It’s time for a candy giveaway! Each year, NCA sends packages of new Easter candy to reporters across the country to give them some ideas of what’s happening in the world of confectionery.
These packages are fabulous – there are candies you know and love in pastel Easter packaging and tons of brand new items, as well. Highlights for me include:
- Jelly Belly Blooming Bottles
- Chocolate Mousse Peeps
- Smarties Jelly Beans
- Dark Chocolate Heavenly Hash Egg and Dark Chocolate Gold Brick Eggs
- Lindor Truffle Eggs
And those are just a few examples. I know Tori was crazy about the Chocolate Covered Oyster Crackers from Wolfgang and Carl was excited about the Hot Tamales Licorice Jelly Beans. In all, there are about 50 items included in the package – and you have a chance to win one of three complete packages.
Two alternate prizes are also available. One lucky winner will receive an Easter basket and six good-size bags of M&Ms and a very special winner will receive an Easter basket full of Toxic Waste hazardously sour candy. (That’s Susan S. in the photo, but she is not included in the giveaway.) Note that to get the Toxic Waste candy, you must specify in your comment that this is the prize you want.
In the comments field, please tell us your favorite Easter candy memories. Was it waking up to find a trail of jelly beans left by the Easter Bunny like my childhood friend Jenn and her sister? Did your parents create elaborate egg hunts in the backyard (including the plastic kind filled with candies)? Or maybe you were lucky enough to get tickets to one of the famed Easter Egg Rolls at the White House. Whatever it is, let us know and use details.
Three Five winners be selected on April 7 so please have all entries in no later than midnight (EST) on April 6. We have a few “celebrity” judges in mind for the contest and we’ll introduce you at a later date (and, no, one of them is NOT the Easter Bunny so please don’t ask me for his autograph!).
Good luck! (And remember to enter by April 6!)
10:04 am on March 27th, 2009
Probably my best memory was when we went to visit my cousins for Easter. They are usually out of town, but they recently moved to our town of normal IL. Anyway, we went over to their house, and they had arranged an Easter-egg hunt for us kids. I was the second best at finding the eggs. My younger brother,(no surprise,) found the most eggs. But the best part was when we sent the grownups out of the room while we kids hid the empty Easter eggs in the downstairs.
That’s my best memory. And I love the blog, BTW!
3:00 pm on March 27th, 2009
My absolute favorite memory was of the two special Easter eggs I received each year in my basket. The first one was a delicate sugar egg. It was completely hollow and closed except for a small hole at the end you could look into and see an Easter scene. I never ever ate mine, it was too perfect. I’m sure my mom threw it out eventually.
My other favorite was the over sized chocolate peanut butter Easter egg from the church ladies. A local group of women owned a confectionery, and each year at Easter they made hundreds of Easter eggs, coconut creme, peanut butter or butter creme all covered in chocolate. The eggs also had a little green leaf and colored flower made of hard icing on top. They were absolute heaven. I ate half on Easter and half the next day.
I so wish I could find them for my children, or at least some high quality facsimiles thereof that compare.
3:20 pm on March 27th, 2009
Easter was always a special time for me, it signaled the start of spring and the approaching of my birthday. I was a die-hard Easter Bunny believer and my Dad never failed to take advantage of that. The day before Easter, weather providing, my Dad would enlist me to rake the yard, clearing out all the sticks and weeds leftover from the long winter. He explained to me that if there were any twigs, thistles or leaves they would get stick in the Easter Bunny’s paws and he would get hurt and not be able to deliver baskets. Worried that I might not get any candy, I took to raking that yard with gusto. After I was done, sweaty and tired, I would spend the afternoon using lava rocks to decorate our driveway with pictures of Easter eggs and a large “Welcome Easter Bunny” sign. I was convinced that my hospitality, and the clean clear yard, would bring me into special favor with the Easter Bunny, and earn me an extra Cadbury Creme Egg, or two!
4:07 pm on March 27th, 2009
My brother and I used to fight over everything as kids and Easter was no different. The Easter basket fight typically started because the ears were missing from the chocolate bunnies. I would get up much earlier than him on Easter morning to protect my basket. I remember how mad I would be that he had gotten up in the middle of the night and mess with my stuff. Years later we found out that my dad would eat the ears on the chocolate bunnies before he put the baskets out! He said he did it because we wouldn’t share nicely. My brother and I still laugh about that now.
4:58 pm on March 27th, 2009
Ok, I’m not trying to win candy cuz I’ve won before. But I can still tell you about my fave Easter.
My dad was the BEST at Easter hunts. “Harry the Hopper” would leave us clever rhyming clues every year. THAT year he was living in an old farmhouse. Instead of just candy, there were fresh fruits and veggies with every clue – like strawberries and carrots and apples and kiwis. And they were hidden in neat places – like the barn!
The best part was sharing our yummy treats with Tony – an old work horse that lived there.
Hopefully I’ll be able to make hunts that fun for my kids someday.
