I'd like to do a small Easter egg hunt for Easter, but I'm not coming up with many good ideas of things to put in the little plastic eggs. My boys are young, 3 years old and 16 months old, and they have a girl cousin who is 18 months, so the prizes should be appropriate for toddlers. The only things I've come up with are matchbox cars and plastic animals. The eggs I have fit in the palm of your hand, so the prizes can't be too big. Does anyone have more good suggestions to make this egg hunt a little more creative?
With children that age, they probably don't care at all about the prizes - it's more about having fun FINDING the eggs. You could have a couple eggs with prizes for each child, but I wouldn't make it about the prizes at all. Make the hunt about the joy of finding easter eggs.
Have you been to Target or Walgreens? Wow, the things they have in their eggs... You name it, they have it.
The only thing I would add to the previous post is edible items. Those were the biggest hit w/my DD. We did one jelly bean in each egg (which was eaten as soon as the egg was found), or you could do individual packets of things like fruit snacks. You could even make up your own mini snack bags for in the eggs of things like yogurt-covered raisins or whatever your kids eat, use plastic wrap tied with a pastel ribbon or something. You could also get those cheap party favors at Walmart or any party store, some of those would be small enough to fit. You could also do little slips of paper for "breakfast of your choice", "dollar to spend at grocery store", etc. Hope that gives you some ideas!
You could put some change in them for the kids to put in their piggy banks. (Ours are 4 and 22 months and they are REALLY into that right now!)
Or put slips of paper with numbers on them and they could correspond with bigger prizes you have. Like stuffed animals, markers, crayons, books, etc.
Tattoos and stickers could fit in the eggs.
Hi K., what about buying something and instead of putting it in the eggs why not write the prize on a slip of paper and placing it into the eggs and give them the prize that is on the slip of paper that way if you see something bigger that you would like to give you can and this way they will be surprised at what they receive. If you would like to add a little excitement buy some wrapping paper wrap the prize and put a piece of the wrapping paper into the eggs that match a prize you know how kids like to open gifts. Good luck and have fun. G. J.
Stickers! Crayons? Don't know if they'd fit...
I've seen plastic eggs at Target that contain play dough. There were actually a couple of isles at target that had many small things appropriate for eggs and Easter baskets. You might look there for more ideas.
What about large-sized stickers? You could roll them up slightly and stick them inside the eggs.
Sticker and tatoos. Toy necklaces? Would crayons fit - open the box and put one or two in each egg? Another idea for your 3 year old would be to turn in small prizes to get a bigger prize - like if he finds 5 stickers, he can turn them in for a jar of bubbles. You could also make homemade playdough and put a small ball of it in some eggs - that would be fun for the kids to play with later! Enjoy!
What about teddy grahams or those Toddler rice puff snacks.
Remedy for stuff that doesn't fit in the eggs...
Just buy some little soft chickies or very specific toys earmarked as a "token," and when the kids find one of them instead of candy or whatever else is in the eggs, they can pick out a "prize" instead...then you can let them use their chickies to pick out stuff like bubbles, crayons, easter toys, ect.
You could even have some bins with different sized toys so if they find 1 chickie they can pick from this bin, if they find three they can get a bigger toy, and if they find five chickies they can pick an even bigger toy...like at the fair.
Candy and snacks are always liked by my two (3 1/2 & 5 this year) Stickers, tatoos, bath toys, chalk, rubber bracelets, keychains, small animals, cars, etc.
We put bigger items in the easter basket - coloring books, water squirters, summer sandals, etc. I found sidwalk chalk shaped as easter eggs.
I remember my mom always hiding eggs with money - a 50 cent piece or now the dollar coin. She marked those eggs with our names so we each only got one. My boys love this too.
Have fun with it!
J.
I wouldn't really worry about the 3 month old -- he won't even know what is going on. But I've always put edible treats like goldfish, teddy grahams, juice snacks, or marshmallows -- whatever you feel comfortable with. Of course some have M & M's and Jelly Beans... it's Easter!
