Easter Egg Stuffer Ideas for Little Ones

Ages ago when my daughter's first Easter came along she was almost one. We were excited newbie parents and wanted her to have the excitement of "hunting" for and opening Easter eggs. Of course - these things are really more about our excitement than theirs at that age, right? Well, I wasn't going to give my precious firstborn candy! Tee hee! The first thing that popped into my mind was animal crackers.

So, that is what she opened on her first Easter over 10 years ago – animal crackers and Cheerios. Just opening an egg to find a surprise inside was exciting. Well, after Easter several other mommies were surprised at my choice of stuffers – they lamented having to put candy in their children's eggs – Because that's just how it was done – and wished they had done something "healthier."

This post is JUST IN CASE, you've got little ones or toddlers and don't want to have their teeth full of sugary jelly beans either. Goldfish would be a nice treat, too, if your child doesn't eat them on an hourly basis and would consider them fun to find inside. Something not too sugary; simple and fun for a little tot. Of course, as they get older chocolate is really the best choice given its nutritional value. Wink. Wink. Or mints or money are also safe Easter egg stuffing choices. Please share your ideas in the comments!

AND please type "Easter" in the search bar on the right to see my more inspirational Christ-focused Easter celebration ideas! Happy Easter - Christ is risen!

Celebrate Jesus' Resurrection

Easter is coming up. Here's little table idea for your gatherings I first designed and posted in 2008!!

These quick paper place cards can be set out for your Easter brunch or dinner whether you're hosting 2 or 20 people. The egg symbolizes the new life we have in Jesus, and the message tags make it clear why we celebrate this holiday.

"He is not here: for he is risen, as he said. Come, see the place where the Lord lay." ~ Matthew 28:6

Tutorial: 
• Cut out 3 inch egg shapes from patterned paper using decorative edged scissors. 
• Print or write various phrases on coordinating solid colored paper. 
• Cut out in circles. 
• Punch a hole through each and string together with matching ribbon. I used: "Hosanna!" "Happy Easter!" and "He is Risen!"

Enjoy! And remember, you can always use the search bar on my site sidebar to find other Christian holiday ideas - 7 years worth of ideas!

My Favorite Two Easter Projects

"Jesus" Easter eggs:

View my tutorial on these naturally dyed Easter eggs spelling "JESUS."

Candle decor symbolic of the sinless Jesus and His sacrifice for us:

View this meaningful tutorial for a centerpiece idea for your Easter table.

For other Easter decorating and craft ideas, including fun kids' projects browse my previous Easter holiday posts.

 

"...Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; And that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the scriptures..." ~ I Corinthians 15:3-4

Easter Egg Paper Craft Tutorial for Kids!

 After school the kids had fun doing a messy Easter egg paper craft:

We used shaving cream to create custom marbled designs on paper Easter eggs.

First we cut out a bunch of egg shapes from card stock. 

They each had a glass pie plate and a can of shaving cream in their station

After filling the plate with shaving cream, use toothpicks to swirl drops of food color around.

Press the paper egg flat into the cream, pressing down to remove air pockets.

 Here's what it looks like after squishing the paper into the design:

Carefully peel up your egg keeping as much cream in the plate or bowl as possible. Here are some of our paper egg patterns drying:

Once they're dry, take a dry napkin or paper towel and wipe off any remaining shaving cream residue. Then you can turn your masterpieces into Easter cards, place setting accents or home decorations. We'll be stringing ours together on a pretty ribbon to decorate!

BUT ... while your pretty designs are drying ... fill another pie plate or glass bowl with clean shaving cream for the kids to dig in and play with!!

Celebrate Christ! Easter Decorating With Meaning

Our living room mantel features our traditional candle representation of Jesus' sacrifice on the cross - the real reason we celebrate Easter. Only one without sin could pay the penalty for our sins, so the white candle is symbolic of Jesus' purity:

(And that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again. II Corinthians 5:15)

The three pieces of wood, of course, represent the crosses upon which Jesus and the two sinners [red misshapen candles] were killed. The vines are a picture of the crown of thorns. Thank you Jesus for your sacrifice! Praise God for an empty tomb!!

Meaningful Easter Tabletop Decorating

As I work to keep my kids focused on the REAL meaning of Easter, I put out this little trio display on my coffee table:

This may seem vaguely familiar if you've been around awhile, as I sometimes use white and red candles with my Easter symbolism:

The wood bases represent the crosses on which Jesus and the two sinners died. The ring of vines symbolize Jesus' crown of thorns. Jesus, of course, is the white candle – pure and sinless. While the two in red represent the thieves. In the top photo, the red flowers in the white vase stand for the terrible sacrifice of Jesus, which was His incredible, beautiful gift. "God presented Christ as a sacrifice of atonement, through the shedding of his blood–to be received by faith." Romans 3:25 NIV

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Paper Easter Egg Gifts Tutorial

I just made these paper Easter eggs for my kids:

They are 5-6 inches high with little gifts tucked inside, like gum, trinkets and lovey messages.

Instructions:
Fold a sheet of pretty pastel-colored patterned paper in half.
From the fold, cut up and around in an egg shape.
Punch 1/4" holes all the way around.
Choose a coordinating thin satin ribbon or string.
Beginning at the top, loop your ribbon through the holes.
Stop about two-thirds of the way around to tuck your Easter treasures inside.
Complete your ribbon's trip around the egg and tie a cute bow at top.
String into the bow: a gift note, cross, child's initial, etc.

I think I might tuck a little invite to Easter service and a treat and give to our neighbors!

Kids Easter Party - Krispie Egg Treats

Heading to a Kids Easter Party with krispie egg treats in hand!

Rice Krispie treats have been made into every imaginable shape, so I thought I'd try eggs for this Easter party. It's easy enough for little kids to help and mine loved it! We sprayed regular size plastic eggs with cooking spray ... along with our clean fingers. Mush a glob into one end of the egg and squish down with the other side until it closes. Open and voila:

We mixed colored Easter sprinkles right into the cereal. Then since these are for a kids' party we had to add some more fun color:

These bright glitter gel tubes were easy enough for the kids. We just did the top part since it seems like the gel will take a long time to dry:

Off to celebrate Easter at the park!

"Jesus!" Easter Eggs

Today I'm re-posting one of my most popular Easter "Inspiring Ideas." It's from a few years ago, but it's a pretty timeless tradition you can do with your family.

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Celebrate Easter with this "Jesus!" display:

Coloring eggs for Easter to celebrate new life in Jesus is a classic tradition. I thought it'd be fun to do a batch with my kids this weekend - to test an idea I had of using letter stickers:

Coloring Easter Eggs: Natural Dye Tutorial

After boiling 6 eggs, I dried them and adhered the letter stickers:

I tried natural ingredients - a first for me - to make my dyes. I googled to find a list of options. I started with blueberries. I heated a small handful of fresh blueberries with a bit of water and white vinegar. Then I strained it into about 1/2 cup hot water:

Next I tried cooking some spinach for green. I learned you'd need A LOT of spinach :-) to get a good green, as you can see mine looks more like pale yellow:My third choice was to be red/pink using cranberry juice ... but this ingredient ended up coloring the eggs brown. I took the one I had in the "green" and gave it a second bath in the blueberry to turn it aqua. Here are our eggs cooling and drying:

I really liked the mottled finish on my eggs, although you may try wiping them a bit for a more even finish. Lastly, I removed the letter stickers to see if my technique worked:Yeah!!!! It did! :-)The kids thought this was pretty fun, so we'll color eggs again ... AND we'll try some other ingredients so my daughter can get her pink eggs! Although she really liked the blueberry dye because it looked a bit purple.

