How To Keep Your Kids Entertained at Home Over Easter

Easter might feel like a bit of a strange blur this year – most parents in lockdown with their children don’t even know what day of the week it is, let alone the month! But with Easter weekend nearly upon us, there’s no reason not to make the best of it. Here are a few Easter crafts and challenges to keep all the family happy, and the kids entertained at home over Easter – or for a little while at least!

Activities to keep kids busy at home over Easter

DIY Easter Bunting

Create a template of a rabbit – then trace the outline of the rabbit onto different coloured card – pastel shades work particularly well for Easter – cut out the rabbits then stick a cotton wool ball on where the tail would go. Get an adult to help you (if necessary) make a hole in either side of the bunny just below the shoulder, then thread a ribbon through, adding as many rabbits as you like and hey presto! Your very own Easter bunting.

Make Some Egg Decorations

Crack your eggs in half as neatly as possible. Wash out the shells, making sure you keep the two sides of the eggshells in their pairs to help you match them later. Wait for them to dry. Stick the two shells back together and cover them with tissue paper. The tissue paper will reinforce the joined cracked eggs together. Wait for the tissue paper to dry and then decorate to your heart’s content. You can paint on them, stick decorations on them or add googly eyes for added fun! They make a lovely addition to an Easter table.

Decorate Your Own Easter Tree

Take one cup of flour and one cup of salt, thoroughly mix the two together before carefully adding ½ cup – 1 cup of warm water. Knead the salt dough for a few minutes – you need the texture to be like real dough so not too sticky and not too dry, adding the water as necessary. Flour your worktop before rolling out the dough to approx. 5mm then start cutting out shapes using cookie cutters or creating your own designs. Don’t forget to use a skewer or straw to make a hole from which to hang your decorations. Pre-heat the oven to 150c (280F) then place your creations on an oven tray lined with baking parchment. Put these in the oven for approx. 3 hours, checking them regularly to make sure they aren’t going too brown. Once these are cooked and hard remove from the oven to cool. Now it’s time to paint them, before adding some ribbon or twine so you can hang them from a flower arrangement, a collection of twigs or even just the doorknobs in your house!

Design Your Own Easter Rabbit Cups

Take a disposable polystyrene cup (or similar) then cut out ears from white card, using a pink pen to colour the inside of the ears. Stick on googly eyes (or make your own), cut out a small pink circle for the nose and then draw on the mouth and whiskers. Cut out two oval white pieces of card and draw on the pads of the feet, again in pink. Stick these onto the cup, along with the ears and add a cheery surprise to your Easter lunch.

Make an Easter Fork Chick

Take some yellow paint – or any colour you want your chick to be – dip your fork in the yellow paint then starting from the middle of your white card, draw the fork outwards towards the edges of the paper. Do this until you create a circular shape. Wait for the paint to dry, then add googly eyes, a small orange triangle for the beak and draw on two little legs with a black pen. These look great stuck in the window, or if you make enough, you can make a string of bunting too.

Create an Easter Egg Hunt with a Difference

Add an extra element to your Easter egg hunt by making a treasure map that reveals a route to the chocolate goodies. This gives you the opportunity to hide the eggs in more obscure places, which will lengthen the hunt (particularly if it is indoors or your garden isn’t huge) and develop your children’s orienteering skills.

Check out some more Easter crafts here…

Recipes to keep kids entertained at home over Easter

Make Chocolate Nest Cakes

These couldn’t be simpler to make, and the kids love them.

You will need:

200g of milk chocolate, broken into pieces
85g Shredded Wheat, crushed
2 x 100g bags of Cadbury’s Mini Eggs
You’ll also need: Cupcake cases

Method

1. Melt the chocolate in a small bowl placed over a pan of barely simmering water. Pour the chocolate over the shredded wheat and stir well to combine.
2. Spoon the chocolate wheat into 12 cupcake cases and press the back of a teaspoon in the centre to create a nest shape. Place 3 mini chocolate eggs on top of each nest. Chill the nests in the fridge for 2 hrs until set, then happy munching! Recipe from BBC Good Food.

Design Your Own Marbled Eggs

These look amazing when complete, but it’s a messy business so make sure you all wear gloves!

You will need:

• Hard boiled eggs
• Vinegar (enough to submerge your eggs)
• An oven tray
• Whipped cream
• Food colouring
• A toothpick or chopstick

Method

Firstly you will need to soak your eggs in vinegar for five minutes. Then spread a layer of whipped cream across the bottom of an oven tray, before dripping your food colouring intermittently over the whipped cream. Use the chopstick or toothpick to swirl a pattern in the cream with the different colours (two / three colours works best). With gloves on, remove your eggs from the vinegar then dry them with paper towel before rolling them through the dyed whipped cream. Place the eggs on a plate to dry. Once the eggs are dry, wipe the excess whipped cream and colour from the shells and you will be amazed by the results!

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• Recipes to try at Home With the Kids