as they could, like some money grab. Evalyn and Henry were pretty confused by it all. I was helping Evalyn, pointing out an egg and encouraging her to pick it up. She was too distracted watching everyone else to try it herself. She'd see one and walk to get it just as somebody else nabbed it. I think she managed to get 2 total in her little bucket. It was kinda sad.
I was taken aback by how fast it all happened. Barely 3 minutes into it, the crowd magically inhaled all those eggs. Very strange. Those kids with parents scooping up handfuls of eggs alongside easily had a dozen eggs or more in their buckets. Matt and I had picked up a couple for Henry so he had 4 or 5 . It was our first public type of easter egg hunt. I'm still not sure what to make of it. I'd call it more of a grab than a hunt! Maybe if we'd gotten there a bit earlier so the kids had time to take it all in and realize what was going to happen it would've been more fun. As it was we stood around in a daze for a few minutes. We took a few pictures (of course) to mark the occasion and were glad we still had our real egg hunt at home to look forward to. And there was a pretty patch of spring flowers to explore on the way back to the car, so that made it a fun outing after all.
5 comments:
Your take on it is pretty funny because that's what we thought the first time we went to our city's "hunt". I call it the "Syracuse Easter Egg Dash". Syracuse divides it into 6 age groups: 0-1, 2-3, 4-5, 5-6, 6-7, & 8-9. This makes it a little easier on the kids, but they still have to really hurry. You should give it one more shot now that you know what to expect.
Fun pictures, Hols. I've never been to a public egg hunt so I found your description insightful. Bless their hearts, they did look confused. I hope you're all feeling better now.
Wow. I went to that one in Berwyn Heights once, I think when I was pregnant with Preston. Both my kids ended up crying because the big kids got all the eggs. I like the way my neighbor does the big friends hunt, because every family brings as many eggs as they want their kids to find. So my boys knew - you get 12, that's it :)
That sounds like quite the event! We haven't ventured to any of the NYC hunts yet (maybe next year) but I hear they hold them all day long because there are SO many people. Now I'm nervous!!! :)
That's exactly how we felt at our first Easter Egg hunt this year... I think in Sophie's group it was more the parents grabbing the eggs instead of the kids-a little sad, if you think about it.
Post a Comment