9:53 pm on March 27th, 2009
Oh I loved Easter. Every year my mom would make me and my sister matching easter dresses and then we would always get a new hat. We would always get up in the morning to find a big (storebought) easter basket in the dining room. Then we would eat breakfast and get dressed up in our new dresses and go to church. After church the church would have their own easter egg hunt for the kids. They would hide plastic eggs with candy or slips of paper with prizes. It was alwyas fun. Then we would go home and we were allowed to open our baskets. They always had a pkush toy, jelly beans, chocolate and other little toys. I always made a beeline for the chocolate bunny. It was the hollow type. I would always, always eat the head first. We also had an Easter party at our house every year. And the night before we would color eggs and then when we got back from church we would hide the eggs and plastic eggs all over our yard for our guests to find them. We had a great time!!
4:12 pm on March 28th, 2009
My very first Easter egg hunt took place when I was four. I got a brand new white straw hat, and little basket to match, and I wore my favorite jean jumper with white tights. My parents took me to the local community center to participate in their hunt.
I was just the wrong age. I was too big to have Mom and Dad run around getting eggs for me, but I was too small to keep up with everyone else, so I was the slowest one out there, and I just couldn’t keep up. Everyone else had full baskets, while mine only had two or three eggs.
Not one to be deterred, I gave up on hunting down hidden eggs and instead went to my fellow egg hunters, approaching them with supplicating hand to ask for one of their eggs. The bigger kids just ignored me, but the little toddlers’ parents took pity on me and shared, at least until my embarrassed mother scooped me up and away.
12:36 pm on March 29th, 2009
Okay, I know I did this for the Christmas contest, but I have another favorite. One year, I don’t remember specifics, I went to Walmart with my Dad, and I found, in the clearance candy isle, a display of sugar eggs. I looked through them carefully before choosing the perfect one. I eagerly payed for my candy treasure, and took it home. I had that thing for the longest time, though I did have a fright when my Dad told e that if I left it out, I would end up with a sugary-slimy mess. I carefully sealed it in a zip-top bag, and took it where-ever I went throughout the house to play. I never ended up eating all of the white sugar shell, but it was fun!
12:31 am on March 30th, 2009
I think my favorite Easter memory was one of the years that we stayed with my grandfather, and he hid Easter baskets (filled with candy of course) around his house for my sister and I to find. I got up and found my basket quickly, but my sister kept searching the house and not finding hers, while my grandfather and I were giggling in the kitchen because it was sitting on her chair. He finally convinced her to come have breakfast, and she was so excited to find her basket. (Part of the reason I love the memory is that my grandfather passed away not that long afterward.)
(Of course, my least favorite Easter memory is when my sister ran into a cabinet and had to go to the ER and get stitches in her forehead. But that is a story for another time.)
10:01 am on March 31st, 2009
As a young girl I’d wake up to a hunt for eggs AND my basket. I lived in Northern CA at the time, so spring was in full swing by the time Easter arrived. I’d have clues written on paper, like a scavenger hunt, to lead me to my basket (which would hold a solid chocolate rabbit, small solid foil chocolate eggs, jelly belly beans, and Russell Stover cream eggs).
The Easter egg hunt (yes, the plastic kind filled with candy) took place in my lawn and garden surrounding the house, and there was never a shortage of hiding spots. My favorite thing to do was shake the eggs to get a hint of what was inside, and hearing that classic rattle of jelly beans was the best find. I’d often drop some in the grass by trying to open some of the eggs with too much excitement.
Out of them all, I miss the Russell Stover eggs. At the time they made a pair of coconut creme ones that came with a white chocolate coating, one green and one pink. I really loved those and they’ve since been discontinued.
8:37 pm on March 31st, 2009
My favorite Easter memory is probably my mother’s least.
In search for my Easter basket (a glorious one at that: jelly beans, Cadbury creme and mini eggs, peanut butter eggs, and real licorice [but no peeps because, well, I didn’t like the idea of eating something with eyes, apparently), I followed clues and jelly beans. Somehow, I got ahead of my mother and followed the trail to the bathroom. There, sitting properly upon the edge of the sink, was a cup of jelly beans! In my haste to snatch it up, I bumped it – right into the open toilet. My mother walks in seconds later to see her sweet little child grabbing jelly beans out of the toilet. I can’t recall eating them, but my mother claims otherwise.
Ah, memories.
8:45 pm on March 31st, 2009
My favorite Easter candy memory is the years I helped my mom, a kindergarten teacher, fill and hide the plastic eggs filled with candy (back when you could still give out candy – and celebrate religious holidays! – in public schools) for her classroom kids. We bought jelly beans, peeps, and other hard candies. No chocolate because it would have melted in the sun.
We also hid peanuts for the kids. Because my mom taught in an area with a lot of immigrants and economically challenged residents, the kids were thrilled to have the chance to hunt for the eggs we hid in the grassy playground area.
We got to watch 30 little ones find their Easter eggs – in many cases their first ever Easter candy – and share the joy they felt. Sometimes, they’d even share their candy with us!
Years later when I was all grown up, I loved sharing Cadbury eggs with my daughters. Yummy!
