Hey everyone! So I recently had the opportunity to volunteer at a local Easter event as the Easter Bunny's helper and I wanted to talk a little bit about my experience. You can find more pictures of my outfit and the Easter Bunny's hutch on my facebook page. Enjoy!
So first of all, let's talk about what I did as an Easter Bunny helper for this event. My main tasks were to decorate the Easter Bunny's area, or hutch as we called it, make sure the Easter Bunny was good to go, and hand out goodie bags to the children. In addition to this, I found myself helping take pictures for families, posing in pictures with the Easter Bunny, and luring shy children over so their parents could take pictures. From the start of the event to the time things started wrapping up, we had an almost constant stream of parents and children coming to take pictures with the Easter Bunny or just say hi. I had a lot of fun, even though it was slightly overwhelming at times. Here's some things I learned from this experience.
#1: A Variety of Reactions
One of the more notable things I learned was the many different types of reactions children have when they meet a character. Some of the more notable ones were the children who started crying the second their parents tried to let go of them (or get them anywhere close to the Easter Bunny), ones who came right up to the Easter Bunny and gave her a great big hug, ones who were very confused as to what this giant thing holding them was (this was mainly very young children), and the shy ones who needed a little encouraging to come sit on the Bunny's lap. Being dressed in Fairy Kei, I also got to see a side of things someone wearing jeans, a hoodie, and bunny ears would not have. There were a few moments that were very special to me where a little girl would come up to ME and want a picture and hug from ME and not the Easter Bunny. It made me feel like a Disney princess. There were also a lot of little kids who were more willing to come pose for their parents when I beckoned them as opposed to just the Easter Bunny due to me looking like a magical fairy princess as opposed to some giant, furry thing they'd never seen before. I also would occasionally scoop up hesitant children or help parents get their children to look in the direction of the camera by being all sparkly and pastel.
#2: Don't Think About Getting Overwhelmed
With the large number of children coming through, it would have been very easy to feel overwhelmed. I did, at first, but after a while it became more of a game of luring children to the Easter Bunny, making sure they all got goodie bags, and helping parents take pictures. Everything kinda became a blur because I focused on accomplishing what I was there for and not worrying about everything that was happening. I didn't even notice I was pretty hungry or that there was a DJ right next to us until the line started to disappear. At the beginning of things, I wanted to try and direct people, both to the Bunny as well as how to form the line, but I quickly realized that people would come up on their own and that I was too busy helping IN the hutch to worry about what was going on outside of it.
#3: Only YOU Can Keep Magic Alive
One of the things I admired the most about the girl portraying the Easter Bunny was her dedication to keeping the magic alive for the children. She avoided talking so kids wouldn't be scared or put off by her raspy smoker's voice. She never took her mask or gloves off and went so far as to have her room mate drive so that she wouldn't have to worry about being seen by a kid with her mask off. I really admire the effort she put in to help bring the Easter Bunny to life for the kids at that event.
#4: Smiling Takes More Energy than Frowing
I remember back when Toy Story 2 came out, at the end of the film Barbie asked if she could stop smiling and commented that her face hurt. I now know her pain. While frowning may use more facial muscles than smiling, a resting frown or look of disaproval takes a lot less energy than smiling. It got to the point that I was wondering if my smiles looked forced. But I couldn't stop smiling. My face hurt so bad afterwords, but all in all, I had a lot of fun.
I hope you all enjoyed reading about my experience with being an Easter Bunny helper!
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