TO THE EDITOR:

I would first like to thank the North Branch Chamber for this fun community event and the time and effort they put into it each year.

This was my 4th year attending this event with my child, which in the past has been very enjoyable and we look forward to each year. This year we went with our neighbor and friends from North Branch. We told them what a wonderful community event this was to enjoy with our children.

We arrived 20 minutes early with baskets in hand and had pictures with the Easter Bunny and the Dog.

We waited patiently with the smaller children up front. According to the sign the smaller children went first at 10. Previous years the smaller children had a separate area to search for eggs so they didnít get trampled.

The children 5 to 8 years said on the sign 10:15. By 10:10 everyone had surged forward.

I had three 6 year olds in tow, two new timers to the hunt. The children had been told 5 eggs each. To my surprise the eggs were gone! I have never seen so many empty Easter baskets and sad faces in my life and that didnít include my three 6 year olds!

I saw children a lot older than 8 years old with bags full of eggs.

What was worse, to my horror there was an adult women by a tree pulling eggs out of her coat. She had about 25 eggs on the ground and as her two children looked on she was opening them and looking for prize tickets. As parents of children with eggless baskets looked on open mouthed as this Easter Grinch stole our childrenís happy memories.

I went up to her and told her what an awful thing this was, she didnít care.

Fortunately another child came up to my three eggless children and gave two eggs to two of the children who then shared with the third child. At least the children have compassion, certainly not the adult Grinch!

Then we were told by the volunteers that there were only 500 eggs not the 2,500 eggs quoted in the paper. If there were 450 children that would have been 1 egg each not 5 eggs each which sounds true.

We also were told to stand in line to receive 1 egg for each child after 15 minutes in line they ran out before we got there.

Next year it might be a good idea to split the age groups again! Pre-registration might be the way to go so there wonít be any unhappy memories!

North Branch is a growing community. Next year everyone should be smiling like the Easter Bunny!

Denise Samson
Stacy