Note: I’d prefer the Toxic Waste basket.
9:06 pm on March 31st, 2009
My favorite Easter memories are always the ones I have had with my own children over the years in the different homes and countries we’ve lived in.
The tradition of filling our ever increasing supply of colorful plastic eggs with smooth milk chocolate mini eggs and various tasty treats and then hiding them inside and outside of the house even when there was a white layer of snow on the ground and every year trying to come up with more cunning hiding spots sticks out so clearly.
Our amusement and the childrens delight at finding those plastic eggs that had eluded even the adults that hid them in the first place weeks later was even funnier and enabled us to share extra special Easter moments and memories long after Easter was over!
If I’m lucky enough to win, I would very much like the Easter basket with the M&Ms please.
9:17 pm on March 31st, 2009
My parents always hid our Easter baskets so well that it would take us hours of scouring the house and yard to find them! My dad in particular was diligent about making sure it would take us a while to find them. I think my mom would have put them in the same place each year if it would have saved her listening to us whine about not being able to find them.
The Easter following a move, my parents had all kinds of new hiding spots in a new home. We couldn’t find them before we had to leave for church, so we were so worried we wouldn’t find them at all! It took us about and hour of hunting and searching to find one hidden in one of our apple trees, one in the bathtub and the other inside the piano.
We keep the tradition going with my daughter who just loves to hunt all over to find her treats!
11:07 pm on March 31st, 2009
When I was little, my mom encouraged us to write letters to the Easter Bunny, much like Santa, the difference being that we just wrote to the Easter Bunny to tell him how our year was, or what we liked about Bunnies in general, or what our favorite candies were. I was always a little nerd who LOVED reading, so every Easter when we got our baskets, I loved the candy and the little toys (Peeps, especially, were my favorite, and since my brother and sister hated them I always ended up with a ton) but most of all I loved that letter from the Easter Bunny. I grew to look forward to writing, and it’s things like this that my mom did when I was growing up that motivated me to become an english major. Even though I am in college now, when my mom sends me a package of easter treats, she always includes a little letter signed “The Easter Bunny”.
The most memorable thing that ever happened with this letter was one year when my brother, sister and I had a fierce debate over whether the Easter Bunny was a boy or girl. To solve the problem, my sister asked the Easter Bunny, “Are you a boy or a girl?” in her letter. Because my mother had two daughters and one son, she couldn’t decide if she wanted to write “Boy” or “Girl” and risk either side being upset and feeling left out, she simply wrote “I don’t know!” For years and years until we found out, my siblings and I would always crack up at the thought because we assumed the Easter Bunny was one seriously confused rabbit.
11:14 pm on March 31st, 2009
[...] not tired of trying to win free candy (enter our giveaways here and here), head over to the Candy Dish Blog for a chance to win some more free candy. In all, there are about 50 items included in the package [...]
8:14 am on April 1st, 2009
When I was a child in the late fifties/early sixties, the local business association would put on an Easter Egg Hunt in the park across from my house. Every year, hundreds of kids would assemble for the mad dash to find the plastic eggs, each one containing some sort of little toy or piece of candy. My father filmed several years worth of the event on his old 8mm Bell & Howell. I still get a wonderful feeling watching the old films and re-living a fun time from my childhood.
8:44 am on April 1st, 2009
One of my fondest Easter memories is of the Easter baskets my aunt made up for us one year. Of course there were the usual sweet treats of chocolate in egg and bunny form, Peeps and a scattering of jellybeans.
My sister and I were thrilled with our candy bounty but our aunt added some additional surprises which we didn’t discover until it came time to throw out the “grass” in the baskets and put everything away til the next year.
Hidden within the grass were glittery bangle bracelets, rings with huge glass gemstones, candy necklaces and some little Easter figurines. It was like having two Easters that year!
10:24 am on April 1st, 2009
My favorite memory is imagining I saw the Easter bunny in my room, through half shut eyes.
11:00 am on April 1st, 2009
My favorite Easter was one I arranged for for my adult children and their spouses. My husband and I hid plastic eggs all over the yard and had all 4 children; ages 20 – 30 start the hunt. I thought it would be a fun way to kill an hour. Well they left the house like banshees! They were screaming and laughing and stealing each other’s eggs! It was the funniest thing to see. Absolutely hilarious! I guess everyone loves an Easter egg hunt!
11:18 am on April 1st, 2009
Growing up, my sister and I didn’t hunt Easter eggs in the backyard, nor did we expect elaborate baskets carefully decorated with colored grass and artfully arranged layers of gourmet candy and toys. For us, Easter meant quantity, if not quality. Crammed into our grassless baskets each year, we found jellybeans, Peeps, foil-covered chocolate eggs, Cadbury Creme eggs, Reeses peanut butter eggs, a hollow chocolate bunny. My sister showed moderation, but I couldn’t, and by the time we sat down for Easter dinner, I had eaten so much chocolate that I wanted nothing to do with corn or ham. But nobody seemed to mind. My parents recognized that for a child, much of the pleasure of Easter came from its excesses. The only part of my Easter basket that I didn’t like were the black jellybeans. I carefully picked around them and offered them to my father, who was so pleased with my rejects that he never asked me to share any other flavors with him. Dad loved black jellybeans so much, in fact, that when my family brought home a squirming black kitten one spring, it was simple to decide her name: Jellybean, in honor of my father’s love for the candy.
