Coronavirus Insists Americans To Look For Easter Fun At Least 6 Feet Apart

Article content NEW YORK - Easter is a special holiday for 6-year-old Nora Heddendorf. It's a time when she loves to dress up with fancy shoes and dresses and go on a hunt with her family and friends for brightly colored eggs.

This year the coronavirus pandemic has forced her to change. LALALALAL She will complete her Easter outfit by adding a white mask disposable gloves in blue and disinfectant wipes. After being informed that the annual egg hunt in her New Jersey town might be put on hold, she thought of the idea of a "rock hunt."

Article content Nora's hunt not only substitutes brightly painted stones for eggs that are scarce at certain stores, but also allows her neighbors to hunt during their walks with friends.

"I was disappointed that it was going to be canceled because of the virus," the kindergartener said to Reuters in a phone interview. "I want people to be content."

The epidemic has affected everyone from the White House to small towns parks. It has also forced the abandonment of traditional Easter egg hunts across the United States. Closed churches and cancelled plans for Easter meals among extended families.

However, many Americans are still looking for ways to have fun during the holidays for the holidays, from an Oregon candy maker creating chocolate bunnies with face masks to a Texas church organizing an egg hunt in virtual reality with the game Minecraft.

Content of the article Nora and her mom began organizing their hunt in Medford Lakes a few weeks ago. She put together a number of DIY kits, each with five rocks as well as four paint colors, instructions, and all wrapped in plastic bags. She used disposable gloves and spray the contents with disinfectant.

She then left the kits outside her home to be picked up by those who wish to participate. On her Facebook page, called Nora's Rocks, the young artist urged her community to return decorated rocks to her to hide.

"Thank you for helping Nora's Rocks bring our town closer but also keep us separated," said the instruction letter she included in the kits.

Samantha Heddendorf, Samantha's mother and the president of an environmental cleanup company that has been cleaning up the buildings affected by the coronavirus crises She said that the hunt will begin on Good Friday and continue until Easter Sunday, with new batches of painted rocks being hidden each day.

Article content The goal is to place 500 stone "eggs" in every corner of the 1 square mile (2.6 square kilometers) town.

"People can look for Easter Eggs or rocks while they are on their social distancing walks." Samantha Heddendorf stated that they can find something to hunt for, take them home, and have at least an emoji to commemorate Easter.

In Central Point, Oregon, chocolatier Jeff Shepherd had a brainstorm to save his Lillie Belle Farms from shutdown in the wake of the coronavirus. He informed his Facebook followers that he would make "Covid Bunnies" which are milk and dark chocolate confections with blue faces masks, and white chocolate ones with no blue faces masks.

It was a huge success. Shepherd was able hire back seven of his full-time workers, sold 5,000 bunnies and is now scrambling to fulfill back orders.

Article content Secure distancing to prevent spread of the virus is what prompted the Tate Springs Baptist Church in Arlington, Texas, to move to digital with its Easter Egg hunt, using Minecraft but disabling potentially scary game elements such as monsters.

"Our primary goal is to preach the gospel, but we also want children to still have fun at Easter," said Reverend Curtis James.

Back in New Jersey, Nora was thrilled that her idea was warmly embraced by a wide range of people, with the town mayor stopping by to watch her fill the kits and the local Lions Club inviting her for lunch "when this whole thing is over."

Her most cherished "thank you" was wrapped in gift wrappers of toilet paper one of the most common items such as eggs being hoarded by people panic buying during the pandemic.

"My mom smiled when the paper for the toilet came," Nora said. (Reporting by Barbara Goldberg, New York Additional reporting by Rich McKay, Atlanta; Editing by Rosalba Obrien