More than 2,000 people attended the Great Egg Hunt event at Real Life Church in Valencia on Saturday, featuring a pair of Easter egg hunts that included more than 14,000 eggs.
The event featured two egg hunts, one at 11 a.m. and one at 1 p.m., that drew large crowds of more than 1,000 at each. Other attractions included a petting zoo, food trucks and bounce houses.
Also during the event, the church received a community partner award given by Assemblywoman Suzette Valladares, R-Santa Clarita..
“It’s my honor to recognize Real Life Church this Easter as an outstanding community partner for all they do for individuals and families in our area,” said Valladares in a tweet. “Thank you to Pastor Kevin (Finkbiner) and all the volunteers who put on an amazing egg hunt for the kids.”
Finkbiner, a pastor at Real Life, said that more than 14,000 eggs were used in the two hunts and that the community partner award presented by Valladares was greatly appreciated.
“She came out and brought her 5-year-old daughter with her and her husband and they did the egg hunt with us this morning, and then she generously presented Real Life with a great Community Partner Award, which was just very thoughtful of her,” said Finkbiner. “We’re going to be looking to partner with both the assemblywoman as well as local government coming up in the fall, we’re going to be doing some city-wide service projects and looking for other ways that we can really get into the community to serve the people of Santa Clarita.”
Finkbiner said that working with the Santa Clarita City Council is a part of that outreach to the community Real Life is aiming to do, and that plans are already underway to manifest it.
“Right now we’re going to connect with schools and with parks… I’m connecting with (Councilman) Cameron Smyth next week for coffee just to see what the needs are, and then whatever the needs are, we want to meet those because we feel like the church is supposed to be in a city for the benefit of the city,” said Finkbiner. “So any way we can get into Santa Clarita to serve people and whatever their needs are, whether these are things like going back to school needs for families and kids, things to beautify our city, or you know, anything in between. We just want to be available to serve and to help.”
Like many of the recent events in Santa Clarita, Finkbiner believes the egg hunt was a much-needed return to normalcy following an elongated period of time where events like these were not possible.
“So we found that, really anytime we can have something for the city, people are just dying to come out to form community, to form friendships, and to have a safe place for their families to come and celebrate,” said Finkbiner. “So yeah, it’s been a tremendous success all the way around.”
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