Improvised Egg Hunt

This is a funny story I posted on facebook.  I thought some of you might like it.

We have a few plastic Easter eggs somewhere in a box, but I could not find them. So after lunch, I got 7 egg cartons (1.5 dozen each) full of golf balls my dad has found in his yard.

That makes 126 golf balls. I tossed them around the yard for an egg hunt for the young adult chirrens.

They groaned about having an egg hunt.  Lydia even made the excuse that she had homework to do.  What's up with that?  I mean, they are only 19 to 24 years old.  Surely they still like egg hunting. 

Everly said it was because there was no candy reward.  We made the strategic mistake of handing out all the candy at lunch time.  So we came up with an other reward.  That made sense.  The egg hunts back in the day usually had a few eggs with money in them.  We did a little math, grouping the factors 7 x 3 x 3 x 2 until we came up with a plan.

I announced a bounty of $1 for every three golf balls, and they flew out of the house to get their share of $42.  I got just what I wanted:   David, Naomi, Lydia, Megan, and Casie (Lydia's buddies from Baylor who live too far away to go home for the long weekend)  giggling and running around the yard like old times.

We tallied up the collections:  19, 22, 23, 27, and 33.  Of course, David has always taken on egg hunts as serious business, and he got the most.  I think it's time for him to go professional.  All but two golf balls got picked up.  We rounded up to the nearest dollar, then scrounged together dollar bills, dollar coins, quarters, fives, and tens.  Everybody got a nice payout. 

For me and Everly, Hugh Delle and W. D., it was $42 very well spent.  Quoting a lyric from Michael Card:  "I would wander weary miles, and welcome ridicule, my child, to simply see the sunrise of your smile, to see the light behind your eyes, the happy thought that makes you fly."

The joy kept on giving.  W.D. came in the next morning having found one of the stray golf balls, and he was as happy as could be.

These few minutes of joyful play are not all that we did on Easter.  Earlier in the day, we worshiped at First Baptist Church, Austin, where I raised the eyebrows of the girls by singing loudly on all the harmony parts.  Roger Paynter preached an excellent sermon, almost slipping into a hoop, about the way that the greeting from Jesus to the Marys was one word that changed everything.  One good turn of phrase said, "He had us from 'Hello.'"  Out front of the sanctuary, church members had brought and placed flowers on the Easter Cross.