Happy Easter 2020!
As I prefaced in my post from yesterday, we didn’t have any major plans for today. So far we are all still wearing PJs and it’s mid-afternoon.
We did get up and do the Easter basket/ egg hunt! The, ahem, “Easter Bunny” really stepped up his basket hiding game this year. Since the boys are 10 and 11 now, the Bunny chose some pretty difficult hiding spots, thinking the boys would be up for the challenge.
Well, they kind of weren’t. Ha!
Asher especially literally could not find a couple of his baskets and finally enlisted help! Jeez. Ivan and I were rolling our eyes at each other behind their backs at how terrible they were at searching. They would open a cabinet (containing a basket right behind the cereal box) and they would bend down, peer inside, say “nothing in here!” and close the door. Seriously?!! If I knew how to insert emojis in a blog post, I would put a face-palm emoji here.
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| Eventually…..victory! |
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| Some cute little props I dug out for the photos 🙂 |
On the plus side, the fact that the basket hunt occurred at all means that the Bunny did indeed have success on a Target/ grocery store run yesterday! He didn’t even have to resort to stuffing eggs with cash; there were plenty of treats and miscellaneous items to be found to fill up the baskets.
A few highlights were: candy (of course), a book for each boy, some fun bouncy ball things and a yo-yo ball for outside, some water balloons (if the weather ever warms up), colored pencils/ markers and some mechanical pencils for their school work.
We had a nice little brunch (in our PJS…) as well- just some cinnamon rolls and scrambled eggs with bacon. Afterwards we Face-timed with my parents for a while. This evening we are planning to make some sirloin steaks, mashed potatoes and broccoli. Probably not the most traditional Easter dinner, but it is what sounded good to us! We have not watched an Easter Sunday church service yet either, so I hope to do that yet this afternoon too.
Side note: When I was a kid, this was how Easter was done…we each got several baskets, they were hidden around and we had to find them. I always assumed that was normal. As I have gotten older, I think most people just do one big basket, and then an egg hunt? Is that right? I don’t even know. Maybe my parents just did that since there were only two of us? We do it this way since it’s what I always did… basically we have a few baskets for each (but since there are several, they are not very full- just a couple/ few items in each) and then a bigger one for both boys to share. I’m just curious what other people do. We generally do not do an egg hunt- just a few random eggs mixed in the baskets. I would be super interested to hear what anyone else does!
Moving on to a few other thoughts…
COVID Pandemic notes
I got thinking about my trip out to the stores yesterday. It was really my first time on a real outing, not counting the post office last week. I knew what to expect from seeing posts on social media and the news, of course, but it was definitely strange to see it all first hand.
I was thinking this morning that I should probably jot down a few notes about it all. Looking back someday, it could be really interesting to reflect on! So, in no particular order, here are some of my observations:
Target
– workers stationed at entrance wearing gloves and masks, wiping down each cart before giving it to a customer to use. You weren’t allowed to just grab your own cart like you normally would.
-super empty compared to normal Target traffic
-everyone in the aisles seemed to feel really awkward if they had to walk past anyone else… I noticed people (and I found myself doing this too) trying to turn their head away to avoid even remotely breathing on anyone near them. People also made sort of a big show of stepping extra far away from others to let people pass (which is good, since that is the point, but it was still sort of funny)
-in the Easter aisles they had arrows on the floor directing traffic to move only one way through the aisles; up one aisle and then back down the opposite direction in the next aisle.
Grocery Store
-definitely more crowded than Target
– >50% of people were wearing face masks. Maybe 65%? A lot of people were. Also, all employees there were required to wear face masks per a sign in the entrance. (Not many people in Target were wearing masks)
-re-usable bags were not allowed
-I discovered that I must normally lick my finger when I open a produce bag! I have never noticed this or paid attention to it, but I could not open those little plastic bags to save my life. I found myself tempted to lick my finger to open the bag! (In my defense, I noticed other people struggling with the bags too!) Fortunately, I caught myself and did NOT stick my finger in my mouth in a public place in the middle of a pandemic.
-The check out areas were very different- they had one big line with dots on the floor 6 feet apart to keep people distanced. Then they had workers assigning you a register when it was your turn, to keep less people in the tight quarters in the check out lanes.