11:52 am on April 1st, 2009
My favorite Easter memory was my brother and I waking up and looking for baskets Easter morning before my parents were awake. Once we found them we would try not to look at them and even covered them with blankets, so that when my parents got up, we would open them in front of them and be surprised by what was inside…And then we would be allowed to pick a peice or two of candy to eat with our breakfast.
12:25 pm on April 1st, 2009
This is not only my best Easter memory, it was one of the best memories ever. As usual, my sister and I got up and had new Easter outfits to wear to church. We got dressed and headed out the door. We knew when we got home, we would get to ‘hunt’ for our Easter baskets, so we were quite excited to go and get back home.
When we got back home we started looking. Under beds in cabinets and finally…I opened the closet door in our bedroom and there stood my grandma (Nonna) holding two baskets for us. Nonna lived in RI, and we had moved to California and had not seen her for about 5 years…so it was the best day of our lives!
Of course that was years ago, and Nonna is passed, but she is still loved.
Happy Easter everyone!
12:25 pm on April 1st, 2009
With complete and utter disregard for what Easter is truly about, it became my favorite holiday for one reason: MOUNTAINS OF CANDY. My family didn’t have a lot of money and I can recall a few years where my mom skipped the frills (i.e. no pastel plastic easter basket, no stuffed bunnies, no brightly-colored cello-grass (which was probably for the best anyway, since the cats had a dangerous addiction to the stuff!)) and just filled brown paper bags with candy. And I was ok with that.
Like with Christmas, we kids used to sneak around and try to find out in advance what sort of crazy candy had been procured that year. My mom got more and more annoyed with this practice and started hiding things under lock and key. One year she had finally had enough, and kept all of the Easter candy locked in the trunk of her car. Unfortunately, it was unusually warm that year and she neglected to put the candy in a safer place…
I still have nightmares about poor Peter Rabbit’s sunken, disfigured white chocolate face– those beady little sugar eyes staring back at me from an unrecognizable puddle of goo.
So, not really my favorite Easter, but definitely one of the more memorable ones!
1:49 pm on April 1st, 2009
Every Easter we would have an indoor easter egg hunt and then go into the kitchen to find the entire table covered in candy. Now that I am older I still look forward to a table full of candy although now it isnt on easter it is every saturday!
2:00 pm on April 1st, 2009
For a few years when I was a teenager, my Dad who was the General Manager of a hotel, used to make me dress up as the Easter Bunny! I had to wear one of those horrible silly furry bunny costumes.I passed out candy to all the little kids at the hotel during the egg hunts. Let me tell you that big plastic head was hard to breathe out of. Plus trying to look out of the little eye holes made it impossible to even see the kids standing around me. So basically I just blindly patted them on the head and dropped candy on them!
3:50 pm on April 1st, 2009
My favorite Easter memory was the year that I lost a tooth the night before. My sister and I slept in the livingroom this night, waiting to wake up and find our goody baskets in the early morning. Very much known to my parents, I put my fallen out tooth under a rug near my pillow on the floor. When morning came, I checked under the rug to see if the Tooth Fairy had left me a monetary treat before rushing off to see the bunny gained goods. But low and behold…there was no quarter or mere dollar there… but a $5 bill!!! I was shocked, no time before had losing a tooth netted me such a gain! I exclaimed to my mom look look look! And she gave my dad such a face…apparently the “easter bunny” was up so late putting together baskets that when switched over to “tooth fairy” couldn’t see straight in the dark and just blindly grabbed money to slide under the rug.
4:53 pm on April 1st, 2009
My favorite memory was last year giving my 13 month old son his first taste of sugar. We gave him a white chocolate Lindt bunny. He did not speak much back then, but he knew sign language. He continuously did the sign for “more” all day. It’s awesome to be on the other end of the Easter basket and creating good memories for my child.
4:55 pm on April 1st, 2009
One of my favourite Easter memories was when I was six years old, we had justed moved from England to Puerto Rico. I had gone to bed very early the night before, which had me up before the sun the next morning so I went to take a pick at the Easter baskets…Yeah, the Easter Bunny had stopped by and the baskets were filled with wonderful things. I headed back to bed to wait for my parents to come get us for easter morning. What a surprise we all had … I couldn’t believe what was NOW in my Easter basket but loads of chocolate bunnies and egss that I didn’t notice just hours earlier when I had taken my peek. Well being the young child with a busy mind I asked my parents has was it that my Easter basket didn’t have chocolate in it when I firsted looked but did when we all got up?. Well my parents told me that I was just very lucky as the Easter Bunny had run out of chocolate and had to make a return trip to add the chocolate.
