Annual Willow Road Easter Egg Hunt

I just finished rifling through Griffin's Easter basket.  As a self admitted crazy person, I opened every egg to remove any oversized or overly sugary candy (for Tom and my sake), any random choking hazard toys (for Vera's sake), and then equally distributed the jelly beans and M&Ms into the remaining/empty eggs so that there was an approx average of 4 tiny candies per egg or a single bite sized candy bar or small toy... it's my effort to avoid any unnecessary sugar highs or melt downs.  Interestingly, of the 4 doz eggs we contributed to the hunt, Griff only ended up with 2 of of the 48- a miky way and stickers.

Today was the 2nd annual Willow Road Easter Egg hunt (we were in Albany last year so we missed the inagural one). The weather felt like spring; it was sunny and over 50 degrees.  The cluster of kids hunted in 3 yards-  Jen's (Maya, Adam & Serena's), Annika's, and then at the other Jen's (Chloe and Mazy's).  There were a total of 17 of them (12 from the neighborhood, plus 2 randoms, and 3 cousins).  It's really amazing how our street is bustling with kids now- definitely something in the water.  We had a post hunt picnic-style pot luck lunch on the Nyberg's back patio.. complete with the full gamut of delicious kid-friendly foods:  Vesuvius pizza, yogurt, PB&J, booty, popcorn, fruit salad, veggie sticks...

It's pretty hilarious to watch kids of different ages and personalities while they hunt for Easter eggs...Today I witnessed and laughed at Griffin's ridiculous egg hunting strategy.  It was both frustrating and entertaining. Of the approximately 3 dozen colorful oval treaures he finished with in his basket, he legitamately found about 9 eggs himself; he picked some out of other people's baskets (they let him), and he received many generous donations from other kids.  While everyone else ran like maniacs trying to zealously overfill their baskets with sugar, Griff walked around as if unaffected/unmotivated by the competitive commotion around him.  He'd literally zero in on a single egg, walk to it, put it in his basket, stop to count his eggs, and then open one up to reveal whether it was filled with jelly beans or something slightly less awesome than jelly beans.  Once in a while he'd ask me if he could eat the candy, and I'd try to redirect him to hunt for more eggs... oh my.  Most kids had baskets that were overflowing with pastel plastic to the point that their parents were actually discouraging them from taking so many.  Toward the end of the 2nd house, Griff started getting donations from others, and soon his basket was filled to the brim with very little effort.  Genius?  I think so.

By the final yard, Griffin was more interested in the swing set and riding the pink Barbie Jeep with Charlie.

Good times.