Do you celebrate Easter with baskets full of goodies? Well, it’s March now, Easter is about four weeks away, and it’s once again that time to start thinking about what to put in those baskets.
In our house, after 11 years of Easters, we have a pretty set formula of what’s going in an Easter basket. Each child gets one outfit (or just a shirt if I’m having a lazy year), one movie, video game, or book, one small toy, maybe an iTunes card, and candy to fill in the empty spots. As you may be able to tell, my kids have fairly large Easter baskets. After my second child was born we needed another basket. We ended up being suckered into getting the ones from Pottery Barn Kids after seeing all the adorableness in the catalog. And in the wide-open of the store the basket seemed a lot smaller than when I started to try and fill it up. I swore it was the same size as the one I had when I was a child. It is not.
That being said – obviously, what one puts in an Easter basket is dependent on the size of the basket, but I think several guidelines can generally apply to everyone.
- Keep it fairly small.
I’m not good at this. And as the kids get older the clothes are becoming more and more impossible to fit in the basket – even with our big ones! And now that I think about it, they are just getting shirts this year. But, irregardless of their clothing size, I always find a toy that’s too big. Since I own a toy store you would think I could manage this part better, but really, no. The toy almost always ends up behind/around the basket. Square corners are not friends with round baskets.
This guideline also applies because Easter is just somehow cute and for cute things. And everyone knows that small equals cute.
2. Keep it age appropriate.
Age appropriateness is important for a lot of reasons, but here I am referring to the idea that a child will get the most out of the toy (or book or even video game) if it’s age appropriate. This seems obvious, but a lot of people (myself included!) tend to forget this when shopping. I always tend to want to buy something that is for a slightly older child and give it to my kid to stretch him, or I think that maybe he will grow into it and it will last longer. But when I do this one of two things ends up happening (and it’s happened a lot in my house). One – my kid starts out having fun, quickly ends up frustrated or overwhelmed, gives up, and then never wants to see the toy again because it’s always thought of as too hard even though the child has aged and it would now be appropriate. Or two – it’s never opened because either the child isn’t old enough to see just how awesome the toy is or it doesn’t quite fit where his interest level is with the topic. The toy then ends up in the back of a cabinet or closet to be opened later, and is never thought of again. We end up with a lot of unused toys (books and video games) this way.
Instead of pushing them with something inappropriate enable them with something appropriate. It’s okay for a toy to be right at a child’s skill level – the fact that it’s at their current level will allow for them to grow without being discouraged. And that’s only encouraging.
Now about the under 3 crowd – I know I said keep it small, but this can be hard to do for very young children and really isn’t age appropriate, what with the choking hazard problem and all. For this I would suggest taking things out of their packaging. All toys get smaller when this happens, and if it’s something like a set of blocks or a stacking toy or something you can spread it out in the basket. It fits, it’s fun, and it’s age appropriate.
3. Keep it quality.
Again, this seems obvious. And I will say I’m better at this guideline than I am the first two. We all want to give kids something that they will love to play with and will hold their attention, but it is so much easier said than done. For this one you really just need to know your child and you need to keep it simple. I think people end up spending a lot of money buying a lot of small trinket type things that end up not used just for the sake of filling space. If that same amount of money was spent on one thing that is more substantial and different then it is more likely to be played with. There are only so many rubber bouncy balls a kid can have. Think quality and not quantity. And if there is space left in the basket add a couple of Peeps or a good book.
4. Keep it tasty.
This is really just about the candy. My only guideline is to give your kids candy you like to eat too and then buy an extra bag (and hide it).
There you have it – my Easter basket buying guidelines. Hopefully they have helped in some small measure and maybe you can even use them for other holidays (ooohhh, like for stockings!). Have a Happy Easter and maybe we will see you in the store before then.
Stories From the Treehouse 