9:36 pm on April 1st, 2009
My favorite easter memory was when my parents woke up early to hide eggs for my brother and me, so that we could do an easter egg hunt after church. it was a great plan except that by the time we got back, squirrels had eaten all our eggs : (
so that wasn’t really my favorite, just the most memorable. my parents did do a jelly bean trail one time, but it was for valentines day. that is my favorite memory because again, they tried to get a head start by setting up the trail late at night after i had gone to bed. but i of course woke up in the middle of the night and ate both my trail and all but about six beans from my brother’s trail. i thought it was pretty nice of me to leave a small 6-bean pile in his room – so generous i was!
12:59 am on April 2nd, 2009
My favorite Easter memory was the year that my parents realized (after the fact) that I no longer needed the easter egg hunt head start. A few families had gathered at our house for the festivities and as the youngest I was released in the yard before any of the other kids. My parents discovered their mistake when my basket was full and there were only a handful of eggs left undiscovered when the rest of the children came outside. I still remember how proud I felt, even though I had ruined the hunt for the rest of the kids. Sadly they re-hid the eggs and a more fair hunt began
2:45 am on April 2nd, 2009
when i was little, we lived in germany, as my dad worked at an army base there. the owners of our rented house were 2 older spinster sisters. they were so excited to have a young couple with a little girl renting the house, that they made every holiday really special for me. they created an elaborate easter egg hunt for me all around the yard-this was my first one, at age 3. and they had little toys for me and everything. of course, my mom couldn’t resist, and she dressed me up in a fancy spring dress and shoes. some of the other american kids came over too, and we searched for eggs again and again-the old ladies kept re-hiding the eggs. it was very sweet of them and i’ll always have fond memories (although somewhat hazy) of the years we lived overseas.
7:34 am on April 2nd, 2009
Hmmm, favorite Easter memories… Having my brother home last Easter… sorta
He’s in the army and was stationed in Iraq for a year. He wasn’t home for Christmas or Easter, so we celebrated when he got home (I think it was early April). My Mom left the Christmas tree up and all the other Christmas decorations in the living room. And she put all the Easter decorations up in the dinning room ^_^ I think my Mom secretly got sick of looking at the Christmas tree by then 
It was fun though ^_^ Had lots to celebrate!
Another memory is… when I got my last Easter basket full of goodies
My Mom said when us kids started college there would be no more Easter baskets… So the last one I got was 12th grade 
I got one of those Panorama Sugar Eggs 
Those things are awesome to the max! Right now I’m going to a culinary school, majoring in Pastry Arts. One day I will make my own Panorama Sugar Egg, yup yup!
9:16 am on April 2nd, 2009
You know, I have seen some mentions of “sugar eggs” recently, as in Philly’s response. At first I figured it was a colloquial term for jelly beans or something but I just looked them up and saw what they are – pretty, fancy eggs with a little figure or small diorama inside. This is something I have not seen before. Of course, most of you who mentioned it are likely good church-going folks, at least for Easter. My parents were heathens and never took us to church, so it could be that only good kids got these in my day!
My favorite Easter memory isn’t one particular instance but collectively all the times I sat with my brother on the floor and traded candy, creating a whole hierarchy of values of different candy. It was like Halloween but with less work.
My mother would often make a ham for dinner on Easter, which was rare for our family. I never cared for it so much, compared to beef or chicken, but it was exotic and special and I savored it. One year she made duck, which was not as much of a hit, but a good effort all the same. Funny – Mom never candied hams or other meats, believing that sweet and savory should be completely separate flavors and should never mix together.
Mom just didn’t understand. When I was a kid (and even now sometimes), candy could almost be a main course. No need for traditional dinner. Just give my brother and me some candy and chocolate and we will be fine!
9:17 am on April 2nd, 2009
Once, I decided to stay up all night in an attempt to see the Easter Bunny. I probably made it until about two in the morning and conked out. When I got up a few hours later to look for candy, I found some hidden in my room. It blew my mind–how did that rabbit break in without me hearing (in retrospect, I realized that my mom must have hidden it some time before I went to bed). Apparently, I was no match for whatever powers the EB possessed, and wisely spent subsequent Easter eves sleeping. Attending church the following morning in some hideous, flowery dress was brutal enough on an eight-year-old without factoring in sleep deprivation.
11:49 am on April 2nd, 2009
[...] Remember – it’s not too late to enter the contest. Read more about the giveaway and enter today! [...]
4:16 pm on April 2nd, 2009
When I was three I got up VERY early by myself, found all of the plastic eggs, and started eating all the candy! When my mom found me, I was covered in chocolate and had a marshmallow bunny smooshed all over my nightgown…
4:37 pm on April 2nd, 2009
I have a Twin Sister.. so every Memory I have of Easter is precious! The First Memory I have of Easter though is waking up and SMELLING chocolate and looking down and SEEING my EASTER Basket!! I was soooo Excited!!! It was beautiful. When I woke up the next day I remember there being a Big sugar Egg in the Basket and there was an Easter Scene in the Egg. (The Egg was NOT edible.
