I love Easter. I remember hunting for Easter eggs and my Easter basket as a little girl. My mom would always put so much work into making it special. My brother and I would have jelly beans and the Easter basket grass strewn throughout the house for weeks afterwards. Probably because of those memories, Easter is a close second to Christmas when it comes to my favorite holidays.

 

Of course, I want to make sure that Easter is just as special and full of memories for my children as it is for me. A few years ago I became obsessed with finding the perfect Easter bunny for my oldest daughter. 

 

I know that’s not what the holiday is about, but I remember when I was probably 6 years old, and my brother and I were staying with my Mamaw over Easter weekend. Not to be outdone by her daughter-in-law, Mamaw had hidden eggs in the most interesting and unexpected places: dangling from the ceiling fan blades, hiding in house plants, and even inside cereal boxes. The grand finale, of course, is discovering the Easter basket. I found mine hidden in my Papaw’s closet, stuck behind the winter boots, and inside was the most gorgeous Easter bunny I’d ever seen. It was soft, and huggable, and a light gray, but best of all, it had long, curly ears. Curly ears. I’ve never been able to find one since. But a few years ago, I was determined to hunt one down, because my oldest daughter has a stuffed animal collection to rival my own from childhood, and I knew she would absolutely adore those spiral ears.

 

So I looked online. I looked in stores. I looked in catalogs. Apparently, my Mamaw really had outdone herself, because she’d found me a collector’s item. I finally found that bunny on eBay. It’s not manufactured anymore, and they were asking $300. $300! Well, you know me well enough by now to realize that $300 wasn’t going to happen, no matter how curly those ears were. 

 

We all have memories likes that - memories from our childhood, full of nostalgia. Memories from days when the most wonderful thing in the world was a curly-eared bunny in an Easter basket. My hunt for that same bunny to give my daughter is just another way for me to recapture those feelings, if even for just a moment. It’s nice to escape the worries about work, home, and money for a little while and return to that childlike delight that Easter brings out in me. 

 

So this Sunday, I hope you’re having a wonderful Easter. I hope that you find all of the Easter eggs and delight in warmer weather, spring flowers (soon!), and Easter baskets. I hope that for a day you don’t worry about your career, your weight, or your budget, and that you’re able to just enjoy time with your family, a nice dinner, and the giggles of children as they hunt for their goodies. And if you happen to come across a curly-eared bunny, send me an e-mail - I haven’t given up all hope yet. I’m Claire, the Afena blog mom. Thanks for reading.