-Every register had a big plexi-glass shield separating the cashier from the customer.
Daily Gratitude:
I am grateful that I am able to be home on Easter Sunday this year. So many years in the past (when I was an inpatient nurse) I had to work on Easter, so it is a blessing to be able to stay home with my family and enjoy the day.
GRATEFUL KAE 
Regarding your shopping trip, it's interesting how much has changed, huh? I have to tell you that I went to Walmart today, for the first time since this started. I've been to a couple other places but have not here. My experience was different. You still grab your own cart but they do have wipes, maybe 25% of people were wearing masks despite there being a decent amount of customers present, and some people shyed away, and that's what I'm used to (zombie like quite and complete avoidance), but not here. Many people would still get close, they were talking, and it almost felt like a normal day. I'm more impressed with Targets approach. And I seen a Dr Oz episode years ago that talked about licking your fingers, and germs, so I haven't done it for a long time. Basic training for this I guess. HahaIm glad that your Easter turned out nice. The boys look happy and it looks like the bunny did them well. Awesome! ~PB
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It is really interesting how the "culture" seems different at different places! I thought it was funny that there were differences even between Target and Woodman's. I thought Target did a good job, from what I saw. It must have been a nightmare for store management at all these places to figure out these new procedures and implement everything over these past few weeks… ugh.
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It was nice to talk to you yesterday!! The girls really enjoyed it – though I think it's funny how they beg and beg to talk to your boys, and then when we finally do, they stand there and say… nothing. Oh well! We were all impressed with the vast array of weaponry on display at your house these days. :-)Here in Ireland each girl gets one basket and then we have a few plastic eggs that are filled with treats (this year loose jelly beans). The Easter bunny also hides a few (like 3-4) gifts around the house separately – a big chocolate bunny, and then some non-candy gifts. Crayons, coloring books, things like that. I too have memories of finding many Easter baskets, but when this whole thing started for us here I literally could not find a single Easter basket for sale anywhere in Ireland. I don't know if Easter baskets aren't a thing or if there is some secret Easter store I don't know about. I should ask my Irish friends. I FINALLY found two for sale in the middle aisle at Aldi one year – they don't have handles but they did have fake grass and were made of pink, purple, yellow and green woven wicker. So we have those. No idea what we will do next year when S is big enough for his own basket! Hopefully another Aldi sale?!?The stores here have hired security that stands outside and enforces a strict capacity on customers in the store – one out, one in. I haven't seen anyone cleaning the baskets or carts though I hope they are doing it sometimes. There are dots on the floor by the check out so we all appropriately distance ourselves. A fair number of people and the cashiers have been wearing latex gloves but I haven't seen many masks. A few – but probably 10% or less. I haven't been in the stores very often we as have been doing online grocery shopping and just picking up outside the store at a kiosk. The last time I was at the store I kind of felt like Lady Pac Man – when I saw a 'bad guy' coming (another customer) I would scurry up the aisle and down different one, trying to stay as far away as possible. One time this wasn't possible and I passed close enough to a woman to smell her perfume. I panicked thinking it was WAY TOO CLOSE and spent the next two weeks hoping she wasn't contagious. (It's been more than 2 weeks since then so I think she and I were fine. Or maybe she was just wearing too much perfume!) Our stores have been well stocked here – a few things have been out of stock occasionally but mostly there have been all the essentials, including toilet paper, rice, pasta, and produce. One thing that has been perpetually low is flour – I think a lot of people have suddenly gotten the urge to bake bread. This really annoys me because I have been baking our family's bread for over a year now and I am mad that their fair-weather hobby is making it hard for me to find a household staple. But other than this one item our supply chains seem to be running okay… for now.
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I was wondering how it would be in Ireland. Interesting that there are security guards. I feel like I heard somewhere some places here are doing that too, but I guess I haven't seen it firsthand. Haha about feeling like Pac man- I know what you mean! It's all just….awkward! No one wants to be the person "breaking the rules" somehow!! I am pretty sure I have a couple of your old Easter baskets here, the nice sturdy ones we had as kids. But I don't think you want to necessarily deal with lugging those home on an airplane next time you're around.
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