Fun, healthy Easter holiday activities for children

Child painting an egg

Sidonie Sakula-BarryEaster can be a bit of a chocolate-fest. To make the celebration healthier for all the family, Sidonie Sakula-Barry, our Health Promotion Manager, has come up with Easter-themed activities for all the family.

Egg painting and a scrummy brunch

Rather than buy lots of chocolate eggs, getting kids to decorate their own eggs with marker pens or paint is a great activity to keep them busy.

You can hard-boil the eggs before decorating them – then eat them afterwards. Or you can blow the eggs first, which is the best way of preserving the decorated eggs – you may want to do this for the children if they’re small, but they might have fun doing it too.

Instructions on egg blowing

  1. Sit a raw egg in an egg box to keep it still. Carefully push a hole in the top of the egg in the centre with a safety pin, making it as wide as possible by rotating the safety pin, without breaking the shell.
  2. Insert a toothpick into the hole and stir around to break up the yolk so it will go through the hole more easily (in step 4).
  3. Repeat step 1 on the other end of your egg – so that you have a hole on each end.
  4. Hold the egg over a bowl. Place the end of a straw on the top hole of the egg and blow – so that the raw egg comes out of the bottom hole of the egg into the bowl.
  5. Once all the egg has come out of the shell, clean the shell under running hot water and pat dry.

Don’t forget to save the egg mixture that you’ve blown out of the egg shells! We’ve got loads of brunch recipes you can cook while your children paint:

Egg recipes

If you don’t have any eggs, simply cut out an egg shape on card or paper as a template for little ones to decorate.

Ewan’s (aged two) before and after:

Ewan's egg before...
Ewan's egg after

Easter egg hunt

What better way to get your kids excited than an Easter egg hunt? We’ve put together some cryptic clues that will work in any home and get your child active. The prize is to find their decorated egg that you’ve hidden!

Simply write out these clues and place them where instructed. Then give them this note:

We’ve hidden your egg but left you clues to find it. Can you get your egg back?

Hand the children the first clue:

There’s a clue in here, of that I am certain

Just take a peek at what’s behind the curtain

Hide this clue behind the curtain:

The next clue is not invisible

Just look in the box that contains the cereal

Hide this clue in a cereal box:

How much cereal should be in your tum?

What do you eat your cereal from?

Hide this clue in a bowl:

Leap up off the sofa and see what’s behind

You may be surprised at the treasure you find

Hide this clue behind the sofa:

Under the wardrobe there may be a clue

But watch out for spiders – there may be some too

Hide this clue under a wardrobe:

Look in the fruit bowl for your 5 A DAY

And see if there’s also a clue on the way

Hide this clue in a fruit bowl:

There may be some dust lurking under the bed

But see if there’s now a clue there instead

Hide this clue under the bed:

A drink of this is so refreshing

And healthy too – we’re not messing!

Hide this clue by a tap:

It gets wetter as it dries

Here you’ll find your beloved prize…

Hide the painted egg where you keep the towels – the final clue!