No Nest for the Weary: Bunny's Easter Egg by Anne Mortimer

IT WAS EARLY EASTER MORNING. BUNNY WAS TIRED.

ALL NIGHT SHE HAD BEEN HIDING EGGS FOR THE EASTER HUNT.

THERE WAS JUST ONE VERY PLAIN EGG LEFT TO HIDE.

But the little cottontail is just too pooped to place that last egg, so she jumps into her favorite basket and, yawning, curls up around the egg to catch a quick nap. But suddenly the quiet of the wee hours is broken by noisy sounds from inside the egg.

"OH, NO!" CRIED BUNNY. "I CAN'T SLEEP HERE. IT'S FAR TOO NOISY!"

And Bunny sets out on a search for a decent place to catch a few winks before the Easter festivities begin. But the quest is not easy. A hollow in an old tree is too close to cheeping, chirping young birds, eager to start the day. A wheelbarrow in an old garden shed looks promising, until she discovers she's sharing her sleeping spot with a hedgehog. Way too prickly! Bedding down with mice is far too squeaky, and a mole in his hole is way too pushy. Quacking ducklings and croaking frogs make plopping down by the pond impossible, and snoozing with a litter of playful, bouncy kittens in the greenhouse is way out of the question.

Finally it's back to the basket for Bunny. At least her favorite basket is now quiet, and the noisy plain egg is nowhere to be seen.

"MMMMMM," SHE MURMURED. "AT LAST. THIS IS PERFECT," THOUGHT BUNNY.

BUNNY DIDN'T SLEEP LONG. THE PLAIN EGG HAD HATCHED. AND BUNNY HAD A NEW FRIEND WHO WASN'T NOISY, OR PRICKLY, LUMPY, OR PESKY.

"HAPPY EASTER, BUNNY!"

In place of that plain egg it's a fluffy, yellow duckling waiting to share Easter morning with Bunny, and together the baby duck and the sleepy Bunny get ready to watch the morning Easter egg hunt together.

Anne Mortimer's stunningly realistic, textured artwork seems to show every soft hair in Bunny's fur and every petal in the spring blooms, and it is these wonderfully warm illustrations which bump her Bunny's Easter Egg (HarperCollins, 2010) ahead of the usual Easter Bunny tale. As an added bonus, Mortimer hides thirteen colorfully decorated eggs among her sumptuous illustrations all through the book to give young readers a chance for their very own early Easter egg hunt.