SAINT CLAIR - More than 50 volunteers hard-boiled, then dyed 3,600 eggs in shades of yellow, blue, green and pink Friday afternoon, getting ready for the annual egg hunt which is expected to draw hundreds of children to the borough today.
"This is our 35th year for the event. I think this year it's bigger than it's ever been," Rick Garland, 66, one of the organizers of the annual Easter egg hunt at Saint Clair Fish & Game, said Friday.
"It has gotten much bigger over the years. Every year, we have more kids come out. People from surrounding areas have heard about it and a lot of kids from outside Saint Clair come out. Crowds vary every year depending on the weather, but I'd say on Saturday we could have at least 500 kids," Barb Conville, Garland's daughter, Minersville, said.
"At least 500. Some people will start getting here at 10:30 a.m. or 11," John Dando, president of Saint Clair Fish & Game, said.
There's no cost for children 10 and under to participate, Garland said, "We do this for the community."
The event, which is free to children 10 and under, will be held at 1 p.m. today at the far end of East Lawton Street in the borough. And thanks to volunteers and sponsors both local and corporate, there are prizes ranging from bicycles to stuffed animals to cash, said Dando, a Pottsville native now of Mohrsville, Berks County.
"We couldn't do this without the donations," Dando said.
At 5 a.m. Friday, volunteers started working at the fish and game headquarters, hard-boiling the Grade A large eggs.
At 12:50 p.m. Friday, the volunteers set up an assembly line for the dying process. On long tables in the dining hall, they filled a few two-gallon aluminum baking tins with pools of red, blue and yellow dye.
Dando wasn't sure how much dye the organization had in stock, but said a lot of it has been donated over the years.
"We have more dye here than you can imagine," Dando said.
If you're dipping, you'll inevitably get some of it on you, Conville said as she slipped into a pair of light-duty disposable plastic gloves.
"It gets everywhere. And some of the kids like that," Conville said.
Among them was Payton Kleckner, 11, of Pottsville. For her, the annual egg dye-athon is more than just a tradition. It's a chance to make a fashion statement.
She, her cousin, Paige Lilek, 9, of Warrenton, Va., and friend, Julia Plachko, 10, of Pottsville, turned hundreds of hard-boiled eggs, along with their arms and noses, blue Friday.
"We like soaking in it," Plachko said, who said she was the niece of Magisterial District Judge David A. Plachko, Port Carbon.
"That's going to be on there for a month," Sophia Felker, Pottsville, said as she watched the girls turn their hands and forearms the color of Smurfs.
Kleckner even dyed her upper lip blue, giving herself an Easter moustache.
Brittany Prutzman, 16, of Minersville, Alyssa Gauntlett, 10, of Pottsville, and Conville's son, John, 18, were part of a group who kept focused on production and dyed 30 eggs green in 1 minute, 10 seconds.
"It's a fun time. I did it since I was a little kid. My pap helps run it," Conville said, who is Garland's grandson.
"I think it's fabulous. It's a great thing that they do for the kids. And the kids really enjoy it," Felker said, who was there with her granddaughter, Madison Thompson, 6.