Easter Egg Hunting And Egg Coloring

Children will love Easter’s fun activities, many of the crafts featured are suitable for preschool kids from age two upwards and some of the fun activities are linked in with educational and traditional Easter stories and songs. The craft activities highlighted may vary from free coloring printables with Easter themes and images in making decorated Easter Eggs which would be great presents or gifts or decorating but could even be used for the traditional egg rolling competitions.

Easter Activities for Children

The children’s activity website DLTK is a great resource for free coloring printables with some fun Easter images featuring bouncing rabbits on pogo sticks and gleeful Easter chicks but the site also offers a range of religious images which are ideal for supporting work on the Easter story or Sunday school sessions with children.

The Pokemon coloring sheets could well prove more popular though and they are also linked in with a simple on-line Pokemon game. DLTK also offer a variety of on-line games to amuse children.

DLTK have a wide range of Easter crafts which includes eleven different ways of decorating traditional boiled eggs with beautiful finishes – from floral designs to crayoned, fingerprinted or pretty pastel eggs which are created with tissue paper dyes.

Some of the range of Easter craft activities offered by DLTK include (visit this site)

However, here are some traditions about Easter egg hunting, egg coloring, and other Easter stories and practices:

Easter: 2 April – 5 April 2010

Easter Eggs

For many people living in the UK, Easter is a double bank holiday during which it’s possible to scoff loads of chocolate eggs.

In some parts of the country, people roll hard-boiled eggs down a hill or indulge in a bit of Egg Jarping, a contest that involves smashing an opponent’s egg to smithereens.

Strange though it may seem, these rather eccentric traditions, including the egg-laying bunny, are inextricably linked with pagan tradition and the Christian Church.

Easter Traditions and History

Eostre-monath

The Romans, Gauls, Chinese, Egyptians and Persians celebrated the egg as a symbol of the universe.

Easter-go-round (by Per Ola Wiberg)In Anglo Saxon legend, the goddess Eostre was said to have changed a wounded bird into a hare so it could survive the winter; when the “hare” discovered its amazing egg-laying powers, it not only left them as an offering to the goddess every spring, but also decorated them in bright colours to symbolize the rebirth of the world.

The time of year became known as Eostre-monath, named after the goddess.

When early Christians began to commemorate Christ’s resurrection from the dead, the celebration was known as Pascha, relating to the Jewish festival of the Passover.

Because this usually took place in Eostre-monath, the name evolved into Easter.

Easter: A Christian Festival

Forming the foundation of the Christian Church, Easter is the most important time in the liturgical calendar and refers to the events leading up to the death and resurrection of Jesus, who was crucified on Good Friday and rose from the dead on Easter Sunday.

Easter Sunday at First Parish (by crschmidt)As a moveable feast, Easter can fall any time between March 22nd and April 25th: the actual date is linked to the Passover and falls on the first Sunday after the Paschal full moon which, being an ecclesiastical full moon, varies slightly from the astronomical one.

Also marking the end of Lent, a time of fasting and abstinence, Easter Sunday signalled a return to a more indulgent diet when eggs could be enjoyed once more.

Easter Eggs and Pace Egging

Traditionally, boiled eggs were eaten on Easter Sunday and people used to wrap their eggs in onion skins, before boiling them and decorating them with flowers and leaves to give as gifts.

Traditions of Pace Egging, Egg Rolling and Egg Jarping evolved in villages, especially in the north of England: these sports and entertainments usually took place on Easter Monday.

Egg rolling still takes place in many villages in the UK especially in Lancashire and Cumbria, with Avenham Park in Preston being a popular event.

An even more famous venue further afield is the lawn of the White House in Washington DC, when competitors roll an egg along using a spoon in a desperate race to the finishing line.

Happy Easter! (by meddygarnet)The old custom of Pace Egging was related to the mumming tradition, and comprised a procession through the streets to the accompaniment of the Pace Egging song, culminating in an entertainment acted out by a group of local yokels known as Jolly Boys wearing elaborate costumes of animal skins and coloured ribbons and streamers.

Egg Jarping or tapping – a kind of conker fight played with eggs – is popular in County Durham and contests are held in pubs and houses. A player is known as a “jarper” and a particularly good hit is known as a “dunch”.

In Victorian times, with the advent of chocolate factories, larger chocolate eggs began to be all the rage. Easter egg hunts became popular, and sometimes Easter baskets were given containing candy.

Printed cards started to be sent as the holiday celebrations became more widespread.

Today, families wishing to celebrate Easter Sunday in a traditional manner will usually eat a dinner of roast lamb, followed by custard tarts and Easter biscuits, all rounded off with a piece of Simnel cake.

Entry Credits: http://directoryofnewcastleupontyne.com