Growing up, my mom always had this fun tradition to help us find our Easter baskets. She would leave a trail of jelly beans along the floor with an empty paper cup at the beginning. We'd follow the trail through the house and at the end of the trail we'd find our Easter basket. It was such a cute tradition that I continued it with Jessey, and then with A, but after that we had some serious logistical problems. We moved into a house where the bedrooms shared a hallway, the three girls shared one bedroom, and the floor was tile. This means that the slightest bump, the littlest rolling bean, a simple trip to the bathroom in the night, and the trails were history, if you could even tell them apart in the first place, that is.
So, about 6 or 7 years ago, I had this great idea. I decided to just hide the Easter baskets and make it a treasure hunt to find them. I started out hiding eggs around the house with clues inside - sometimes they'd be clever and written in rhymes and sometimes they'd just be simple, like "Go look in the fridge". Each child would have one egg for each year they were old, and the last egg would lead them to their baskets. This system worked great for a few years, and the kids loved it, but eventually I ran out of witty material and original places to hide things and I needed a new plan. So one year I just hid eggs around the house, a different color for each kid, and inside were puzzle-pieces I'd cut from a sheet of paper. They had to reassemble the pieces and then follow the directions, which were spelled out in paces ("Take 3 steps forward, turn left, take 9 steps, etc.."). This took some serious planning and estimation as I tried to guess at the different-sized feet, but once again the kids loved it. And by this point, the Easter basket tradition had become something they all looked forward to - and something I winced at. Why had I thought this was a good idea so many years ago? Every year I kept trying to be creative (except the one year I wimped out and just hid their baskets, and the one year I just handed the baskets to them). And then this year, I had a great idea. Why not make looking for their baskets like the TV show The Amazing Race? We could make a whole weekend out of it, doing fun activities with each other, and enjoy the hunt as a family. If you're thinking that it sounds like fun, so was I (and it was!), and if you're thinking it sounds like a lot of work, then you are certainly right.
I called it The Amazing Easter, and I even made a logo for the event.
Look familiar?
I bought envelopes at the teacher supply store, since I wanted to be authentic and have the kind with the tear-strip, just like they do on the TV show. Each envelope had the logo on it and the Leg # written on it, with a clue and cash inside, just like the show.
I spent a couple of weeks thinking through the possible tasks in my head and working things out with my mom, and then we spent an entire day driving the whole route, looking for landmarks, noting important details, hours of operation, fares and fees, and obstacles that may present a problem. We also had to set approximate times for transportation schedules, and to fit in meal times. I definitely have a new respect for The Amazing Race production staff!
On Friday night I packed all of the envelopes - 11 Legs for each of the three girls - complete with clues, answer sheets to fill out, and of course, cash. Here's what they had to do.
We started at 11am at the train at Vasona Park. My dad was driving the train that day so A had gone with him to fire up the engine at 6am. We met her there and started the race near the train station. Their first quest was an easy one. They just had to take the cash in the envelope and buy a snack and drink for themselves, and buy a water bottle to give to a worker they didn't know. We had agreed on a water bottle ahead of time since that's the only food or drink staff members can have while on duty, and we thought giving food to a complete stranger (my original idea) might be scary for the girls, and maybe a little bit creepy for the strangers.
Once that leg was complete, they were given their next clue. This one was a little more cryptic. First, they had to figure out from the clue that they were supposed to ride on the carousel. And then, each one had instructions that they were supposed to ride "with" a specific animal (that they had to figure out from a different clue). See that animal barely visible on the chest of the horse? That's what they were looking for. It took them all a while, but A and C managed to figure it out in time to hop on and ride, but K was still puzzled by the time the ride started so she had to wait until the next go-round to ride her assigned horse.
The next clue told them to take a ride on the train and they had to fill out the answers to some questions along the way (of course this required us walking the entire track the day before to see what would be visible from the train since it was only open on weekends). They only had to get two of the four (one was a bonus) question right in order to get their next clue. They had to count the swings on the playground, find the speed limit on the road next to the train, and write down all the letters on the switch signs next to the track. The bonus question asked them to estimate how high the trellis bridge is (it's about 5 feet). A managed to get all the questions right, and the other two got 3 right, so we were off to the next leg.
This one required them to go to the playground and look at the real plane they have there. It's a fighter jet and on the plaque it said the plane's nickname. They were supposed to write the nickname down. The first time they ran all the way out there and ran back with the answer of the letters that were printed on the side of the plane. I told them that wasn't right and sent them back again. They all returned a second time with the real name of the plane from the plaque instead of the nickname, but after running to the playground and back twice, I didn't have the heart to send them a third time. They'd actually been running the whole way because in true Amazing Race style, the clue said "Warning: The last person to check in, may go hungry." Lunch was our next stop.
