Easy Easter Activities for Busy Moms
One of my favorite parts of being a mom is planning and doing fun, crafty holiday activities for my kids, but I also find myself short on time, more often than not. The longer I’m a mom (now 11 years in, crazy as that seems), the more I realize that simple and done is better than complicated and never attempted... because meaningfulness and time together are the end goals, not perfection in the process (because hello, sinful mom and kids) or a Pinterest-worthy product!
If your Holy Week is a lot like ours, BUSY - with work, school, soccer, dance, and multiple church and family activities taking up most of your time - I’d love to invite you into 5 EASY and fun traditions that we’re doing to celebrate Easter as a family this year.
1) Resurrection Eggs - These plastic eggs (pictured above) come in a set of 12 and are each filled with a symbol related to Jesus’ death and resurrection. It comes with a little booklet explaining each symbol and relating it back to scripture, so these are great for quick, hands-on devotionals at bedtime, meals, or snacktime, or if your kids are older, letting them use the eggs to retell the Easter story! This afternoon, I’m surprising my girls with a Resurrection egg hunt in the yard, and then they’ll take turns explaining what’s in each one over a special snack (some bakery Easter cookies). Amazon and Hobby Lobby sell them, or here’s a tutorial to make your own using stuff you already have around the house.
2) Resurrection Rolls - Made with just 5 ingredients - canned crescent rolls, jumbo marshmallows, butter, sugar, cinnamon, these fun, tasty rolls represent the empty tomb! This is one of my favorite traditions and couldn’t be easier - or yummier! The girls and I normally make them together on Saturday night, and we eat them for Easter breakfast. See recipe/directions here. (*One change I’m making this year is to use the jumbo size crescent rolls - I think this will help the marshmallows not to ooze out like some have done in past years!)
3) Jesus Storybook Bible - If you’ve been around here for long, you know how much I love the Jesus Storybook Bible! We like to read the related storires as a family at Advent and Easter, and now that my girls are older, they take turns reading aloud to us. There are 4 stories related to Jesus’ death and resurrection, starting with “The Servant King” and ends with “God’s Wonderful Surprise.” So, you could read one a day from now until Easter! Here’s a link to their free Lent guide, which also has some coloring pages and fun freebies.
4) Easter Story Snack Mix - I wanted to get the girls to help make something special for a few friends and neighbors, and my friend Julia @carteechaos shared just the perfect thing this morning - a super easy Easter trail mix with a cute free printable by Happy Home Fairy! It has craisins, pretzel sticks, mini marshmallows, etc., and each part represents what Jesus has done for us. My girls have virtual school on Fridays, so we plan to mix up some bags tomorrow morning and deliver them as a Good Friday “happy.”
5) Drip Painted Eggs - Inspired by @mericherryla - See her video tutorial shared in my Instagram stories. If you don’t have droppers, could also just paint them with paintbrushes, q-tips, do splatter paint, etc. Besides being super FUN (I can’t stop watching the video), I thought it was a relatively easy craft that would be fun to keep and display over the years - or give away! She also has tutorials for some beautiful salt dough egg ornaments and embellished clay eggs, if you’re feeling extra crafty this year... ;)
Whether you do some, all, or no special activities with your kids this Easter, I want you to know that you are a GOOD mom! Our activity or good works never has or will define our worth as a mom or a person - only Jesus’ blood on the cross can do that. I’ve definitely done less in past seasons with younger kids and a full time job! I hope you will search for and find some moments to reflect on and talk with your kids this Easter weekend about what the cross means to us and how those 3 days truly change everything. And, if you don’t have a home church and are local to Tuscaloosa, I’d love to extend a personal invitation to join me at Capstone Church for one of our Saturday or Sunday services. Happy Easter celebrating, friends!!