The BIG thing I remember about that Easter (hahahah) is that my Twin sister left her Easter Basket on the floor and our Little Dog ATE the WHOLE contents of the BASKET… Yeah Gads what a mess!!! NOT Cute!! the Dog was sick for days, because chocolate is NOT good for them. YIKES! hahahh
Leslie
5:36 pm on April 2nd, 2009
My dad used to hide our Easter baskets every year. When we were little, my mom would make bunny prints out of paper and we could follow those, but as we got older, they were hidden much more cleverly! One year, I remember finally finding my basket at about 6 pm in our boat trailer in the backyard! I think my mom probably finally told my dad to stop making them SO hard!!
5:52 pm on April 2nd, 2009
My fondest memory of Easter candy goes back to when we lived in a huge three story housee. My parents let me hold an Easter party with all of my frineds in celebration of Easter and my near by birthday. There was all kinds of candy hidden in so many places throughout the house along with Easter baskets, dyed eggs and even special little Easter toys tucked away in various places. In order for all of us kids to be involved and no one get left out of getting their share of goodies we were considered a team and everything found was brought back to a central location where it could then be passed out between all of the children. The passing out was easy for my parents as they made sure to have a childs namce on everything so that when we gathered around they could pass everything out to all of us. It was a blast because we worked in pairs as we ran through the house looking up, down, inside and around everything imaginable to find all of the Easter treasures. My very very favorite Easter candy was, and still is, malted milk eggs. After we were all done hunting and gathering all the goodies my mother brought out a glorious birthday cake. It was decorated so beautifully and topped with a layer of malted milk eggs. Yummy!!! A short while later, the Easter bunny showed back up. (We didn’t know it then, but it was my Uncle all dressed up). He took all of us outdoors to play games, do a bunny hop dance and then take us for a walk down along the river to hunt for turtles and anything else we happened upon. It was so much fun and my malted milk egg topped cake just made my day.
JD
visionquest2020@msn.com
5:55 pm on April 2nd, 2009
My favourite (spelled with a U because I’m Canadian) memories are recent ones with my 3 children. The Easter Bunny always hides candies in 3. Who ever is the first to find a batch will alert the other two to come over & get their share.
For all the fighting that takes place over the course of living life with brothers & sisters, it gives me great pleasure to see them make sure they each get equal treats.
6:26 pm on April 2nd, 2009
One of my favorite Easter Memories is that growing UP the Easter Bunny would HIDE our Easter Baskets and we would have to find them. IT was a real Treasure Hunt! The Easter Bunny also would hide plastics eggs filled with candy and some with coins and dollars and up to ten dollars. While hunting we would find eggs along the way and find the BIG Easter Baskets filled with ALL our GOODIES that the Easter Bunny had left for US.
10:49 am on April 3rd, 2009
For many years my father worked as a baker. When he would come home, he would always have a pastry or a bag full of donuts in his lunchbox to share. His story, for my neice and nephews was that the Easter bunny worked in the bakery with him on the off season and what my dad brought home were the items that the Easter bunny made for them.
When my nephew went to school, one of the questions on a test was to circle the most appropriate answer to the questions. The question was “Who is the best baker?” and the options were a picture of a turtle, a mother and the Easter bunny. David couldn’t understand why he got that question wrong. He circled the Easter bunny, who he felt was a much better baker than his mother!
11:26 am on April 3rd, 2009
We always went camping with my cousins my mom was more into it than all the kids , she got up extra early to make sure all the baskets were perfect and all the eggs were filled with candy and money, i was the youngest of the bunch so she would help me find the eggs, she would never tell me where they were but would kinda lead me towards them, at the end of the hunt she would have a blanket ready for us to sit with our Easter baskets and candy we would compare candy and most of the time we’d exchange candy for our favorite, i remember i alwasy favored anything chocolate, but tootsie rolls and the little eggs covered in foil were my favorite.Those were very fun times especially for mom.
11:50 am on April 3rd, 2009
I must say that I am a huge candy fan! And, jelly beans are my all-time favorite candy too – so I have to buy a few bags as soon as they’ve hit the stores! Well, I believe I was 7 or 8 years old and my sister and I could hardly sleep the night before Easter – we were too excited about the Easter bunny filling up our Easter baskets. We were both conviced that we would see the Easter bunny that night, so around 3 in the morning we both peeked through the window in my sister’s room, and we really did think we saw him! Across the street, we both could have sworn we saw a classic “mall bunny” (you know the ones – the Easter bunnies that you have your kids take a picture with at the mall – but the kids always cry?) across the street. It is so weird because we were both seeing the same thing…I think we were “seeing things” – and being such close sisters, I guess we were both in the same state of excitement that we were both convinced that we had seen the bunny!! A few hours later, we rushed to our Easter baskets that were sitting on the front porch, and all I can remember about what was in it was that there was a ceramic, bunny shaped dished filled, and I mean FILLED with pastel jelly beans! And boy was I in heaven! To this day, I just can’t get enough of jelly beans! I’ve actually already eaten some today! That is one childhood memory that I’ll probably never forget, and we still laugh about it today.
