What are your Easter traditions?

[tassis]

Title says it all really - what happens in your house at Easter time?

[maisystar]

we eat chocolate

will do a little easter egg hunt for ds and a couple of friends i should think but thats it really.

[donnie]

go to church and read easter stories to dd.Try not to have too much chocolate and fail!

[Mothernature]

Go buy Easter eggs on Good Friday..chill on Saturday, go to inlaws on Sunday, chill on Monday all in all a chilly weekend to be had by all here....

[SeaShells]

Easter eggs, lots of egg painting and craft type things with DS and easter egg hunt and that's it really!

[ja9]

r u looking for ideas to start your own traditions? or, are you just interested?

[zippy539]

We roll painted (or boiled in onion) boiled eggs down my parents drive (we don't have a drive ) and my dh's parents are big on easter egg hunts in their garden.

[SenoraPostrophe]

eat chocolate. get fat.

But they don't sell chocolate eggs in Spain

[coldtea]

We always paint eggs. Easter sunday i get all my family over for a big egg hunt , this year i've prepared an adult one too! Then we play games , pin the egg on the easter bunny , egg & spoon races & sack racing & the adults have to join in it's great fun! I look forward to it as much as the kids!

[Lonelymum]

No real traditions except give the children chocolate eggs, but I wanted to say I would like the TV to show Robert Powell in Jesus of Nazareth again as I haven't seen it for years and it was so moving. Stupid thing to say maybe, but I think it would boost my faith.

[NotQuiteCockney]

Oh, I miss dyeing eggs, I've not seen any kits here for that. We always used to dye eggs when I was a kid.

We also have one very very cool easter tradition - no egg hunt, strings instead. The Easter bunny comes into the house and lays strings, one per child, in "their" colours, with goodies on them, and a nice big goodie at the end. Not a lot of chocolate, often a book or whatever.

This is fairer for kids of different ages (which is why my parents made it up). Also, when kids are bigger, you get the kids to lay out each other's strings, and the grown-ups just put the goodies on them. The strings can be quite evil, with lots of going under around and through things.

(Like my mum, I get in quite a huff about that horrible Easter bunny and his horrible strings messing up my house.)

[Lonelymum]

Not got satelite TV waswondering

[Lonelymum]

Where does the Easter bunny tradition come from? Am I alone in feeling it was never mentioned when I was a child. I can honestly say the first time I heard of the Easter bunny was about 4 years ago when it was on the Vicar of Dibley!

[expatinscotland]

Go to church on Good Friday. Have a family outing on Saturday. At night, after dd goes to bed, I meditate and pray quietly in a bedroom.

Sunday DD wakes up to her basket and we have a light breakfast before church. Then, a huge lunch!

[coldtea]

Notquitecockney , i love the idea of string , that sounds great. I colour code the eggs with stickers to make it easier & fairer in the hunt though i won't do this for the adults! I always had a bunny bring the eggs he/she(must be politically correct!)brings the egg knocks on the door & hops away , you have to be quick not to get spotted! This year though the bunny will bring in string! I bought a dye kit from the card shop birthdays , it was only 99p.

[NotQuiteCockney]

The string thing really is lovely, and it makes things much fairer for kids (My sister and I are four years apart. My kids are three years apart.). Last year I bought DS1 a backpack full of dinosaurs from Woolies, and just distributed them along the string. Very very popular.

Still haven't sorted out this year's gift, though ... may be time to go to woolies again.

[ediemay]

I love the string! We usually hide eggs but my brother's dog finds them all first and it's a big drama. Last year he ate millions (with the foil still on) then vommed them up on the living room carpet. Lovely. he had also eaten a few painted eggs for extra crunch. The string is a fantastic idea, and this year I'm locking up the dog.

[SoupDragon]

I invented The Chicken Hunt as our Easter tradition I hide those little fluffy chicks in the garden and the children then exchange them for eggs and, here's the important bit, they get the same number of eggs regardless of how many chickens they find.

[NotQuiteCockney]

Chocolate is poisonous to dogs, so it's best to lock the dog up, for everyone's sake.

[Hulababy]

We don't have any traditions for Easter - I feel like we are missing out now!

DD will get some Easter eggs from great grandparents, aunt/uncles and I have persuaded grandparents to get her an alternative (books maybe) instead. Dh and I haven't got her anything. Her birthday is the week after and we have spent a small fortune on her party and present as it is.

[Tommy]

church and chocolate sort of sums it up here as well

[tassis]

Well there are some lovely ideas on here. So far ds and I have made Nigella's Easter nests, we've got a sunrise service at church on Sunday morning and bacon rolls at church afterwards (I'm cooking the bacon so will miss the service). Egg rolling after the next church service. Roast lamb for lunch perhaps? Easter bunny might hide eggs in the garden. Ds is almost 2 so we're starting new traditions! Last year I bought him a great Easter book instead of an egg, and I might do the same this year. We might let him eat a bit more of the chocolate this year!!

[nutcracker]

We don't really do much at easter, never have. Infact i'm not even buying the kids an egg this year cos their grandad and uncle are buying some and i don't want them to have too many else i'll be tempted to eat them all

I am buying them a pressie though, Dd's are having new lunch boxes (i know, but they need them), and ds is having a cuddly Tractor Tom.

I should get an enormous egg for the fact that i have just spent all bloody night making their easter bonnets.

[tassis]

Hey nutcracker, Easter bonnets is an Easter tradition! What are they like?