easter egg hunts?

[monkeyma]

Does anyone here do easter egg hunts? What do you put in your eggs? Not necessarily for this year, but I'm curious as to what thoughtful alternatives to candy and $ store toys that could be put in the eggs.

[honeybunmom]

Off the top of my head:  seeds if you will be planting a garden; neat rocks or stones; shells, play wool, seeds for feeding ducks/geese if you have a pond nearby with access; miniatures for fairy house/doll house; a note about a special trip or outing; special spring/Easter verses.  That's about all I can come up with now.

[monkeyma]

Thanks! I'm starting to get the direction we could go a little more. I love the seeds idea. 

[Pumpkin_Pie]

A friend of mine put popcorn in eggs for her son and I am totally stealing that idea this year.

[Melaniee]

We have done stickers, cereal (I washed the eggs first), little cookies, coins, erasers, glass/stones or beads.

I love the popcorn idea!!

[mommariffic]

We had both dyed hard boiled eggs and the regular plastic that we have...I fill them with stickers, crayon rocks, pretty stones, and candy. Most health food shops and I think the Natural Candy online shop have some health(ier) alternatives to things like peeps. 

[RollerCoasterMama]

The first year, I just gave DS a bucket and toy eggs to play with.  ;)  The 2nd year, we did put jelly beans in the plastic eggs.  I'd made a few wool eggs, but just put them in his basket.  Last year was fun though!  I made a dozen solid eggs and needle-felted decorations on them and it was just enough for a 3 yr old egg hunt.  I had intended on making a few more each year.  Although I better get cracking if I'm going to do it!!  DS didn't seem to mind at all that his eggs were just for finding and didn't have treats in them.  He got some treats and a new umbrella in his basket, so we really didn't need any more candy in the house!!

Here's our eggs:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/30975615@N08/4491456813/  I still think they turned out pretty cute!!  I stole tons of ideas from etsy.  :) 

[monkeyma]

Originally Posted by RollerCoasterMama 

The first year, I just gave DS a bucket and toy eggs to play with.  ;)  The 2nd year, we did put jelly beans in the plastic eggs.  I'd made a few wool eggs, but just put them in his basket.  Last year was fun though!  I made a dozen solid eggs and needle-felted decorations on them and it was just enough for a 3 yr old egg hunt.  I had intended on making a few more each year.  Although I better get cracking if I'm going to do it!!  DS didn't seem to mind at all that his eggs were just for finding and didn't have treats in them.  He got some treats and a new umbrella in his basket, so we really didn't need any more candy in the house!!

Here's our eggs:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/30975615@N08/4491456813/  I still think they turned out pretty cute!!  I stole tons of ideas from etsy.  :) 

Those are ADORABLE! I like the idea of just finding eggs, too. Where did you get your felting supplies and wool from? I was looking at Weir crafts... do you know anything about them? I definitely want to get into felting.
 

[RollerCoasterMama]

Quote:

Originally Posted by monkeyma 

Those are ADORABLE! I like the idea of just finding eggs, too. Where did you get your felting supplies and wool from? I was looking at Weir crafts... do you know anything about them? I definitely want to get into felting.
 

Thanks!  I was sooooo happy how they turned out!  It was good practice for me too!  Weir crafts is an awesome resource!  When I had my etsy store I got all my doll fabrics and yarns through them!  Great service and quality and very good prices!  :)  

The main eggs, I made with just plain white wool.  I have huge piles of it from the doll-making days--I used to order by the 5 lb box.  (You know you're a fiber-geek when a big tub full of lovely clean carded wool makes you feel that all is right with the world.)  But definitely, if you're doing anything solid, you'd want to do cheap white wool on the inside and just decorate with the pretty colors.  My colors aren't very nice quality.  I got them off Overstock.com actually.  Totally random find.  But I have an assortment to keep me busy with little projects.  I got the needles and a foam pad for Christmas one year from XH.  I can't remember which online store I sent him to but there are lots of places that sell needle-felting starter sets.  You could probably even find them just at a big craft store...it's been pretty trendy the last couple of years.  It's really easy and fun!  And etsy is a great place to go for ideas!  Some of the cutest things are so simple!!! 

I think this weekend, it's time to make some more eggs and then I can decorate them between now and Easter.  Last year, I let DS help me with the wet-felting part to make the eggs.  He "helped" for a few minutes, but we had fun anyway.  Then I just worked on them here and there for a few weeks until I had the full dozen.  By the time I got to the polka-dot ones I was flat out of ideas!!!  Hopefully I can get inspired again this year to do something fun. 

[MammaG]

Our kids hunt eggs at church. They are hard boiled eggs, decorated by the older children of the parish and hidden in the cemetery for the little kids to find. Our old (Revolutionary War-era) cemetery looks so beautiful dotted with colourful eggs and filled with children in their pastel Easter outfits. We now have a tradition of egg salad sandwiches for tea on Easter Monday so as not to waste all those eggs.

I once saw a tutorial somewhere for wet-felting wool over a plastic egg. (Maybe it was this one?) You then slice the egg open along the equator of the egg, leaving a hinge. Remove the plastic egg. You can embroider your wool egg and pop a little surprise inside if you like.

[4alt]

Our Easter egg hunt is always outside so we use plastic eggs, and since I don't want to wash all the plastic eggs (we do not have a dishwasher) I put coins in them every year.  We have been doing this for over 7 years for our kids along with our nieces and nephews.  Everyone loves it.  Since we live in the Chicagoland area, sometimes there is snow on the ground, sometimes it is just wet and muddy, sometimes it is nice and sunny, but no matter what the weather everyone has a good time including the adults who are watching 8 mostly little kids look for over 100 eggs.  I should mention that some of our eggs have suction cups to attach to windows, some have strings that can hang from tree branches.