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Mr and Mrs Rabbit were blessed with a baby daughter in early spring. To their surprise, she was completely pink! They should have been organising the Easter egg hunt, but they were too busy thinking of a name for their baby girl. Nothing they considered seemed to fit energetic Baby Pink!

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Mr Rabbit took to studying books from the library after the day’s work was done—the usual baby name books, but also literature that went a little deeper. He would read bits out in a musing fashion whilst his wife was feeding their daughter.

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“It says here: ‘Pink, first used as a colour name in the late 1800s, is most often associated with charm, sensitiv­ity, tender­ness, sweet­ness and femininity.’ Fancy that!”
Mrs Rabbit paused in her struggles to get a ram­bunctious Baby Rabbit wash­ed and into bed. “Charm … sweet­ness … tender­ness … yes, just fancy.”

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The next morning, Mr Rabbit was up well before dawn. Mrs Rabbit found him in the garden of their tiny stone cottage, meditat­ively tend­ing their crops of carrots and swedes. He had his “thinking” hat on as he worked—literally a hat he wore when brain­work was required. He said it helped.

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“Breakfast time, dear,” said Mrs Rabbit. Mr Rabbit took the wheel­barrow to the back of the cottage, doffed his thinking hat, peel­ed his garden­ing gloves off and came into the kitchen with an air of having succ­ess­­fully solved a thorny problem. Mrs Rabbit looked hope­fully at him whilst doing her best to spoon porridge into Baby Rabbit.

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“I’ve had an idea,” announced Mr Rabbit. “We need a name for our little treasure. I suggest we put it out to tender, as it were. Our friends all want to visit to see our new arrival. We’ll ask each of them to suggest names and at the end, we’ll choose one—if necessary by drawing it out of my thinking hat.”

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Mrs Rabbit, clearing off the kitchen floor the lumps of porridge re­ject­ed by their little treasure, approv­ed the scheme. Mr Rabbit spread the word that they were ready to receive visitors, and took to privately ponder­ing a way to hasten the planning and prep­aration for the Easter egg hunt.

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Their first visitors were Mrs Fox and her two cubs, bear­ing gifts of spring flowers, as was the custom in their neck of the woods. They all cooed over Baby Rabbit, comment­ing on her beautiful colour, her energy and her fine set of lungs! Mr Rabbit took out his note­book. “Tell me,” he said, “what comes to mind when I say the word ‘pink’?”

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"Bubblegum!” responded one youngster excitedly. “A pig!” cried the other. Mr Rabbit started to put his pencil and blank note­book away. Mrs Fox smiled. “It makes me think of camellias; carn­ations; roses; sweet peas.” Mr Rabbit scribbled a few words and thanked her. “Do have some more carrot cake, Mrs Fox!”

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After their visitors had left, Mrs Rabbit remarked tentatively, “Perhaps ‘Rose’ or ‘Sweet Pea’?" Mr Rabbit wasn’t so sure. “We want our daughter to grow up to be courag­eous and strong. There’s always a danger of nomin­ative determin­ism, you know.” He went to tend to the veget­able garden again, leav­ing Mrs Rabbit staring after him, baffled. Nomi- what? It would be a fancy idea out of one of those library books, no doubt!

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Scarcely had Mrs Rabbit brought out a plate of mini Swiss rolls when they had their next visitors: Mrs Bear and her two little bears. Mr Rabbit waited patient­ly for the coo­ing over Baby Rabbit to stop, and for tea and Swiss roll to be served, then produced his note­book. “‘Pink’. What does it make you think of?”

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“Candyfloss! Foam Shrimps! Straw­berry milk­shakes!” announc­ed the two young­sters at the tops of their voices, almost in unison.
Mrs Bear thought about it. “I’ll say flamingos,” she said, “and water­melon. Such a treat in hot weather!”

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“I don’t know if this is working,” said Mr Rabbit moodily after the bear family had left. “Well, some of these ideas sound promising,” replied Mrs Rabbit. “Although perhaps ‘Pig’ would be best after all!” She had turned to find Baby Rabbit had got into the pea­nut butter jar and was covered with that nutritious but very sticky substance.

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“Would you say that if she was a boy?” queried Mr Rabbit. “Or would you be more tolerant of over­eating and mess in that case?” Mrs Rabbit paused in her clean­ing of little pink whiskers, ears and fur. The things Mr Rabbit came up with! Although…perhaps he had a point! To give her­self time to think, she swiftly counter­ed triumph­antly with: “Don’t you mean, if she were a boy?”

