Anyone have any Easter Egg Hunt Ideas??

[poohlover]

I am putting together an Easter Egg Hunt for the toddlers - age 7 kids in our church. I've got some ideas...anyone ever do anything like this?? All ideas welcome & appreciated! Any good ideas on candy or something for toddler age kids??

 

[bananiem]

My only suggestions would be to have each child only allowed so many eggs and then they stop or each age finds a certain color or something. That way you hide the older kids eggs in a little harder place.
Toddlers are hard to buy treats for. I'd go with smarties or something similar.

 

[Spinning]

OH MY! WE do this every year in our church! It has become a big deal! This is my first year not to be doing it! We'll be away!
Anyway this is what we do:
Order stuff (littl trinkets) from Oriental trading
We usually get bubbles or pin wheels for the smallest kids and hid them in the yard. For the older kids we get small bracelets or those snap wrist things. YOu can find lots of stuff from O.T.
We section off the area into age groups. Plus put a limit on the number of eggs they can find.
We also do a candy campagne. ask the memebers of the church to give us candy that is wrapped and will fit inside a 3 inch egg. This is the first time doing this and it is saving us a ton on candy!
We also serve lunch which is usually hogies for the adult and hot dogs for the kids.
Everyone has a great time. We also sell tickets. Just to cover the cost of the food and trinkets/candy.
$3 for kids $5 for adults
We even have bunny! so we take pictures of the kids with a bunny! Lots of fun!

 

[piratesmate]

My cousin runs one that DD goes to every year. Their church is very small. They ask the families to donate WRAPPED candy and/or money. They use the money to get more candy if they don't get enough - rarely a problem. The first few years some people donated the plastic eggs as well, but now they just have the children dump the eggs & take only the candy home. (As I said, SMALL church!)

They have someone who donates marshmallow peeps wrapped in plastic wrap every year. I'd be hesitant to allow that in a larger group - or where you don't know everyone they way these people do. If they get more $$ than they need, they sometimes will put coins in some of the eggs.

They divide the children into 3 age groups: 2 - K, gr 1 - 5 & gr 6 - 9. (Some schools here have middle school & others have jr high.) Because many parents have more than one child, they have the kids take turns so you can see them all. They don't limit the number of eggs each can have, but the children (even jr hi) are good about not taking too many. They usually plan on ~30 eggs/child - if it's nasty out, though, they can come home with closer to 60 because no one shows up!

They also have eggs with stickers for special prizes. I think they usually have 3/age group - there are rarely more than 15 - 20 kids/group. Children are limited to one sticker/prize. Prizes are paid for by the $$ donated & are age appropriate: beanies, bubbles, a cute bank . . . I can't think what else.

Oh, they also allow a parent or older sibling to accompany the youngest children. So far they haven't had to restrict extra parents with video cameras.

They plan it for Palm Sunday weekend so they'll have a rain date if necessary. They'd have no where to go with them otherwise.

Good luck!

 

[MerryPoppins]

I've done this at my church many times. My suggestions:

Divide them into groups by age (we did toddlers, younger kids, and older kids through 5th grade). Hide the eggs differently for each group. The toddlers mainly just need eggs on the grass, the older they get the more they like sneaky hiding places.

Avoid chocolate - on a warm spring day it can melt and get all over the kids cute clothes which ruins the photos

Make sure the prizes are age appropriate and not a choking hazard.

Have some paper lunch sacks on hand in case anyone forgets a basket

Have a limit to the number of eggs to be collected. If a child finishes collecting he can help his neighbor. When everyone is at the limit you can always open it up for a free-for-all, but that way no one ends up with an empty basket.

If you are on a budget you can ask for candy donations or have each family bring filled plastic eggs ahead of time. Our youth group fills the eggs on Palm Sunday and hides the eggs Easter morning.

Put out a collection box for empty plastic eggs. Lots of kids don't care about the eggs and just throw them away. We started keeping them and reusing them next year. Just check to make sure they aren't dirty.

Bring a camera! The hunt sure makes cute photos.

 

[Trish Bessette]

Easter egg hunts are so much fun!

As mentioned earlier, it works out best when you separate the kids in age groups and depending on how many kids set an amount limit so some don't end up with a bunch and other not any.

For the youngest children, I've put mini marshmallows in eggs also the Goldfish crackers. It works out great, and the kids love them.

Good luck and have a great time!

 

[PamCo88]

My family does this every easter with 9 kids ranging from newborn to 13. We color code the eggs - 1 color for those just starting to walk - to make things equal.

Ideas for egg stuffers beside candy for the young ones:
animal crackers
stickers
gerber snacks
goldfish

Good Luck

 

[soccerchick]

Our church also does this and everyone is right about separating ages and having different areas set up for them. Church members donate bags of candy and/or money for door prizes. The youth group does the hiding and also helps supervise the "finding." One thing our church also does that I didn't see in the previous posts is to have a hotdog lunch afterwards which is a nice way to wrap it up. Depending on how big or small your church is, the hunt could be pretty short. Our church also has door prizes (stuffed animals, books, stickers, etc.) that they do while everyone is eating. Every child "won" something in the door prizes. I can't remember if they do an RSVP/sign-up sheet to know how many kids to expect since we only did it DD's second Easter. We were in WDW last year when they held it and we will be in FL again this year the week prior to Easter.

Have fun!

 

[poohlover]

Thanks for all the wonderful suggestions! I had all ready thought of separating the ages, I think I will do toddlers - 3, then 4 - 8 yrs.

Thanks for the idea of mini marshmallows! I had thought of goldfish, pretzles & stickers. Also had ideas of Oriental trading.

I think we are going to do 2 prizes for best Easter bonnets...prettiest & most creative! I have 2 stuffed bunnies I got last year at 80% off after the holiday for prizes.

This year my family is hosting the hunt. My son accepted $500.00 from our minister to "do God's work", in whatever ways we can come up with. My 12 yo DS has surprised me with what he has come up with. Some straight out donations...making dinner for a soup kitchen...making a fleece blanket for a homeless shelter are a few(got that no sew idea right here!). He has to "report" back to our congregation in May about what he has done. So we are trying to keep the costs down.

Again thanks for all the great ideas & keep them coming if you'd like. I appreciate them all!

 

[nicurn]

you can also find easter stuff at Joann Farbric's which I think is now at least 40% off. they have some cute stuff like bubbles, hair bows, socks, necklaces, cute little rabbits, chicks,etc. It's worth a trip. (and don't forget the AFTER easter sales to stock up for next year. Target goes as low as 90% off on easter stuff, Joann's and Michaels will go to at least 75% off , and don't forget your local grocery store, they will clearance stuff as well) Good luck! maggie

PS: I colour code for our egg hunt, it's much easier