12 indoor exciting Easter egg hunt ideas
Whether its lockdown or the rain that’s driving you indoors, use these creative ideas to still have the best Easter egg hunt yet!
As someone who lives in rainy England and has spent the last few weeks of lockdown indoors, I certainly appreciate the creativity of an indoor Easter egg hunt. What you lack in space to conceal eggs in great quantities you have to make up for in innovation, making each one more of a challenge to find.
With these indoor Easter egg hunt ideas, you might not want to bother venturing outside at all, even to the garden. Lots of them try to make the hunt just a teeny bit harder, either with clues to follow, puzzles to solve, or challenges to overcome to find the eggs.
Others involve indoor activities that you can also use as Easter basket goodies even if you do have an outdoor hunt. There are even some ideas for different prizes, so you’re not constrained by the size of a plastic egg. Happy hunting!
1. Make It Interactive
They might not be able to run around in the grass, but that doesn't mean you can't get them to expend some of their boundless energy during their egg search. Print out some directions, slip them inside the eggs, and, every time a hunter finds one, they have to do the action inside. After all the mooing and hopping, they'll be ready for a nap.
2. Hunt in the Dark
Close the curtains tight — or wait until night time — and let the colourful glow guide the little scouts. You can either buy glow-in-the-dark plastic eggs (these are lit by batteries, so you don't have to worry about charging them in the sun), or you can use DIY glow-in-the-dark paint on real eggs.
3. Leave Clues
Instead of leaving a ton of eggs all over every nook and cranny of your apartment, you can carefully hide a few of them, and then offer a trail of clues that'll help kids find them. It combines the fun of an egg hunt with the thrill of a scavenger hunt. And, for the design-challenged, you can even buy pre-made clue cards on Etsy.
4. Include a Word Search
Hunting for the right letters can be just as thrilling as hunting for eggs, right? If you really want to go the extra mile, you can make your own word search that somehow contains clues to the locations of the hidden eggs. Or, you can download this one and make it one of the found prizes.
5. Turn It Into a Letter-Hunt
If you want to take the word search idea a step further, you can combine the two and make the eggs into the words themselves — a message that can only be "unscrambled" if you find them all and place them in the right order.
6. Add an Extra Puzzle
To add a second layer of challenge, conceal a puzzle piece inside each plastic egg — kids have to find them all to solve the puzzle. Use a blank, draw-on jigsaw puzzle to write the final clue to where the Easter eggs are hiding.
7. Do It Blindfolded
Make the festivities even harder by adding a blindfold; you can either direct the kids to the eggs "hotter/colder" style, or, if they're younger, fill them with coins or other noise-making prizes and shake them until your toddlers find you.
8. Switch up the Prizes
It's hard to fit good prizes in the small, plastic eggs — and keeping prizes with real eggs is even harder. If you don't want to use candy or a small piece of junk, consider hiding "points" or raffle tickets with each egg — the harder the hiding spot, the more points or tickets — that can be combined for a larger Easter gift. Or get even more creative, and hide "privilege cards" that can be used to get out of chores or get extra treats like more screen-time.
9. Use Camouflage
If bright, plastic Easter eggs stick out too much against your décor, this twine eggs might be harder to spot. Plus, you can use them as a rustic decoration before and after the hunt.
10. Enlist Fairies to Help
Make these fairy jars as a DIY craft before Easter, and you'll bring a little of the outdoors inside. Then, the fairies can help the Easter Bunny hide the eggs around the house. If your kids need an extra hint, the votive candles can offer a clue. And, since these don't scream "Easter," you can use them afterward for whatever fairy treasures your kids collect.
11. Colour Code It
If your two kids' ages are such that one has a competitive advantage when it comes to egg-hunting, assign each child a different colour egg to find. That way, the toddler can find some easy ones and while the big kid hunts for the harder ones. Or, if they're close in age, you can assign a certain point value to different colours, depending on how well they're hidden. At the end, you can see who found the most eggs and who found the hardest eggs.
12. Turn the Tables
Once they've found all the eggs, let them grab a few and hide them on you. They can use the "hotter/colder" method to direct you to their hiding spots. Just promise not to peek!
We hope this keeps you – and the kids – busy this weekend, and helps to create lots of family memories, even if you have to be indoors. Happy Easter!