Happy April Fool's Day from Giant Teddy

Are you feeling Foolish today? Here's the Giant Teddy April Fool's Day Blog! 

Have you ever wondered why April 1st is called "April Fool's Day" with pranks and jokes of all sorts?

We did. And here's what we found:

• Some look to ancient history, when the New Year was celebrated close to April 1st, before the current calendar we use today was created and put into use. 
• Some think it has to do with the change of seasons, heading from dark and gloomy in the Western World to the lightness of spring, making people feel foolish. 
• Some feel it is a combination of many things including some religious holidays that happen at this time of year for several religions.

The entire Western World observes some form of April Fool's Day, sometimes called All Fool's Day. 

And ironically? Many of the explanations of what April Fool's Day is are themselves April Fool's hoaxes, including a famous one in 1983 where the AP widely distributed a story from a professor about the origins that turned out to be deliberately and completely FALSE. 

Whatever the explanations, it is a day to feel light of heart and be silly - and being silly is certainly something Giant Teddy bears know something about!

Here is an April Fool's Day story from one of our social media followers, who has Willy Shags living with her - he gets into a lot of mischief and today was no exception! 

Early this morning I was in the kitchen looking for my glasses - I was sure I had left them on the table, but they weren't there. I was standing there wondering how I was going to cook breakfast without them when I heard a big commotion. I went to find out what was going on (I suspected that Willy Shags was probably involved) and instead of finding one giant green teddy bear, I found TWO!

They were a little blurry, but one of the bears had a black nose, and one had the same cute brown nose I know my Willy Shags has. Who was this other black-nosed bear? 

My Willy Shags was talking really fast and very excited, claiming it was his twin brother, Will E. Shags, who had arrived for an unexpected visit to see what Willy's new forever home with us was like. 

Of course I was excited for their reunion and glad to have him here but in the back of my mind I was wondering “Is the world ready for TWO of these big silly green bears in the same place?”

I noticed that the black-nosed Willy Shags was quiet, and quickly realized that something wasn't quite right...

And that's when Willy Shags started laughing and yelled, "April Fools!" He hopped up and down, and handed me my glasses. That's when I saw that he had been standing by a mirror, and "Will E. Shags" was Willy's own reflection with a black dot placed cleverly just where his nose was so it would look like a slightly different bear...especially to a lady missing her glasses! 

What can I say? You just have to love a big silly bear... and at my house, we all really love Willy Shags! 

Happy April Fool's Day 
-Submitted by Kay Garrett and Willy Shags

All the bears and humans at Giant Teddy hope that your April 1st is full of fun and light hearted mischief - and of course full of Giant Teddy Bears!