The best egg hunts were family ones with my cousins when we were all together at my grandparent's house. That didn't happen every year, but it did a few times. I always enjoyed decorating the eggs with us all together and then on Easter morning one (or some) of the adults would hide them, but that was never enough. After the eggs had all been found we hunters would take turns being hiders and we would hunt and hide for most of the day. Nobody ever received a prize. Nobody needed to. There were plenty of Easter goodies to go around and the real prize was the fun we all had.
I can't remember going to an Easter Egg hunt as a child. I have taken my own kids and my grand children on egg hunts which were fun to watch as the kids enjoyed themselves.
My mother used to love making the colorful Easter eggs , and then hiding them for us kids. I was an only child, but we were like family with the people next door, and they always had more children there for the holidays. We had a huge yard; and while everyone was at church, mom would go out and hide several dozen Easter eggs. After we got home and changed clothes, then we went out and hunted for the eggs, and often, Mom would slip around behind us, and re-hide some of the eggs as we gathered them (and put them in the large melmac picnic bowl that we put them in after we found the eggs). Once we had finally found all of tthe eggs (counted by my mom , to be sure we had them all ), then we feasted on the hard-boiled eggs. Usually , Mom had to give us some clues to make sure that we found the eggs that she had done too good of a job of hiding from us. After I grew up and had children, I discovered how much fun that my mom had all of those years when she was hiding our Easter eggs and watching us chase around finding all of them. I also loved coloring the eggs, and I would draw pictures of flowers and bunnies on the eggs and paint them or decorate the eggshells with glitter on the ends. It was a lot of fun, and sometimes, I miss doing those kinds of things, still.
We never did the Easter Egg thing. Easter meant getting up very early for a ridiculously early Easter service at church, and I'm talking about something like 4 am. They did the same thing on Christmas morning, and we'd get up, get all dressed up, go to church, go home and go back to bed, and I was never quite sure if I hadn't dreamed it later when I got up for the day. On Easter, we'd always have someone for dinner. Sometimes the grandparents or, otherwise, some other family that we were related to. Although we did have Easter candies, the bunny and the eggs were looked up as being pagan rather than Christian, and we didn't do that. Oh, we did get far more of the Easter candies later, after Easter, when they were all on sale, but then they were just candies, not an Easter thing.
We always had a huge Easter egg hunt at my grandparent's home on my mother's side. They lived in a rural area and had plenty of hiding spots. I'm guessing all the aunts and older cousins took the time to decorate the eggs for us little ones. I would admire the decorations for a little while and then crack them open to eat them. Yum, yum. My first Easter egg hunt with my sons was not to my liking. The decorating dye always landed somewhere I didn't want it to, not to mention the boys battling over who gets which egg, duh they were all the same white eggs. I was so glad when I discovered the plastic fill in eggs and stickers.
Haha, yes I enjoyed so much stuff back when I was a child and a teenager. I remember Easter Egg hunts too, those were so funny at that time.
I tend to think of the bunny and the egg thing as more of a pagan rooted event, also. Of course, I didn't think about things like that back then; and I know, too, that the meaning of things change over time. I don't think there is any real meaning behind the bunny and egg thing anymore. It's more or less washed out, and back then it was just a fun, albeit somewhat confusing thing to do. I suppose it's the same for kids today. Especially since it seems to be more of a do we or don't we situation in varying churches, with some saying, "We celebrate Easter AND the resurrection," which I really don't see as any less confusing for a child. When you think about it the whole bunny thing is kind a of a borderline horror story. A giant rabbit breaks into your house and leaves things at night while everyone is sleeping. And lays eggs, no less. Then at Christmas we have the guy in the red suit to contend with, who is no less frightening or confusing. Actually, he is probably more so as kids get the idea they might get a less than desirable gift if Santa doesn't think they've been really good all year lined up beside the birth of a savior who has the power to forgive all things.
We always went to church and fidgeted in the pews until time to go home. LOL Then we had our glorious Easter egg hunt! My siblings, cousins and I always went to my Grandma's house and hung out inside, while an adult hid the eggs. Sometimes after we returned home, my older brother would re-hide mine for me. I remember one year, I couldn't find any of them! Later my dog started digging up my Easter eggs. My brother had buried them in the yard! I was so upset, but it was so funny after we grew up.
Brittany, I can so relate to this post. I can imagine your anxiousness to get home from church and begin the fun of the Easter egg hunt! Great post!