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Family Organizes Elaborate Easter Celebration; Four-Year-Old Finds Most Joy in His New Tape Dispenser

Cole Camp, Missouri – Kimberly Knowle-Zeller and her family of four, plus her mother, gathered for an Easter party complete with an egg hunt, jelly beans, and a pizza lunch. The kids’ Oma, as she is called, hid the traditional Easter candies and gifts including chocolate bunnies and coloring books throughout her house. As soon as the kids arrived they began their search. Both parents and Oma directed Charlotte, 7, and Isaac, 4, about whether they were hot or cold in relation to the hidden gifts. The kids ran in circles and cheered when they found a new gift. “Look Charlotte, look,” Isaac yelled as he held up his new jump rope.

During the party, the kids asked to eat their candy but Oma reminded them they still had more gifts to find. Each kid tiptoed into the living room and looked under the couches and next to the fireplace. Finally, Oma lifted her couch throw pillow to reveal one tape dispenser. “Tape!” Isaac reached his hand out smiling. “Now I can hang my pictures up all by myself.”

A few days earlier, Knowle-Zeller and her mother were putting away the latest craft supplies when Oma lifted up a Costco-sized purchase of tape. “That’s what you need to get Isaac,” Knowle-Zeller told her mother. “He’s always using our tape and we’re constantly running out. You know how he likes to hang up his drawings on his art wall.” Oma seemed skeptical, but needed one more gift anyway she said.

Days later after the coloring books had a few pages of color and the candy had been either consumed or put in the candy jar, Isaac continued to use his tape. He found paper towel tubes and construction paper and made birds and rockets. “I need my tape,” he kept repeating. The family’s main hall leading from the dining room to the bedrooms was covered with pictures taped over light switches and under picture frames.

“He’s our creator,” Knowle-Zeller said. “For many kids we know that they’d be just as happy playing with boxes as opposed to the gifts found in those boxes. That’s true for Isaac too, but mostly, it’s just the tape he wants. I think for his next birthday we’ll skip everything else, and just buy him an assortment of tape.”

Isaac’s father disagreed. “Who’s going to repaint the walls when all the tape comes down?”

 

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// This post is part of a blog hop with Exhale—an online community of women pursuing creativity alongside motherhood, led by the writing team behind Coffee + Crumbs. Click here to view the next post in the series "Breaking News."

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