We headed back to our cars and drove out to Togo's for lunch. We were running a little behind schedule and we were going to either have to eat in 10 minutes, or miss our bus and catch the next one 30 minutes later. We opted for the latter and hoped we'd make up time somewhere else.
Once we'd all finished our lunch, I gave the girls their next clue. It told them to take bus #66 and to get off after they saw Original Joe's, a restaurant downtown. I hadn't looked at the bus stop, so I said take the bus 'north' when the sign only said the end-of-the-line name instead, so I had to break my own rule and tell them which way to go. But once on the bus, they kept their eagle-eyes out for Original Joe's. We had driven the bus route two days before, searching for a landmark that was easily visible, between the previous stop and theirs. I was really thankful we found one! The clue also told them to follow the signs to the Tech Museum, which happened with some manageable level of chaos.
Once we were in front of the museum, they got their next clue, which told them to go to the billiard-ball machine, choose a single ball, and follow it through the maze three times. They were supposed to write down if the ball took the same path or different paths, though they were yelling at, cheering for, and encouraging their balls so much during the trips that it was hard to miss what was going on. If you haven't seen the billiard ball machine before, you should go see it!
Surprisingly, everyone's journeys ended right about the same time, so they received their next clues which told them to walk to the Museum of Quilts and Textiles. This museum is seriously one of the coolest museums around, and if you haven't been there before, you are really missing out. My mom and I were looking for something else fun and interesting to do downtown so we didn't just ride the bus out and back, and this was the first thing we thought of. We weren't in there long, but I don't ever mind giving this place some money to keep supporting what they're doing. The only hard part was that we couldn't visit the museum ahead of time without paying, and the questions I tried to write based on the text descriptions on their website, were pretty horrible and nearly impossible to answer. Thankfully, they had a prepared scavenger hunt that they offer to kids who come into the museum, so we just switched to that. They had a huge potholder collection on display that was really fun for the girls to look at, and the theme of the front room was all food-based textiles, so that was kid-friendly, too. I wish I could have taken some pictures in there to show you, but you'll just have to go and see for yourself. :) We all were so busy looking around the museum and spent way more time in there than we had allotted. So now our 30 minute delay had become over an hour, and I was getting a little nervous about the timing of the last few legs. We were supposed to finish the race today, but that possibility was quickly slipping away and it was looking like the race would carry over into Easter Sunday.
Once we left the museum, the clue told the girls to hop on the lightrail and take it to Oakridge Mall. Our bus passes wouldn't have been good for two trips anyway, so we decided to try another mode of transportation out of downtown. The clue told them to go to Sorabol. It was the only place in the food court I knew they hadn't heard of and couldn't necessarily guess by the name. We would need the food court tables, but they would need a map to figure out where Sorabol was once they got to the mall from the lightrail station.
Once they found Sorabol, I gave them their next clue (#9 if you're keeping track), and I was so sad to realize that we'd have to rush this clue since I thought it was one of the cleverest clues I'd made. We were going to have to skip #10 for today because #9's activity was looming. It literally started 15 minutes after we got to the mall. This is how #9 was supposed to happen: The envelope for #9 contained no clue, just 30 pieces of a small puzzle that they had to put together on the table and $8.75 in cash. They would assemble the puzzle and then wonder what to do next. Hopefully, one of them would have noticed some blue writing on the back of one of their pieces, or they would lift it up by chance to look at the back. Once they did, they would notice a giant letter written in blue Sharpie on the back of their puzzle. Each of them would turn their puzzle over and realize that one had the letter "R", one had an "I", and one had "O2". Then they would realize that the clue was telling them to go watch the movie Rio2, and the money was to buy a movie ticket with. They would buy their movie ticket and then we'd do Leg #10 while we waited for the movie to start.
That was the plan. Here's how it really went: They opened the clue and dumped the pieces out on the table. I snatched up all the cash and ran off to buy the tickets for the movie for everyone really quickly. I came back and all the adults tried to help the girls hurry to put the puzzles together without seeming like we were rushing them or taking over. Once the puzzles were all together, I gave the girls about 30 seconds to think of something before giving it away and turning one of the puzzles over. Well, almost. Turns out that when you buy a dollar store puzzle and assemble it once, it sticks together enough to turn it over. When you assemble it again and try to turn it over, the whole thing falls apart all over the place. So, I did my best to put enough pieces near each other that they could make out the letters on the back. They did actually guess it, and then we all ran upstairs with just a few minutes until the movie started.
After the movie was over, we were all pretty wiped out and decided to officially end the race for the night and pick it up again in the morning after church. We met my dad and Jessey for dinner and then called it a day.
Actual Date: April 19
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