IT'S EASTER! Chocolate bunnies beware!!

The faint of heart, beware. It is mutilation time again. All over the country ears will be bitten of rabbits, chicks will have their heads chewed off, and millions will eat their younger siblings -- not even out of the shell yet! It sounds like something from a Stephen King thriller. But no, it's only Easter. And thankfully, the bunnies and chickies are made of chocolate.

So here for all you Easter monsters - and we can tell by that chocolate stain around our mouth - is some Easter trivia.

The original site of the White House Easter Egg Roll was the grounds of the United States Capitol. The traditional event began during the Presidency of James Madison (1809-17). His wife, Dolly, had heard that Egyptian children rolled coloured eggs on the site of the Pyramids. She thought that the children of the Washington area would enjoy the activity.

The activity became a tradition until 1877 when Capitol policemen, under orders from members of Congress, forced the children to leave. The Congressmen considered the activity "messy."

Some claim that an irritated nursemaid and her charges stormed down to the White House to complain. Others say that President Hayes was driving by in his carriage and saw the unhappy children. Anyway, in 1878 Hayes and his wife opened up the White House south lawn to the children on Easter Monday, and except for during WWI and II, when the roll was held elsewhere, the tradition had continued. Today many of the boiled, dyed Easter eggs are autographed by famous people including the President and the First Lady.

Boiled and dyed eggs are a tradition all over the world. In Bulgaria, bright red eggs are a symbol of Easter and are cracked after the midnight service. The first egg must always be cracked on the wall of the church and eaten to break the Great Fast. The ritual of cracking the eggs takes place before the Easter lunch. Each person selects an egg and each takes turns tapping the egg against the eggs of others. The person who ends up with the last unbroken egg is believed to have a year of good luck.

As the dying of eggs is such a tradition, Heinz Vinegar commissioned a survey to find out which colours are preferred. They found that blue was the favourite colour when dying eggs. Next in descending order were purple, pink, green, yellow and red. They also found that 64% of people eat the boiled eggs, 22% throw them away, 10% don't dye eggs, and 2% of the people surveyed said that they saved the eggs and they went rotten.

Besides eggs, we eat more than 13.5 billion jelly beans at Easter time in North America, and over 180 million Cadbury's Crème Eggs are sold between January and Easter each year. And now that we know the Easter Bunny actually lays those creamy confections, it would be good to know a little more about "him."

The Easter Bunny was originally the Easter Hare. Contrary to popular belief (something I admit to once believing myself) rabbits are NOT rodents. They are lagomorphs, and are more closely related to horses than they are to rats or mice.

Rabbits and eggs have one thing in common. They are symbols of fertility, for many of the roots of Easter are in the pagan religion. In fact, Easter is a convergence of three traditions: Pagan, Hebrew, and Christian.

So enjoy your Easter, enjoy your chocolate bunnies and your eggs, think of the religious significance of the holiday, and . . . oh, yes. Smile! Composer Irving Berlin took his tune "Smile and Show Your Dimples" changed the lyrics, and retitled it "Easter Parade."

You can find Easter & other Holiday and seasonal paper collectibles at Paper Lion. Just don't get any chocolate on them!