Easter fun for kids (for mums and dads too!)

Easter is a great time to get crafty with little ones and there are so many fantastic things to do that are fun for little ones.  I love art and craft as does Lee, we are a very creative family and we both want Tristan to have lots of fun getting crafty as he grows up.  Craft activities are great for children, it’s a great way to entertain them and it encourages their creativity and imagination whilst they are having lots of fun.  The list of ideas for fun for Easter themed crafts is endless, below are a few of my favourite fantastic craft ideas –

Easter cards,

Kiddies can have lots of fun getting creative making homemade Easter cards.  It’s a great activity for children of all ages and you don’t need that much for them to make a beautiful card they will be proud of.  All that is needed is some card, glue, scissors and any colourful and interesting craft materials for them to use to decorate their card as they let their imaginations run wild.  Crayons, paints, colourful card, tissue paper, glitter etc are all great to make a pretty card and you can even recycle materials and give them things like old cards, empty sweet wrappers and old magazines to decorate the card so that kiddies can make a lovely homemade Easter card with a variety of different colours and textures.

Decorate chocolate eggs.

Children can have fun decorating and personalising chocolate eggs.  Give children cake decorating supplies such as icing pens, chocolate buttons, edible glitter and icing flowers to decorate their chocolate eggs.

Easter baskets.

Perfect for holding their yummy Easter eggs children can make their own, homemade baskets.  These baskets can be used during Easter egg hunts to hold any eggs found on the hunt.  Great instructions to make an Easter basket can be found on the Lindt Chocolate UK  - Easter Activity packs page on their facebook page along with other ideas for fun this Easter.

Lindt Chocolate UK

Painting and decorating eggs for Easter.

Decorating eggs for Easter is a great activity for children over the Easter period.  There is so much creative variety with decorating eggs and children can get really imaginative decorating their eggs. 

You can use either hard boiled or blown eggs; eggs that have been blown rather than hard boiled will be more fragile but can last years if cleaned out properly.  We used to decorate eggs that my mum had blown to empty out the contents and you can always use the contents in cooking.  Instructions for how to blow eggs ready for decorating can be found on the brilliant blog Red Ted Art on the Easter egg blowing post or a video can be viewed on the Parteaz blog post on how to blow and decorate eggs for Easter.  A great tip if you decide to blow eggs and the egg cracks slightly when you pierce it is to try and blow from the cracked end otherwise the pressure will cause the crack to fully break and the crack can be sealed when you paint the egg.

You can paint the eggs using a variety of different paints and methods such as poster paints, watercolours, homemade paint and food dyes.  If you decide to use hard boiled eggs and plan on eating the eggs non toxic paint should be used. 

A variety of different methods can be used to achieve different affects, such as using brushes, sponges and fingers.  A great different way of painting an egg can be by using a volcano egg dying method, a great post about his can be on Toddler Approved website on the volcano egg dying post..  Another way is to dye the eggs to create a beautiful marbling effect; instructions can be seen on Martha Stewarts’ post on marbleized Easter eggs.

marthastewart.com

Another unusual way to dye the eggs with colour is to use tissue paper (gift tissue paper will not work as it is colour-fast, use craft tissue paper instead), you simply dampen the egg and place different colour bits of tissue paper over the egg, overlapping and moistening until the egg is completely covered.  You leave the egg covered with tissue paper which absorbs the colour from the tissue paper but don’t let it dry.  After leaving for a few minutes remove the tissue paper and see unique, beautifully decorated eggs.  (Staining may happen, so cover clothes and work surfaces, wear gloves to protect hands from staining or wash hands with warm water and soap as soon as possible to get rid of stains).  A more detailed post with pictures can be found at the blog Edeltraud Mit Punkten on the English translated post here.

Edletraud Mit Punkten

Create craft animals.

As well as painting eggs you could also get children to paint their eggs and then decorate with craft supplies to create little egg animals.  Some great instructions on how to make adorable egg animals can be found on the Family Fun website and I love the cute sheep there and other egg creatures can be seen on Martha Stewarts website where the bunny with carrots is adorable.

marthastewart.com

Children can also make little animals using other craft supplies or recycle household products; animals can be made out of toilet rolls or empty egg boxes.  How to instructions to make cute sock bunnies can be seen on the Family Fun website.

Family Fun.

As well as getting crafty Easter is a great time for other activities too.

Easter egg hunt.

My mum would create fabulous Easter egg hunts for us and they were so much fun.  Kids will love cracking clues as they hunt for eggs (or other small objects if you don’t want them having too many eggs) that have been hidden throughout the house and garden.  To make the hunt even more special and fun you can make a special treasure map to help the kids on their big quest to find the eggs using clues and their mysterious treasure map.

Some great tips can be found on Tesco Magazine about creating a fun Easter egg hunt as well as different ideas for the Easter egg hunt including photo clues for younger children and multiple choice questions.

Easter themed cooking.

You can get creative with your children in the kitchen and create some yummy treats with an Easter theme.  Decorate cupcakes for Easter as little nests or bunnies, make chocolate Easter nests and fill with mini eggs or make biscuits shaped bunnies.

Family Fun

Lots of other great craft ideas and fun activities can be found on the Easter craft section on Martha Stewart’s website and the on the craft section of the Family Fun website as well as lots of other sites online.

Not only are these activities fun for children but it’s also a great excuse for us mums and dads to have fun and recapture our youth getting creative with our little ones.  Hope everyone has a fun Easter.