Easter Cupcake Toppers - free download

I decided to make Easter cupcakes for my daughter's preschool tomorrow. I added "Happy Easter" and "Jesus" paper cupcake toppers to go with:

It's not a Christian school, so these toppers will really just be for our extended family and the preschoolers will simply enjoy a special treat in honor of the Easter celebration. (With assorted sprinkles, of course!)  :-) 

But ... I've uploaded the cupcake topper daisy artwork as a free download for you. You can use them on cupcakes, or any other cake/treat, or even string them into a spring-colored Easter banner. To go on cake or cupcakes, glue a "Happy Easter" back to back with a "Jesus" topper and a toothpick in the middle will stick it right in place. For a banner, glue them along a pretty ribbon and decorate your fireplace mantel or Easter buffet.

DOWNLOAD FILE

(This is a .pdf file. An 8 1/2 x 11 page that opens with Adobe Acrobat Reader.)

Now, I have no idea how bunnies worked their way into the Easter holiday. It's not the focus at our house, but my little ones made these two adorable buck-toothed bunnies at a recent party:

They make me laugh and the kids had a ball making them. My wonderful friend pulled the whole thing together for a preschool spring break activity. Jelly beans poured into [clean] children's socks, cinched at the neck with a ribbon, rubber bands to top the head, then snipped at the cuff of the sock to create two floppy ears:

Now, I recommend dry beans or something other than tasty treats that your child may suck on THROUGH the sock in the car on the way home!  Note the interesting belly on the pink one! :-)

I do hope you have a blessed Easter, remembering Jesus' sacrifice for our sins, His gift of eternal life!

The No-Egg Egg Tree for Easter

Paper crosses decorate my tabletop "egg tree" for Easter:

Oh, yeah, I guess I shouldn't call it an egg tree since there are no eggs. :-)

One of my hurricanes got a fresh look for Easter. And it cost me nothing. Nada. Zed. I found a terrific narrow branch for the tight spot in my living room that this will be going to. I anchored the stem in some local "pretty" rocks my daughter loves to collect. A satin ribbon and silk peony adorn the hurricane:

The delicate smaller branches are decorated with assorted-size crosses cut with decorative-edged scissors. The variety of scrapbook papers I chose from my scrap pile were all patterned on both sides. A small hole punch and fringy ribbon rounded out my supply list:

And it doesn't even matter if the pattern was upside down ... on the one cross I photographed up close ... because you didn't even notice ... right?  ...  :-)  (I'm sharing this idea with all the visitors to DIY day at A Soft Place to Land and Get Your Craft On at Today's Creative Blog.)

Through the Seasons with my Footed Bowl

I'm decorating for Spring with my sweet little birdie and her two little blue eggs:

My friend gave me this large footed glass bowl at Christmas:

For Valentines Day I removed the large plum candle and potpourri and replaced with a red candle I already had. I added red ribbon and glass beads:

Now for Spring I shopped the house for my two little, yet heavy, cast iron birdies. One is resting in the bowl with two blue wood eggs and natural shavings nest from my Easter supplies:

As my kids say - "She's the mommy birdie caring for her babies in the eggs and the daddy bird is looking for food and keeping them safe from bad guys. Like Spiderman." Yeah, something like that.  :-)

Linking to: DIY Day, Get Your Craft on and Tip Me Tuesday.

Easter Cross Candle Decor

If you want to introduce some of the Original reasons for Easter into your holiday decorating, I have a simple idea for you today:

A candle trio to represent Jesus on the cross next to two sinners. Naturally, the sinless Christ is the white candle, while He has two red candles on either side. Each one is placed on a wood base to represent their crosses. These rustic wood slices were found at a craft store. A plain strand of twine adorns a simple grapevine wreath, which surrounds Jesus' white candle as a symbol of His crown of thorns:

This is sitting on my hall table, but I think it would make a special centerpiece for Easter dinner/brunch.

Tip: In the right side column of my blog is a section called "Topics." Clicking any topic listed will bring up all posts I've done on a given topic, like Easter, kids or spring. Here's all my posts to-date on Easter, for example.   :-)