For a lot of us, Easter includes getting dressed up in our spring themed “Sunday Best”, attending the ever popular Easter service, eating a big, traditional meal afterwards with family and/ or friends, and, of course, egg hunts and outdoor festivities. Also for a lot of us this year, we are quarantined, limited on who we can see, where we can go, what groceries we can find, and honestly it feels sad, bleak, and just disappointing overall. But! There are so many fun things you can do, right from the comfort and safety of your own home to not just make it special, but the best Easter ever! I’m not going to talk about the traditional things leading up to Easter that we normally do like dying eggs, planting jelly beans to grow lollipops, or the night before prep with Resurrection rolls or preparing Easter baskets. That’s the obvious stuff you can do at home if you haven’t already done it out of sheer desperation to keep the kids occupied. We’re going to talk about Easter Sunday specifically. So lets dig in!
Get up and read the original Easter story (the Resurrection Day story). If you don’t have a story book, there are several free resources such as this little printable book the kids could even color while you read the story from the Bible:
Printable Story Book: Easter Mini Book PDF
Read the Bible Story Online: The Resurrection of Jesus
You can also watch this kid/ family-friendly video of the Easter Story:
Make a fun breakfast together!
I did a simple little decor on our table last year and put out the baskets so we could go through them while we ate our pancake breakfast. My husband is a big breakfast guy and pancakes, sausage and eggs are our go-to fun breakfast. But get creative! Try your hand at home-made cinnamon rolls, french toast, or even Eggs Benedict (my personal favorite). Don’t forget to add in some special breakfast beverages. Emmy loves decaf coffee because it makes her feel like one of the grown ups.
Still get dressed up!
Yep- get dressed up and take family pictures. Just about any photography device, whether it’s a simple point and shoot digital, fancy DSLR, or a cell phone camera app, typically all have a timer on them. If you haven’t used that feature before, utilize this coming week to play around with the camera settings and figure out where you want to take pictures. You can still get your traditional family photos and have fun doing it. Get creative!
Attend a virtual church service!
Thanks to the endless live stream options out there like Facebook Live, YouTube live, and of course TV, you can still very easily watch an Easter service. Make it extra special by still dressing up and sitting as a family in the living room. Fully participate in the singing, congregational responses, and bowing your head and closing your eyes to sincerely join in the prayers.
If you are overwhelmed with which service to watch, feel free to check out my church’s service options. They are on Facebook and YouTube and have a website of course.
First Baptist Church of Enterprise: FBCE Facebook Page
First Baptist Church of Enterprise: FBCE YouTube Channel
First Baptist Church of Enterprise: FBCE Website
Write down why you’re thankful!
It can sound trite or lame and, yes, I know this is typically something you do around thanksgiving, but I know a lot of us are so surrounded by the scary and uncertain things while adjusting to new schedules and responsibilities that it can be hard to just focus on all the good still around us. If you follow my InsaStories (username emily.helvin) this week, I’ll be doing an Easter Gratitude Tree with Emmy and showing you how we’ll make it super special. Join in and get the kids involved. Pull out those random craft supplies once more and help your family think about all the wonderful things surrounding you. You can even add to the tree after Easter if you can see a need to refocus your thoughts.
We are super blessed to have some awesome neighbors. We are often getting together one way or another just to hang out, have a game/ movie night, or just sit in each other’s driveways while watching the kiddos ride bikes and play with chalk. If you are under a travel ban, inviting neighbors over (totaling no more than 10) to eat and taking the proper sanitary precautions, is a perfectly valid option. Maybe this year, you just add in a bottle of hand sanitizer to the food table so everyone gets a pump before going down the line. If you’re wanting to take more precaution, whip up some easy, no-sew face masks for everyone (you could even buy spring themed fabric from Walmart). If there aren’t any kids around, do outdoor games (relays, badminton, and corn-hole), do an adult egg hunt (fill eggs with money and make one a golden egg with a big prize maybe?), pick a board game, have an egg painting or Easter themed cooking competion, etc.
If you end up getting together with your neighbors or family, still do all the fun, traditional things like egg hunts, traditional food (maybe throw in some spring themed treats [ideas pictured below]), outdoor games, etc. Just make sure you’re taking proper precautions and avoid hugs and hand shakes. If you don’t have access to traditional Easter food, consider a good old fashioned cookout with whatever meat you can scrounge up or even having a potluck style feast where everyone brings whatever they can scrounge up with what’s on hand.
All in all, there are several things you can still do to have an amazing holiday together as a quarantined/ social distancing family whether you add in a few friends or not. You don’t have to exclude attending church and dressing up. And of course the food is still going to be around regardless of it being traditional or unique for this year.
Stay healthy, safe, and positive, my friends! Wishing you all much love and happiness this Easter season!
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