Easter on a budget

 

 This year for Easter we are celebrating on Saturday due to schedules. I was dreading it at first as we have zero money to budget for an Easter celebration, but then I talked to my mom and she gave me a couple of different ideas and reminded me that it’s all in the attitude. So one night after the kids went to bed, my husband and I brain stormed and came up with a plan. I thought I would share it with you in case you find something helpful.

We save our plastic eggs from year to year. Each of our children have their own color of plastic eggs because their finding abilities have varied over the years and by looking for only their own color means we can hide them harder or easier accordingly. This year, instead of filling all the eggs with candy, I’m going to buy a small bag of candy, you can get them for a dollar at the dollar store, and divide it up between the kids and then fill the rest of the eggs with “coupons”. If you aren’t familiar with the idea of coupons, they are slips of paper I decorated and then wrote a promise on them to be redeemed at a later time. For example, one says “Present this coupon to mom for 30 free minutes of screen time, no strings attached.” Another says “Good for one candy bar of your choice.” Another says “You get to pick what we watch”

 Instead of a big dinner, we are going to have an Easter themed brunch that we invited my mom too. I am fixing a ham and cheese frittata, a fruit salad and biscuits. My mom is bringing cinnamon rolls, and if I guess right, probably some Easter treats.

 We are going to hang out all day as a family, if the weather is nice we’ll probably go to a park. The kids will probably want to Hide the eggs again for us to find like they usually do and I have a few “minute to win it” type games to play.

Then we’ll fix chili for dinner with chocolate cupcakes for dessert and watch Sight and Sound Theater’s production of the Jesus story. We have the dvd and it is phenomenal!

The kids will probably notice the lack of an Easter basket, but I plan to just redirect and keep them busy all day. We have never done the Easter Bunny anyway so there won’t be any feelings of being forgotten by him, kind of like we never did Santa because I never wanted to get caught in a situation where Santa let them down. We have done coupons for things before and the kids really enjoy being able to whip one out whenever they want. They usually go through them pretty quick, haha.

What tips do you have for celebrating Easter on a budget? Happy Easter!