BROWNSVILLE — A congregation of kids gathered outside Brownsville Community Church Saturday morning, bundl ed in coats and winter hats to guard against the chill and holding empty wicker and plastic baskets on their arms.

Strewn all around them, from the patch of lawn next to the church’s exterior to the concrete-padded pavilion known as Tribute Park that lies a short downhill walk from the church, were more than 2,000 plastic Easter eggs shining in the morning sun.

Starting at 10 a.m., the seventh annual “Great Brownsville Community Church Easter Egg Hunt,” hosted and organized by members of the church, doesn’t take very long to finish once the children get to hunting.

Last year, it took only six minutes for all the eggs to be found, said Kristen Huebner, the event’s chief organizer and wife of church pastor Christian Huebner. This year, with the total egg count doubled, the hunt lasted about ten minutes.

Most of the eggs were easy to find, sitting out in the open in the grass or on and under the picnic tables under the roof of the pavilion. Most of those got snagged quickly by the toddler crowd, who got about a minute’s head start ahead of the older siblings to allow them a chance to gather as many eggs as possible, Huebner said.

Those eggs held various sweets: Chocolate, Twizzlers, Smarties. But there were also eight much-larger eggs secretly hidden around the area that held within their shells slightly-more luxurious prizes like gift cards to Dunkin Donuts.

“This year, I believe there’s only candy (in the normal-sized eggs) but we’ve had toys in them in the past,” Huebner said.

Once (most) of the eggs were found, kids began comparing their hauls with that of their friends and showing off to their parents. A boy dressed as Luigi from “Super Mario Bros.” expressed comical dismay at the tote bag stuffed with candy he held in his hands.

“Out of all these eggs, I only got this much candy,” he exclaimed to no one in particular.

Eight-year old Jackson Edgerton, of Brownsville, along with three of his friends, hurriedly ran back to their parents ready to begin assessing and trading their eggs.

“We’re splitting this, Baker,” Edgerton yelled to one of his trailing friends. “We’re splitting this!”

The egg hunt is designed to be a community builder and a showcase for the pavilion, Huebner said, which was completed in 2022.

“We wanted to showcase it to the community so that it can be used for community events, church events, and to get the whole community to be here at the church and just feel welcome.”

Morgan Guillet, Amanda Yates and Julia Burakian were a trio of parents from Brownsville who attended the egg hunt and watched as children excitedly rush to gather up egg after egg.

Guillett said it was her family’s first time at this particular Easter egg hunt and that her two children, 6 and 8, were both over-the-moon about being there.

“Anything that gets them outside and seeing their friends makes them happy,” Guillett said. “Plus it involves candy.”

By egg hunt’s end, all of the eggs had been found and mounds upon mounds of their plastic shells were piling over in a five-gallon water bucket and other containers. They were stuffed into trash bags for storage until next year’s hunt.

All of the eggs had been found — but had they really?

Edgerton was in the middle of discussing how he thought he fared in the hunt — “It was good, I got one of the big eggs” — when he was interrupted and alerted to something hidden in the slate-rock wall next to him.

Within moments, he’d found another egg. He quickly popped it open and asked his father to unpeel the Twizzler he’d uncovered inside it.

Ray Couture can be reached with questions at 1994rbc@gmail.com.

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