We have had many ups and downs in trying to attend the White House Easter Egg Roll again. When the tickets went exclusively online I thought, "that beats camping over night on the ellipse." And then we actually tried to get the tickets. HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!
The joke was on us, and half the other people around here. The internet site was bogged down so quickly that the tickets were gone too fast. We had three adults on high speed connections trying to get tickets, but the site kept crashing from the high traffic. After a while we gave up on that method.
Then Todd decided to try the old fashioned way, ask people he knew. We didn't count on getting tickets, just hoped and waited. Then, at the end of last week, we got great news. One lady had enough tickets for our little family. Hooray!!!!!!
We again got excited and started planning out our trip. I could hardly contain my excitement, for although past years had been a little stressful, it was always so much fun. They had always had sponsors that handed out fresh fruit, small drinks and trinket toys even before you got into the actual egg roll. Then you got a little candy, egg decorating kits, collectors egg, poster, coloring books upon entering and hardly had to walk around to find entertainers roaming the lawn, small stages set off to the side, and just in general had a lot of fun.
The big day finally came and we all went down, happy and ready for a great time. We walked from Todd's office as we ate our meager ham sandwiches. On the way we even got to see a large motorcade go through, which was kinda cool. Finally we reached the ellipse and got our first shock of the day. No activities on the ellipse. What?????? Only rows of ropes like cattle chutes. So we stood there in line for an hour, trying to entertain the kids.
Finally we got to move through security only to stand in another line for an hour. The "entertainment" was a middle aged man, trying to be a DJ, while dancing around in a strange orange outfit. Eventually they brought a magician on stage, but very few people wanted to leave their place in line to go watch.
Finally, we go inside. Yay!!!! Oh, wait.............you can only enter half of the activities if your child is 6 years or older. A little strange considering to even get tickets you have to have a child 10 or younger. So we bipassed those activites from which we were excluded and went for the egg roll, chose the short line and got through quickly, only to discover that there was not the traditional piece of candy at the end. So we're trying to console a competitive 5 year old, without sugar as a distraction, while trying to figure out what is left that we're allowed to do, all while attempting to talk loud enough to be heard over the pounding hiphop music from the stage. Yeah, again, music and entertainment geared toward older teenagers at a young child event? Have these event planners ever seen a young child?
We trudged down to the egg hunt, hoping for something better. With some cute smiles they sift through the straw to find the eggs and place them in the provided baskets. The kids get through only to have everything prised from their hands, yet again, with no real compensation. (Why would a toddler be happy about a poster?) I glanced at the egg dying station which would only give 1 egg per family, yeah like that would work with 2 kids and vinegar, and they had eliminated the egg decorating kit which was traditionally given to each family when leaving the area.
With our heads throbbing, our children exhausted and bored, and little to show for our efforts, we left to get our collectors egg. We were hoping that Ethan and Maya could each get their favorite colors, blue and purple, but no. Another let down. All eggs given out were a horrid lime green. Seriously????
I'm sure that this would have been an absolutely spectacular event, if we hadn't gone the last couple of years and had such wonderful experiences. We've yet to decide if we'll go again next year. All complaining aside, we did have some fun and the kids did enjoy parts of the day. It was also nice to be together as a family.