2:39 am on April 4th, 2009
When I was growing up, we always had peeps in our baskets. They were always out of the package, which meant Easter grass stuck to them. being sugar deprived, we didn’t care and ate them all the same. My parents did hide plastic Easter eggs one year with jelly beans. I thought it was the coolest because we always had plain eggs. My best friends family was always getting the “cool” plastic eggs. So, now, for my daughter, we do both
12:01 am on April 5th, 2009
My favorite Easter memory was the year my cousins, sisters and I decided to “catch” the Easter bunny. We reasoned that if we caught him, he’d have to give us candy everyday instead of once a year!
We tied a trip wire behind the curtains in the living room. The parents sent us outside to play while the Easter Bunny came.
We hung around the front door until we heard the crash. We raced inside to grab the bunny…only to see my aunt, sitting on the floor, 2 Easter baskets tipped over and candy spilled all around!!
we never did catch that Easter Bunny.
1:21 am on April 5th, 2009
When I was about 8, my Mom took me to the yearly easter egg hunt at our town hall park. There is a huge field in which volunteers place hundreds of plastic eggs…3 of these eggs have a number written on them 1, 2, or 3. This was my only year going to the Easter egg hunt, and when I saw an egg with a number on it, I dove…I won 1st place! A chocolate bunny that was as big as I was…my Mom passed away last June, so this Easter will be bittersweet, but we never forgot that memorable Easter, and that huge chocolate bunny!
2:57 am on April 5th, 2009
May Canadians enter?
I learned fairly early that Easter candy came from my parents, and I don’t remember them ever making a big deal out of the Easter Bunny. My brother and I each had a small wicker Easter basket that we used year after year. We didn’t hunt for the baskets, and usually we each got a small (and high-quality) chocolate bunny in the basket and then filled it with the eggs we found in our indoor hunt.
Despite our Easters being less over-the-top than some people’s, I actually have quite a few special Easter candy memories: the year we stayed at my grandparents’ place and they made us baskets out of Rice Krispie treats because we hadn’t remembered to bring our own; sneaking down the stairs early to scope out where the candy was hidden before my brother could, which is not so easy to do when your parents’ bed is between yours and the stairs; the year my friend’s family hosted a big Easter candy hunt out in their yard, complete with different sections of the yard for each of three age groups and with candy hidden in fun places like holes in trees that somehow made it seem less like it had just been hidden by parents; the first year in our new house when there were all sorts of new places to look for candy; the years that a friend of my mom’s made pysanky with us (okay, I guess that isn’t really a candy memory, but it’s one of the things I associate most with Easter); and my first year of university when my grandma sent me a whole batch of homemade fudge and a card that made me so homesick I cried.
My favourite memory, I think, is of the egg we didn’t find. Don’t worry, this isn’t a story about rotten eggs. The ones we hunted for were usually chocolate, and if I’m remembering correctly this particular one was one of those malt Robin Eggs. When I was young we lived in a fairly small house, and since my parents didn’t hide any eggs upstairs or in the bathroom that meant there were only about 500 square feet in which the eggs could possibly be. We learned quickly where the eggs were usually hidden – in the corners of window sills, behind the legs of the coffee table, in plant pots, under the stairs… they didn’t usually put eggs inside anything that closed. One year when I was seven or eight they decided to be a little more creative, and we didn’t notice it right away. We found all the eggs in the usual places and assumed that we’d just gotten slightly fewer of them that year.
The next day my mom not-so-subtly found one in a cracker box (between the bag and the box), which, after some teasing from my dad about not being very good egg hunters, set off another hunt for eggs in things. My parents helped, we found quite a few more, and again we assumed we were done. This time, so did my parents. We ate all our candy and got on with our lives.
We didn’t find the last one until November. It was hidden in the toe of my mom’s ski boot, which was sitting on a shelf in the storage room. My mom found it when she was planning to ski, and my parents seemed more surprised than I was, so I took the opportunity to return a bit of the teasing. My dad countered with “Why would I want to eat candy that’s been that close to somebody’s toe jam?” which gave us all the giggles. I don’t think anyone actually ate that egg.
4:05 am on April 5th, 2009
My mom always made a bunny cake for easter, but didn’t use the same old licorice and jelly beans. Each year she’d take us to Target and let us pick the candy-whatever it may be- and incorporate it into the cake. She did a fantastic job, and in doing this, made the cake very appealing and special to us. This was a great way to make sure we’d like the candy in it!
8:57 pm on April 5th, 2009
My favorite memory from childhood was receiving the sugar eggs that you would look into and there would be a display. It looked like a little world inside the egg. It was always my favorite thing from the Easter Bunny. I also received a big chocolate bunny in my basket every year and I loved it. I don’t remember the cadbury creme filled eggs but they are my favorite today.
9:21 am on April 6th, 2009
One of my best Easter Memories was getting up in the morning when I was 6 years old to find two (I have a twin sister) purple Schwinn bikes in the livingroom!
