Favorite Things About Easter

As a child, my favorite thing about Easter was leaving my empty Easter basket out the night before Easter and waking up to a basket full of candy, chocolates, eggs, and toys. I vividly remember peeking under the door late one Easter Eve night and seeing fluffy bunny feet hopping around my family’s den! It’s true – just ask my little brother – we both saw it!

Now that I am older (and wiser about the Easter Bunny’s true identity), I still enjoy eating all the fun Easter candies and goodies, but I try to make sure all the sugary goodness of Easter does not overshadow the true reason for the celebration: the resurrection of our Savior, Jesus Christ. Since my children are young, I have found a helpful lesson that teaches them to associate Easter with the story of the resurrection. It is simple, but requires some advance planning. You number and fill 12 plastic Easter eggs with items that symbolize parts of the Bible story about Jesus’s crucifixion and resurrection, then open the eggs in order and talk about the things inside. My kids love this tradition.

Just like my family did with me when I was a child, I still sing the “Here Comes Peter Cottontail” song every year during Easter time with my own children, eat way too many Cadbury Eggs and buy packages of Peeps that for some reason don’t get eaten quickly enough and end up as hard, stale chick-shaped marshmallows no one wants to touch.

Easter eggs hunts are a must-have this time of year. Since we live in Alaska, some years the ground can be covered with snow – and there definitely is no tall green grass in which to hide the eggs even when there’s not any snow on the ground. However, kids don’t get phased by this one bit. We hide eggs in every nook and cranny of last year’s grass and our Easter egg hunts are just as fun as if we had a plush carpet of green to hide them in. I love watching my children scramble to find every last egg they possibly can – even when I know they have probably found them all already.

Last year, we started a new tradition of leaving out carrots for the Easter Bunny to snack on while he visited our house to fill our Easter baskets. My kids were ecstatic to see the half eaten carrots the next morning…THE EASTER BUNNY CAME! HE REALLY CAME AND ATE OUR CARROTS! I am sure we will be leaving out carrots again this year, too.

It is fun to be a child at Easter – endless Easter egg hunts, coloring eggs, tons of candy, and fun family traditions. I hope that children and adults alike will enjoy this Easter season, whether or not we see actual fluffy bunny feet under our doorways (like I did!), and that we can remember to take the time to focus part of our family’s Easter on the true reason we celebrate the holiday: our Savior, Jesus Christ.

Disclaimer: “I wrote this blog post while participating in the SocialMoms and Hop blogging program, for a gift card worth $25. For more information on how you can participate, click here.”