At long last, it’s just less than one week to go before Easter Sunday! Around here, that means last weekend it was time to get out the Easter baskets, decor, and other fun things associated with the holiday! Well, what can I say, with Easter so early this year, we had to wait until St. Patrick’s Day was over and in the books in order to move onto the next best thing: Eggs and candy.

Speaking of eggs, we also got in a last-minute, unplanned play date around the corner to dye hard-boiled eggs. T usually dyes eggs with his Auntie Kel, which he’ll probably do later this week, too, but this was the first time he got to dye eggs with friends.

What a basket full of egg-filled fun! We used the usual Paas tablets dissolved the tabs in either white vinegar, lemon juice, water, or some combination of those three. We wound up with a wonderful mix of almost two-dozen pastel and bright eggs for the kids to decorate!

Then we let the kids use the stickers that came in the Paas packet, but our friend also brought out her bin chock full of regular stickers, markers, crayons, and glitter glue. Heck, we probably didn’t even need the Paas tablet kit to be honest. I think next year I might see if just regular food coloring will work with vinegar and water. Given the kids can pretty much use whatever sticker or pen to decorate the eggs, why all these fancy kits?! Though I have to say, that little scooper wire that comes in the Paas kit works much better than a spoon does.

Along with getting out our decorations and dyeing eggs, T also got to sample some new-to-him candy, thanks to C going on an impulsive candy run to the local Rite Aid. I really think drug stores should be called candy supermarkets, RMT’ers, because this was C’s third stop after two grocery stores for the sought-after goods. Eventually, C brought home a mixed bag of Reese’s Eggs, Cadbury Creme Eggs (caramel, chocolate, and original), holiday-themed and -packaged Skittles, and a plain old Butterfinger bar.

What C originally went on the run for was the Cadbury Egg; he really wanted T to try it. Given T’s general disdain for chocolate (aside from M&Ms and chocolate chip anything), I was curious to see how this was going to turn out.

Verdict: T liked the insides of the Cadbury Egg (pure sugary goo-ness), but not the chocolate outside. More for C then, as I really don’t like those Creme Eggs either myself (other than the caramel ones, those are very good). Oh, and T loved the Skittles, but that goes without saying. He loves those sweet-tart type candies, so much so it definitely makes up for his lack of palate for chocolate.

That reminds me… time to get to work on Team Easter Bunny this week (AKA, go candy shopping)! We’ve got eggs to fill this weekend!

RMT’ers, aside from your religious observations, what Easter preparations are you planning for the weekend ahead? And for our Passover friends, please share your favorite Kosher-for-Passover sweets and treats! Last year I posted a few links to Kosher-for-Passover dessert recipes on this post, but the one for what I now refer to as “Matzo crack” from Smitten Kitchen is most definitely my favorite of the bunch! Happy holidays to all!