We could not IMAGINE how the Easter Bunny traveled with those bikes, let alone got them into our house witout being heard! When Mom and Dad got up and mom fixed breakfast, she set an extra plate…there were 5 of us kids…Imagine the screams when the Easter Bunny (someone in full costume) sat down to be with us at breakfast!!
After we ate (I dont remember the bunny eating, I now as an adult “get it”), we went out to the backyard with baskets for the annual egg hunt.
We also had our Easter baskets on the hearth all in a row (5 of them) loaded with gifts. Easter was more like Christmas for us.
We all still talk about it and it is an Easter we will never forget!
11:27 am on April 6th, 2009
Hands down the best memory is the smell of the Easter basket. Easter was my favorite holiday because I am a candy fiend and the smell of the basket even tops the Halloween bag.
I have always had a very active imagination and my mother told me the Easter Bunny had a helper when the questions came. I can still see the visual of my childhood bunny – life size like the one at the mall, driven around in a golf cart from house to house by his “helper”. His basket always had a hole in it because there was a trail of jelly beans, foil wrapped eggs, plastic candy filled eggs and M&M’s that always led to the magical basket of See’s candy.
My Easter bunny is the best. Now he uses the post office to deliver my care package because I moved to NY and we do not have See’s candy here.
1:25 pm on April 6th, 2009
[...] 17:21:04 · Reply · View candyblog: Final hours of the huge NCA candy giveaway – http://candydishblog.com/2009/03/27/thank-ya-easter-bunny/ Enter now to win! 2009-04-06 17:20:25 · Reply · View TwitterDoodle by The Lessnau [...]
4:43 pm on April 6th, 2009
When my son was 3 we decided to leave a trail of M&Ms to his Easter basket. My husband put my son’s small chalkboard next to the basket. We were going to write “Happy Easter!” but right before I put the chalk to work, I thought for a second, “This kid is only 2, he can’t read- we could put ANYTHING on that board and it’d all be the same to him!”
Which is why we have a picture from 1997 of a chalkboard with a sketch of the Easter Bunny that said “Happy Snorkum Glibble!”
5:04 pm on April 6th, 2009
My favotire Easter memories…
I loved coloring eater eggs with my dad. He always used the wax crayons, and made secret messages on our eggs.
But as a child, I would recieve one new historical doll in my easter basket each year. One year it was Betsy Ross, then Martha Washington.
I would get to eat the loose peeps in my basket, dress in my easter dress, then I was allowed to play with my new doll while my father took my easter picture.
As an adult, I adore assembling the basket!
6:39 pm on April 6th, 2009
I totally love the Cadbury Creme Eggs. I know Easter is coming when I see them popping up all over the place. My sister and I would buy 6-10 at a time and hide them in the cabinet. Mostly to protect ourselves from eating them all at one time. Out of sight, out of mind right?! Not really, I do take my time eating them though.
The other day my daughter starting talking about “Where is the nest mommy?” I didn’t figure it out until I saw her in her room enjoying a Cadbury egg. She sneeked into the cabinet and ran into her room. Since I didn’t get it for her, she decided to get it her self. She looked at me and said “Where’s the bird mommy?” I don’t know where that bird is, but I sure wish it was around all year long.
Now we sit and enjoy the Cadbury Creme Eggs together.
6:59 pm on April 6th, 2009
Searching our front yard for plastic easter eggs. We didn’t care what was in them, it was just fun looking for them.
10:26 pm on April 6th, 2009
My four siblings and I grew up in a house with no candy. Well, not a lot of candy: we’d get to choose one candy bar on Sunday, on the condition that we behaved in church.
So you can imagine the anticipation we had for Easter, when we would each get a basket filled to the brim with candy. The bunny would always hide our baskets, so we had the thrill of the hunt when we woke up on Easter morning. And when we found our basket (we each had a unique wicker basket — different shape, different color — that was used each year), we launched into the confections with abandon.
There was always a solid milk chocolate bunny from Philadelphia Candies. Always. Inevitably, there were Peeps. Fruit-flavored Brach’s jelly beans, in black-only for my brother. Malted milk robin’s eggs, chocolate eggs, and maybe one of the new trends for the year.
Decades later, Easter isn’t the same for me unless I have that chocolate bunny from Philadelphia Candies, and my kids’ baskets look suspiciously similar to the basket I got when I was small. The bunny must know, somehow.
12:00 pm on April 7th, 2009
[...] had some incredible entries for our Easter candy giveaway contest. Our celebrity judges have finally been released from the Candy Dish Blog isolation tanks and have [...]
9:46 pm on April 11th, 2009
my fav easter was last year i was sleeping and when i woke up at about 7:00 am i did not kno my easter basket was at the end of my bed so i jumped up and scream andd it was so full that i drug it to my mommy and daddy ’s room and when i told them
i went back to my room and sorted my candy then
placed it back into the basket .(and then screamed some more it felt like i was the queen of candy****)
9:42 am on September 17th, 2009
[...] Thank Ya Easter Bunny (a [...]