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Unexpectedly, there was another rap on the door. It was their next-door neigh­bours, also rabbits, with their offspring, shyly proffer­ing bunches of colour­ful flowers to Mrs Rabbit, who was busily putting out carrot cake and mini-Swiss rolls, pour­ing orange squash and boil­ing the kettle for tea. Mr Rabbit posed the usual question and sat with pencil poised. Surely, from some­pet, they would get the inspiration for Baby’s name!

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“Lily the Pink,” stated Father Rabbit. “Big hit in the late 1960s. My great-great-great- —­I forget how many greats­—­grand­father was always whist­ling it, apparently.
“Ballet shoes and tutus,” said Mother Rabbit. The two young­sters, engag­ed in lick­ing the icing from the top of their slices of carrot cake, stopped to consider the matter. “Toffee apples, Love Hearts and Fry’s Turkish De­light!” suggested one and “Rasp­berry sorbet!” said the other.

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Their next callers were the Chicken family: grand­mother, mother and daughter. Mr Rabbit promptly set them to think­ing about what ‘pink’ meant to them. “Water lily and orchids,” said Mother Chicken. “Cherry blossom!” chirped Baby Chick. “Lotus flowers,” was Grand­ma’s contrib­ution.

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Grandmother accepted some carrot cake to take home, then firmly stated: “We’ll be back tomorrow to help with the egg paint­ing.” Mr Rabbit was very grate­ful. What with one thing and another, he had neglect­ed the hunt prep­arations! They bade fare­well for the time being to their guests.

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Mrs Rabbit covered the kitchen table with wax­cloth to protect it from paint. Mr Rabbit sat musing over his note­book. “Well, ‘Lily’ has come up a couple of times. Also ‘Blossom’. What do you think of those as names, dear?” Mrs Rabbit was ex­hausted. It was nice to see all their friends and neigh­bours but it was so tiring, and she’d run out of vases and had had to resort to putting flow­ers in jam jars. Plus Baby Rabbit had been fed biscuits and cake by all the visitors and had been difficult about her plain bread and milk supper.

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She maintained a discouraging silence, broken only by some sotto voce critic­ism of mothers who fed their off­spring Foam Shrimps, toffee apples, Love Hearts, Fry’s Turkish Delight and candy­floss. “Well, these things never did us any harm,” remarked Mr Rabbit, taking a more lenient view­point. “Come on, we’d better have an early night. Busy day tomorrow!”

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As arranged, the Chicken family arrived early the next day and the next few hours were en­gaged with decorat­ing eggs. Mrs Chicken discover­ed a talent for fashion­ing ornate eggs in the Fabergé style, with little gold bases.

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“We’ll make those special prizes,” suggested Grand­ma. “Now, it’s going to be a dry night, so I suggest we get these all hidden ready for the hunt to­morrow. Not you, Mrs Rabbit! You look worn out, and it’s no wonder. You go and have a lie-down. We’ll look after Baby."

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It was the day of the hunt! Groups of excited pets gather­ed in front of the Rabbits’ cottage, ready for the off. Mrs Rabbit stepp­ed to the front, Baby Rabbit clutch­ing her mother’s apron with one tiny pink paw. “We have chosen Baby’s name,” she announc­ed. “It’s ‘Pearl’. Pearls can be al­most any colour, but Baby is our pearl; a pearl beyond price.”

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Everypet cheered enthusiastically.
Mr Rabbit came forward. “Good luck with the hunt! Ready, steady—go!” The pets dispersed, clutch­ing their bask­ets in antici­pation of the eggs they would collect, and Mr and Mrs Rabbit were left in peace for the time being with Baby Pearl.

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“I did quite like some of the other names, though,” mused Mr Rabbit. “Yester­day it occur­red to me that ‘Fabergé’ would be a great name.”
Mrs Rabbit tut-tutted. “What would that do for her nomin­ative thing­amajig?” she queried.
“She might become a very, very rich and famous jewell­ery maker!” chuckled Mr Rabbit, and they each took one of Pearl’s front paws and with her hopping between them, went inside for lunch.

Melville has enjoyed an Easter Story, but it is time to go home. Please select another pet as visitor, so they can also enjoy this event!