Extraordinary Easter Egg Hunts

By Pamela Stock

As every parent knows, kids love to look for most anything -- from sandy horseshoe crabs on the beach to those few gray hairs on the top of mom's head. One of the most beloved traditions on Easter is an Easter-egg hunt. And with just a little tinkering, you can update the tradition to make this year's search the most fun ever.

Here are some hints on having the most egg-cellent egg hunt (NOTE: these tips also apply to any kind of treasure hunt for any other party).

1. Be wary of big hunts, especially with little kids.
   "It lasts about 15 seconds as the big kids trample the little kids to get the candy," says one mom of three in Armonk, NY. "And the parents can be worse; I once saw two adults going for the same egg. It wasn't pretty."
   
   
2. Go underwater.
   Lisa Schuba's two kids in Durango, Colorado enjoy the local Recreation Center's annual Easter Egg hunt in an indoor wading pool, though she says it gets a "little nuts" with four-year-olds and two-year-olds chasing floating plastic eggs filled with candy. Simpler to create your own "underwater" egg hunt. Weather permitting, you fill a wading pool with water and have the kids splash for filled plastic eggs, or, if it's too cool, "fish" for them with nets or large ladles.
   
   
3. Use clues.
   Instead of a free-for-all on the lawn, make a treasure trail using either drawings (older kids can help) or photos. Here's how it works: Everyone starts at the same spot, say, the backdoor where there is a drawing or a photo of the next stop, perhaps an overturned flowerpot. At the flowerpot, they find a photo/drawing of the big tree, where they see a picture of whatever's next, and so on. The last photo/drawing shows an overturned box where the eggs or baskets are.
   
   For older kids, substitute written riddles instead of pictures for clues. This hunt can easily be done indoors.
   
   
4. Color-code the goodies.
   To make sure the biggest or bossiest child doesn't get all the goods, each child is assigned a color. Sophie gets all the blue eggs/bags/toys; Alex all the green, etc. Then, when kids find someone else's color, they can either give it to the other child or re-hide it themselves.
   
   
5. Don't forget the Golden Egg.
   Kathleen Holt, mom of two in Brooklyn, NY says her family always had one special egg "that had a treat that was a little bigger and better than the other ones." The child who finds that one is the winner. Keep in mind: for the littlest kids, everyone is a winner.