The Greatest Easter Egg Hunt Ever

At 10:00am this morning, the Seattle Department of Parks & Recreation sponsored “The Greatest Easter Egg Hunt Ever” at Cal Anderson Park, and I was in attendance. I watched as my sprogs jumped in a moon bounce, got their faces painted, and of course … hunted for Easter eggs.

Now, when 200 kids are involved, an “Easter egg hunt” is always a misnomer. Trust me, there is no “hunting” involved. “Easter egg rugby game” or “grand theft Easter egg” are far more accurate descriptions.

At the appointed time, the kids lined up, and once the whistle was blown, the horde charged the open field of Cal Anderson like Mel Gibson in Braveheart. Whoever reached an egg first, and could defend that egg with his/her life, laid claim to the egg. Inside of each egg was a special treat … candy, stickers, toys … but of course, no one knew what loot they had scored until the hunt was over.

My kids did pretty well, because not only did they procure about two dozen eggs, and thus two dozen separate prizes, but one of the eggs they had procured was a “prize egg”. A prize egg was a special egg which was redeemable at the Bobby Morris Playfield for a much larger prize. See, at first my wife was upset when I handed my oldest child a .38 before the start of the hunt, but when she learned that our kid had used it to rob another kid of their prize egg, who was the hero?

That’s right, me.

One of these days, everyone is going to understand that father always knows best.

When we took the prize egg in for redemption, the kids were awarded an Easter basket full of candy and toys. I was shocked by how good the prize was. I was expecting perhaps a coupon for a Happy Meal, which would have been cool, so when they handed us an Easter basket, I was very surprised. Of course, the kids were quite excited to receive it as well, and as I type this, they are consuming/playing with every shred of what was in the basket.

The Cal Anderson egg hunt was a great deal of fun, and I would like to thank the Seattle Parks and Recreation Department and all of the volunteers for putting on a great event. Everyone had a blast.