Have pious parents ruined Easter for chocolate-crazy kids?

Kids at at Easter. Chocolate-crazy, ammi right?

They’re just shoving all those eggs and bunnies into their faces by the sticky little handful. The sugar-high is off the charts and they run around like drunk puppies until they crash into a pile of mahogany-smudged overtiredness, drooling and dreaming of fresh, crisp apples.

Well… no. Not so much.

Judging by the Easter hunt I witnessed last weekend (yes, we went early, we’re busy people, people), kids are so thoroughly indoctrinated into the “sometimes food” rules that they would no more shove a load of choccy in their face than they would skol their mum’s beer.

Listen to what happened, on the This Glorious Mess podcast.

We hid hundreds of eggs around our local park last Sunday. We hid them up, we hid them down, we hid them all around… Most of them melted, to be honest, on an a surprisingly sunny autumn morning, but that didn’t deter the kids’ enthusiasm. Their enthusiasm for finding the eggs, that is.

When all the eggs were discovered, no stone left unturned, little kid after little kid filed up to their parents, poorly-made (by my children) basket in hand. And asked the same question: “Am I allowed to eat one?”

Now, look. I know it’s a good thing that kids are being educated about over-consumption, about being cautious around food-allergies, about sugar being the abject devil, about the obesity crisis. I know it’s great that this gaggle of four and five and seven-year-olds all know that their parents, not them, are the arbiters of what’s good for them.

But seriously, parents. It’s Easter. It’s the season to be chocolate. To be actually mostly composed of chocolate, for 48 hours minimum.

It’s not a forever thing.

There was something a tiny bit sad about seeing how domesticated and well-behaved around the sticky-delicious goodness of lollies and choccies us well-meaning, middle-class parents have made our children. Of course it's for their own good, but holy Easter Bunny, what happened to magic?

When I was seven, I was about as likely to be able to carry a basket of Cadbury mini-eggs home with me for mum to put in the fridge and dole out as tiny after-dinner treats as I was to pronounce q-u-i-n-o-a.

This Sunday we'll be camping and there will be another Easter egg hunt. I have every intention of letting my kids go rogue, of whispering in their ears, "Just go for it, grab all the eggs and stuff them in your face as fast as your fingers will unpick that cheap foil wrapping, my dears. Be kids! Eat chocolate! Let the sugar rush take you! Live a little!"

But you know what? I probably won't. Because there will be other parents looking on.

And I won't want them to think I'm a lax parent, a throwback to the 70s.

So line up, kids, let me count your eggs. And then let me pat you on the head and say, "Just one, darling. It's nearly lunch time."

Do you let your kids go wild with the Easter eggs? 

Listen to the full episode of This Glorious Mess here:

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