Easter Happenings

For the last two years I have searched high and low for egg coloring kits here in Manila to no avail. When we were stateside this year we left just on the cusp of the stores changing over their Holiday swag from Valentines to Easter and I was able to buy a few Easter essentials, cadbury cream eggs, peeps and of course, an egg coloring kit. I was clearly more excited than Holden for this but he obliged me and we got together with some friends who hadn't received their egg kit via the US postal system yet for a night of festivities.

Early the next morning when the "Easter Bunny" got up to hide the eggs, he/she found out just why they may not sale egg dye here! The cold eggs mixed with the high humidity made for some serious condensation and re-activated the dye. It was a lovely and by lovely I mean mess. Holden was excited all the same to find his and Finnley's gifts gathered together in one big basket. The big bunny remembered the yearly tradition of shoes and of course threw in a little star wars between the chocolates.

Later that day after breakfast crepes, we headed across the street to the Marriott hotel where we have our gym and pool membership for a proper egg hunt. It was just like a birthday party here in the Philippines complete with characters, face painting and magician. What fun. Things, of course, got out of control when the egg hunt started and parent and yayas "forgot" that they weren't supposed to participate. Argh. Luckily Holden is big enough now to fend for himself so we just sat back and enjoyed until someone ran by him with their kid under arm in a rush for eggs and kicked him in the cheek. It's all out war and chaos at these events here! The golden child survived and was excited with his fair share of plastic eggs. We met some friends for a mexican feast for Easter lunch and relaxed the rest of the day.

The city shuts down for the few days before the holiday and it's sometimes nice to have this forced relaxation. All of the stores and restaurants are closed all over except hotels, so we spent the whole weekend relaxing at the pool. It's a nice change from the cold spring that I remember back in the Western US.