Homewood resident spreads Easter cheer from his front yard

Not only does Mitchell Whaley own an Easter Bunny costume — he also doesn’t mind making a fool of himself, he said.

Whaley waved, blew kisses and hopped around his yard on Kensington Road Saturday, April 11, as families drove by.

Whaley’s love for Halloween have him the idea to dress up as the Easter Bunny this year.

”I am the self-proclaimed king of Halloween,” he said. “So I have like 50 or 75 costumes in my basement — it’s just something I’ve always done.”

He still has his Halloween costume from when he was in kindergarten, back in 1979. During the month of October, he picks his children up from school wearing a different costume most days. He also has an Easter Bunny costume, and he said it dawned on him last week that the children on his street wouldn’t get to see the Easter Bunny this year amid public health concerns from COVID-19.

He emailed his neighbors and offered to dress as the Easter Bunny for the neighborhood. It was a big hit, he said, so he decided to open up the opportunity to the rest of Homewood.

He made a post on the What’s Happening in Homewood group on Facebook, inviting the community to come out. But as he was typing the post, he said, he got another idea.

”I thought, ‘Well gosh, I might as well try to do something good out of it,’” he said. 

He decided to set up a table by the street with a sign asking for canned food donations.

“I didn’t think too much about it, but we collected over 100 cans today,” he said. “Not too bad for a whim.”

Although wearing the Easter Bunny costume was warm, Whaley said it was also very gratifying.

”It started out to brighten up our street, morphed into being a treat for Homewood, and came full circle by helping out some families in need,” he said.