On the way home from an Easter brunch at the home of some friends, my wife and I started talking about our own family traditions for the holiday. Each year, we would take pictures of the kids as they opened plastic eggs full of jelly beans. When the picture was timed right, it showed a cascade of jelly beans falling from the egg into their baskets. I thought my wife brought the tradition from her childhood. This year I learned that she started it when our kids were very young.
My wife’s family did have an Easter egg tradition that they called “bunting.” Two of them would each hold a hard-boiled egg. On the count of three, they would bump the eggs together. One would crack and the other would not. Before starting, they would choose whether to bunt the pointy ends or the dull ends first.
My sisters and I usually found a set of circus tickets inside a decorative egg that was made of cardboard or maybe papier-mâché. I also remember that we had two Easter decorations that didn’t just look like ducklings. They were taxidermied ducklings. As I recall, my mother had received them as a hand-me-down from an elderly aunt.
