April 05, 2010

Easter and Multiples

Last week my daughters were on Spring Break. We also had family in town, so it seemed like a good week to take a blogvacation. But I'm back!
This year is the first time I've tried to incorporate some fun activities into Easter. In the past my girls seemed too young or we were too pressed for time. Since Grandma and Grandpa were here, I had reinforcements and decided to dye Easter eggs. This activity reminded me of the subtle differences between having one or two children and having four. I boiled a dozen eggs. A dozen eggs! We're not big egg eaters, so it's going to be interesting to see if we consume all of them. When I did crack open an egg to put on a salad, I was greeted with shouts of "Don't take the colors off our eggs!" Even with that many eggs, each girl was only able to color three eggs. I know they really wanted to dye more eggs, but I couldn't justify having two dozen hard boiled eggs in our refrigerator and I'm not brave enough to try non-boiled eggs. So, if anyone out there has ideas on other things to dye for Easter next year, I'm all ears.
Even our backyard Easter egg hunt had to be carefully planned. I bought two packages of plastic eggs at the dollar store. There were 18 eggs in each package, so thank goodness it only took two packs to have a sum divisible by four. Then I had to label the eggs with each girl's "letter" (the first letter of her name). Then I had to make sure they each had the same amount of goodies in their eggs. No, I didn't count the jelly beans, but I made sure they each had one egg with a Cadbury egg, four eggs with small Nestle candy and four eggs with jelly beans. I know life isn't fair, but I don't think an Easter egg hunt is the time to learn that lesson. I still remember and egg hunt I went to as a child and I only found one egg. The bigger kids who could move faster had baskets brimming with treats. Did it scar me for life? No, but I wanted a stress-free day. I will give my girls credit. When they found an egg labeled with someone else's letter, they would tell her where it was, but they didn't pick it up. After our egg hunt, they decided to hide the eggs for me. Their hiding spots were pretty creative.
Overall, we had a fun day, and I hope you did, too!

9 comments:

MaryAnne said...

My parents used to initial the plastic eggs like that. We stuck to hard-boiled ones plus two Cadbury eggs per child this year. Although, the Cadbury eggs were so messy I think I'll save those for Mike and give the kids something smaller for sweet finds next year!

As for avoiding boiled eggs, you could always decorate wooden ones - pricier, but maybe they could do one per year and have a small collection to keep?

Sadia said...

Potato salad, perhaps, to use up the eggs?

We joined a family with a total of 5 cousins, plus my two, so they boiled 18 eggs, and sent 6 home with us! I throw boiled egg whites in my curries for a protein boost, so we'll end up using them.

Melody and Jessica collected more eggs than their friend Katie so, post-hunt, they combined their finds and divided them equally.

It's not quite the same thing, but cookies and cupcakes make for good decorating. Also, they could decorate the plastic eggs you'll use for their egg hunt, and then each one could hunt for the ones she made.

Roman and Tiffany said...

It sound like the girls had a blast! We having been playing "Easter Bunny" since Ryla did her egg hunt. I hide the eggs for her and then she will hide them for me. She gets such a kick out of it.

Good call on the dozen of eggs. I bought an 18 pack for Ryla to dye and now just the thought of eating another hard boiled eggs makes me sick.

Quadmama said...

Decorating the plastic eggs might work. I'm thinking about making egg salad for sandwiches... then we MIGHT actually eat all the eggs. Potato salad is a good idea, too.

Stephanie Manner Wagner said...

You can buy wooden eggs at the craft stores and paint them. My oldest is allergic to eggs so we always did that instead.

Polly Chrome said...

I would totally just cut out bunches of egg shapes with construction paper and let them go to town decorating those with craft bits like foam stickers and glitter and pom poms and markers and paint and the whole nine yards.
I'm completely not a fan of hard boiled eggs, but my MIL makes a weird potato salad with practically mashed potatoes, hard boiled eggs mashed in, and mayonnaise. I think it's gross, but my kids totally love it.

Once I got old enough to not destroy them, what I loved best was to decorate blown eggs (yano, where you take a small needle and make a hole on one end, and a slightly larger hole in the other end then blow through the small end until it's empty?). Even when they break they're pretty. I also loved making little dioramas in egg shapes. You can paper mache' a balloon egg shape with a large opening, then make a diorama inside with cotton and chicks or some other such, or just make the paper mache' out of pretty easter colored tissue paper so it's the art on it's own.

Becky said...

we went to decorate at grandmas....3 grandkids 12 eggs each....i have 3 dozen eggs hard boiled eggs!!! My big boys actually like to eat hard boiled eggs....and we ARE have egg salad for dinner tonight.....and tomorrow night.....and maybe the night after that too.

Becky said...

oh yeah....my MIL use to blow eggs out for decorating....then they could "save" them and if they broke, oh well....BUT it sounds like A LOT of work to me and I've never tried it.

Quadmama said...

Three dozen eggs??? OK, now I don't feel so bad!

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