It always jumpstarts my spring to prepare for Easter! Decorating my home, adding spring flowers to the porch, enjoying the budding and blossoming trees all over our little corner Arkansas. It is another magical time of each year.
Earlier today I was standing in the department store. I’ve been looking at these wonderful Easter basket goodies for weeks now.
Why then is it Easter week and I’m still trying to decide what to put in the kids’ baskets?
I’m not a procrastinator but I honestly get so wrapped up in all the joys of each of our wonderful four seasons here in NWA that the actual holiday of each season always sneaks up on me.
So I gathered some ideas for my three children, plus a few extras, and wanted to share ten ideas for all you who are standing in the store aisle scratching your head.
1. BOOKS go well in baskets for all ages. It’s always my number one filler. (If your child doesn’t particularly like reading then pick a book you would enjoy reading to them and put all your heart into it as you draw your child in to the magical adventures through reading.)
2. COUPONS for no or low cost mommy-child or daddy-child dates. Write the coupons out on pages in a small coloring book or sticker book. Two prizes in one and also a treat for tweens and teens even if they would never admit it.
3. COLLECTIBLES or small additions to your child’s “collections” like one little car, doll accessory, train piece, characters, nail polish, PEZ dispensers and some extra refills of course! I always add a charm to my girls’ charm bracelets and I include baseball cards and a vintage license plate for my son to add to his collections. Kids have all kinds of “collections” and even if it’s rocks or twigs, believe me, they want more! Just hope its not frogs and snakes they collect!
4. THEMED BASKETS are easily put together. It’s a great way to celebrate the activities of spring! Real child-sized tools are available at all your home improvement or hardware stores. Make a carpentry basket with hammer, nails, apron, safety goggles, glue and a birdhouse kit. Fill one with gardenening tools and seed packets. Glow-in-the-dark eggs, glow sticks, adhesive glow stickers, and light-up balls will make for a great nighttime fun basket. The ideas here are endless.
5. SUMMER ITEMS will get you ready for summer vacation (just 6-8 weeks away.) Fill a sand pail with an small inflatable, new swim suit, beach towel, or just anything fun for the pool or beach. Another great summer-themed basket would be fishing gear with a child-size pole and gear box. Maybe your child has been wanting some bicycle accessories and also add a coupon for some bike trail rides on those summer evenings.
6. CHILD’S SPECIAL TALENTS AND INTERESTS can be renewed by staying more generic and less commercial. It makes for a lot more interesting basket when you save the super heroes and movie characters for the birthday party celebration! Think about each child and their special talents or interests. How about a basket with some new art supplies to replace that old watercolor set and the play-dough. Or maybe your child LOVES play-dough so fill it with the new spring colors and some of those great play-dough tools for some new fun. Maybe you have a budding archeologist. Put some dinosaurs and rocks and fake gemstones in with some digging tools and rope off a digging site in the back yard.
7. A child’s FAVORITE COLOR is always a fun theme for a basket but monochromatic is not interesting. Use varying shades of the favorite color in items all throughout the basket.
8. MOVIE NIGHT is always a hit at our house. A basket with new DVDs, boxes of their favorite movie theatre candy, popcorn and movie character plush or action figure.
9. If QUALITY TIME is what you’re looking for, consider adding the ingredients of a favorite recipe to make with your child. You could include the items necessary to build a bird house to the Easter basket.
10. If you want to keep it SWEET AND SIMPLE with strictly eggs and candy then mix it up for a really creative basket. Fill some of the plastic eggs with small prizes, gum balls, jelly beans, chocolates, quarters, coupons, stickers, gaming tokens, and then add some other egg-shaped items to fill-out the basket like egg-shaped cookies, chickie lollipops, and a big chocolate bunny.
I hope this list helps you as you put the finishing touches on your Easter celebration. May we all remember the resurrection of Christ in the midst of all the bunnies and eggs this Easter Sunday. Happy Easter!
