Thursday, August 29, 2013

Homemade Easter Baskets

So I was going through my pictures today and realized that I forgot to add these pictures in and even though it is months past the season, I thought I would go ahead and add these in.
I come from a family of 6 kids and every Easter we would always make our own baskets. For years, I thought that was what everyone did as part of their celebration. It was a real shock as a child when I saw baskets in the store and realized that not everyone shared our tradition. 
Here's why I love our tradition so much:

1. They are economical and disposable! 
I don't have to find room to store all the baskets- and I don't have to spend ridiculous amounts of $ on new baskets because I threw last year's away either. For the cost of a couple sheets of poster board and some stickers we're ready to go. Oh, and the art supplies- I do have to pull out my tub of markers and a stapler. A week or two after the holiday I have no problem tossing them out- they have served their purpose and I don't feel like I have to store them because the kids look forward to making a new, beautiful creation next year. 

2.It keeps them busy and they're personalized!
The kids love to decorate their own basket. It has been fun to watch their tastes change as they grow up, too. Our oldest started out with scribbles, graduated to Thomas the Tank Engine, then we had a year of Angry Birds (which admittedly was a bit horrifying as his pictures depicted all sorts of baby chicks,  Peeps marshmallows, and chocolate bunnies getting flung from their slinghots...) and last year we even had some Tron rezzing discs show up.
Plus- I refuse to boil more than 2 dozen eggs for them to color because my kids LOVE to color them- but they don't so much love to eat them. I can only handle so many deviled eggs and so much potato salad before I'm burnt out. The actual dying of the eggs is over pretty quickly, since we have 5 kids working on it and they are always sad when it's over. It is nice to have another fun project to pull out right away while the eggs are drying.

3.The kids are SO proud of themselves.
The baskets may be inexpensive, and they may not last- but for that week or two it is really nice to see the look of pride on their faces when they realize that they made their own basket and helped to decorate our home. I love how each basket is so different, truly a representation of it's owner, unique and special.



I was busy helping the kids this year, so my husband Matt made our basket... AWWWW.


Here's some baskets from year's past: