Easter Basket for Older Kids

Remember when it was as simple as filling a few plastic eggs with candy or small toys, hiding a few around the yard, and the Easter hunt was complete?

Flash forward to now older kids, teens, and young adults, what can you do to celebrate the fun of a hunt and keep them engaged?

At our house we still have an egg hunt, but fill the eggs with one word clues to find the basket of goodies.  We stretch out a rhyme or something funny in many one word clues to fill the plastic eggs to make it part hunt, part riddle, part scavenger hunt.

We make a clue like: “Remember your birthday when we had the best cake?  What theme was the party?  Find the memento from the party in your room for the final clue”-- that’s 27 eggs worth of words.  Then in their room we put a final clue with the photo from the party they still have on their memo board.  Final clue might be “Where the clothes go tumble, tumble” - obviously hide the full basket of goodies in the dryer.

The older our child has gotten, the harder it seems to be to find something small enough to fit into an egg for hunting.  But we still like the fun of a hunt, and so far, the kids put up with it (they get a basket of goodies after all)!

Then with the space of a basket for goodies you can get more creative with what to fill it with.  We  fill the basket with rolls of quarters for laundry if they go to a laundromat, a gift card to the movie theater, their favorite fast food places, and the favorite basket filler;  gas station gift card!  I usually also include a new hoodie, flip flops for the summer or new sunglasses to get us all excited for the upcoming season.  

When our child was in college, Easter was usually right before finals and the end of the school year.  Filling the basket with snacks was always appreciated to finish the school year off right!

Now that our child is out of college, and working, gas cards are still top on their list.  But now I can add a fun bottle of wine or cans of their favorite hard cider.  I still like the tradition of an egg and basket hunt, and they still participate.  I’ll hold onto that as long as they will let me.