Chapter 7: Easter Brunch
Summary: Easter morning waffles and Easter Egg Hunt at Meredith's house.
Waffle Sunday is a common occurrence at the Grey-Shepherd household, especially around the holidays. This morning's crowd will be smaller as many have their own Easter plans, today Meredith, Cormac, Amelia, Link and Jackson are there with their kids as well as Cormac's and Link's parents. Some of the other work family members will be joining them for dinner, as long as the emergency load at the hospital stays low. Tonight's dinner guests will include the majority of the Surgical department heads, so they know they can easily all get called to the hospital.
Cormac's parents head off to Saint James Cathedral in Seattle for Easter Sunday Mass early morning service, leaving Cormac to call Jackson to see if he could get a ride to Meredith's. Jackson has no problem swinging by and picking the three of them up as they head for waffle brunch and the surprise Easter activities. Liam and Austin quickly greet Harriet and squish themselves in the backseat with her without complaining. Breakfast preparation is underway when Cormac and Jackson arrive while her kids are playing with their traditional easter baskets from Meredith. Meredith's tradition has been a few small toys, colouring books or other items that can easily be taken to and from daycare as she's often spent Easter weekend on call and she wants to ensure they always have a special gift for the holiday. This year Bailey, Ellis, Zola and soon Harriet are playing with Easter themed Lego sets while Scout is happy with a bunny teething ring.
Waffle breakfast with the Grey-Sloan surgeons has become a loving and wonderful tradition started by Alex Karev and become an amazing activity that both kids and adults enjoy. Those attending vary from week to week, but rarely there isn't a week that goes by where waffles aren't cooked at Meredith's house. Two folding tables along with folding chairs are located conveniently behind the laundry room door so the table can easily accommodate the numbers at the table. Cormac and Jackson quickly start pulling out the extra table and chairs while Austin starts setting the table and Liam plays with the kids.
"Meredith, this looks amazing," Seánan says as Liam leads them into the kitchen after introducing them to everyone in the house, including Link's parents, Eric and Maureen Lincoln.
"Thanks Seánan," she says, accepting a hug from him.
"Do you need any help?" he asks, looking in amazement at the work going on in the kitchen.
"I think we are good. Help yourself to coffee, tea, juice or water," she says directing him to the counter with the coffee station.
"Liam, do we have enough chairs?" Austin comes in asking, not knowing how many are in her house for breakfast.
"As long as we don't have any extras here, we should be good. Is Dr Maggie here today?" Liam asks.
"Maggie and Winston are at brunch with Richard," Jackson answers.
"Yes she was grumbling she would miss the kids this morning," Meredith adds.
"One of us needed to have brunch with Mom and Richard," he replies knowing he'd ducked out of brunch to allow Harriet to play with Mer's kids.
"Don't look at me, I'm not related by blood," Meredith says, giving Jackson a hard time.
"Hey, you two! Do we need to separate the siblings? Think we should get these kids fed," Amelia teases, handing Harriet to Jackson. The food is quickly consumed by the sixteen for breakfast. Maureen and Máiréad chat through the meal and along with their husbands offer to clean up from breakfast allowing the younger generation to take the kids outside.
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On the deck outside, Liam has coloured baskets for each of the kids, handing the pink one to Ellis, orange to Harriet, green to Bailey, yellow to Zola, and blue to Link for Scout. "So only collect items that match your basket," Liam says.
Ellis and Harriet are bouncing as they see different coloured eggs throughout the backyard. There are chalk bunny footprints on the path along with a few eggs, including one easy to find egg for each person.
"How come most of the eggs we see are blue?" Zola asks Liam.
"Who has the blue basket?"
"Scout!" Ellis answers quickly.
"Because he's so little?" Zola replies.
"Yes, and yours will be the hardest," Liam teases.
"Actually, Liam and Austin have the hardest ones to find. Liam, Austin, for you," Cormac says, handing a red basket to Liam and a lime green one to Austin.
"Aww, da, you didn't need to do anything for us," Liam replies.
"Who gets the purple basket?" Austin asks, accepting the lime green basket.
"Meredith has never done an egg hunt."
Chaos erupts as the kids gain Meredith's attention. "Meredith, come here!" "Mom!" "Mom, there's a basket for you!"
"I thought this activity is for the kids?" she asks.
"Someone said they'd never done an egg hunt, so you are looking for purple eggs. Everyone ready?" Cormac says as he hands Meredith the purple basket and gives her a quick kiss. She looks at him with wonder, thinking of how wonderful he is to her.
Link carries Scout down the back stairs and leads him to a blue egg and shows him how to put the egg in the basket. Quickly Scout gets the hang of the activity, but is stalled by the plush blue bunny. Link and Amelia manage to help Scout find all his items, including a special gift of artisan chocolates, labelled "For Scout's parents."
Harriet, Ellis, Bailey and Zola quickly start scouring the backyard hunting for their colour, while Liam and Austin start hunting in some of the higher locations. The kids all keep hunting for all their items, eventually helping one another trying to find the last few elusive items. Liam and Austin find a couple of gift cards hidden in their eggs along with some favourite Cadbury chocolates, Clove Rocks, Keogh's Crisps directly from Ireland. They both ran over and hugged their grandparents when they realized the special Irish treats that were included in their gift. Cormac had received a special package this morning of Dingle Cask Strength Whiskey and Skelligs Chocolates, both family run businesses located in the south west corner of Ireland.
Meredith is amazed by the thought and care Cormac and his boys have put into this morning activities. The kids work independently and together on their tasks, while whispering trying to keep the location of any of her eggs unknown. She loves this. It is an amazingly wonderful activity. She searches the backyard with the kids, searching for the 12 items that Cormac says the Easter Bunny hid in the backyard. Cormac spoils her with some amazing Indi Chocolate products, a relatively new chocolatier at Pike Place Market. Her items include their mint chocolate lip balm, handmade chocolate soap, chocolate orange body lotion, lavender tea, chocolate mocha beans, cacao beans, cacao and cinnamon infusion kit, rose marshmallows, some truffles and a chocolate easter bunny. Meredith's last Easter Egg included a note, "After the easter egg hunt, please take a walk with me. C"
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Watching everyone hunt, Jackson whispers to Cormac, "So did you hide a ring?"
"I plan to ask her this afternoon, just her and I," he replies, shaking his head.
"She looks like she's having fun hunting with the kids," Jackson says looking at his friend enjoying herself amongst the kids in the backyard.
"She does."
"She deserves to be happy, and so do you. I haven't seen her like this in years," Jackson says. Not sure what to say to that Cormac just nods, thinking of how glad he was that Cristina Yang had recommended him for this job in Seattle.