Now that spring’s here it’s time to pull out all
my flowery and sunny home accessories! We have obscene amounts of holiday
decorations, boxes and boxes for Christmas, Halloween, Thanksgiving, and even
for birthdays! But I realized I don’t have much specifically for Easter. All I
have is my mother’s old ceramic green ware bunny jar, and a vintage Crayola rabbit.
The house is already filled with bright colors, so buying flowers, shuffling
around milk glass and setting out dyed eggs usually feels festive enough.
This year though, I want a little more. The weather has been so gorgeous, it just
really feels “springy”. I want to celebrate open windows, blooming flowers,
baby lambs, and all that jazz. I’m in the mood for a mini Easter project.
I’ve
had some white painted sticks in the boy’s playroom since Christmas; they’ve
been collecting key chains, and dust since, so I thought it would be nice to
repurpose them into a spring time center piece for our dining room. An Easter tree
seemed pretty logical and I thought the boys could have fun adding some eggs or
flowers to the branches. They were not as interested as I expected however…
deciding quickly after we started painting the sticks that they would rather
practice their “ninja moves” and climb the trees like “super-kitty-boys”. I guess
they’ve come down with a case of Spring Fever.
The next day while shopping at World Market for
Easter basket filler, I stumbled across a display of fuzzy chicks. They came in
various sizes, colors, and themes, like chickens, bunnies, and cuteness. I didn’t
realize till my basket was overflowing that they were five dollars a box… and I
had maybe fifty bucks worth of chicks who thought they were coming home with
me. (Sad face.) I apologized to them as I put them back, and searched the table
for a variety pack. (None!) I can’t justify spending that much on chicks,
though I did think if I had lots I could make a chickie wreath for the front door. (Adorable, but still
unjustifiable.) I stood there and
grumbled for a bit. I often wonder how I look at moments like that…. first squealing
and frantically tossing chicks into my basket, then freezing while I poorly do
some math in my head… (My husband says my “math face” is pretty tragic.) talking
to the boxes as I gloomy dump them back on the table… and next angrily digging
through them all searching for that one possible mixed box. Honestly, crazed
right? Well, I am not crazed… I am thinking. Thinking I want to do something
with these chicks… and when I realize what I want to do is to glue them onto my
Easter tree, I think that a rainbow of chickies is better than just yellow
chicks! Maybe I am a little crazed… I am throwing a mental temper tantrum over
fluffy baby chickens. I am going to blame that on Spring Fever too. Eventually
I have a vision of a chick in a top hat with monocle and decide I can just
settle on a pack of classic yellow. I’ll try to personalize them at home.
Romyn was very excited to see the box of
chicks and begged to play with them. It seems he’s had a tiny chick in his
treasure box since last Easter and he joyfully brought it down to join the
others. It’s a bit matted, like he’s loved on it. (Romyn requested its new home
be a nest in our tree. So I made one.) We discovered these World Market chicks are
craft- quality but not quite play-with-quality, they broke apart in Ro’s rough five-year-old hands. This
was traumatizing for the boy, but I was able to play doctor and glue them back together.
I used hot glue to customize and attach them to the branches of our center
piece, so the boys couldn’t actively help with the construction. Instead they enjoyed telling me all about the hobbies and lifestyles
of our chicks, naming them, and bringing me more toys to add to their “tree
house”. Inspired by our time painting sticks outside we added a kitty chickie
(who likes to climb trees) and a ninja chickie. (Ninja chick tradded his sword
off of a Ninjago Lego man for two jelly beans.) If you have older children you could
probably personalize chicks with small amounts Elmer’s glue. It all depends on your
patience levels. As I mentioned, we’re suffering from Spring Fever, so I knew glue
+ chicks + boys = bad idea. (I used scrap felt, ribbon, and paper to style our
chicks.)
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