Top Free Things to do this Easter
The Easter weekend is nearly here! What are the top free things to do with your family this Easter? We have some top tips and high on the list is watching a live performance of the Easter story. Scroll down to read more about these free performances!
Easter Trails and Egg Hunts
Free Easter events are an opportunity to embrace Spring! Enjoy the Great Outdoors by visiting the many Easter trails and egg hunts across the UK. Parks, Gardens and stately homes have a range of free activities for families wanting to enjoy the Easter weekend. Easter trails often have an Easter egg theme with wicker eggs and seasonal displays. Sometimes there are real Easter egg hunts and children can hunt for the brightly-coloured mini eggs that have been carefully hidden beforehand. For adults, the Easter weekend is a perfect time for scenic outings and long walks in the countryside to enjoy the Spring and contemplate new life and rebirth in creation and in the Easter story.
Make Easter Gifts
Traditional gifts to make and give at Easter include an Easter Hat and crochet decorations. An Easter hat was once decorated with flowers and seasonal items and then worn to church on Sunday. Today you can decorate your Easter hat with many more items to make it unique and decorative. Many people use tissue paper flowers, real flowers, origami and crochet to decorate their hats.
You might also be part of a crochet group making Easter decorations for your home and for the local community. Look out for walls, fences, noticeboards and red letter boxes decorated with crochet to celebrate Easter!
Hand-decorated Eggs
Real eggs are used to make beautiful and often elaborate Easter decorations. There are many different ways to make these eggs. One easy way is use patterned napkins To do this you use the top layer of the napkin and cut it into small pieces that are easier to lay on the egg. Then boil some eggs and let them cool. Use some milk or egg white and a brush to gently ‘paint’ the napkin onto the egg surface and let it dry. Once it is dry, the napkin dries perfectly onto the egg and looks like it has been hand painted!
Another way to decorate eggs is to use bees wax to paint delicate patterns on the egg surface. You can use the wax in a tealight or you can use a wax crayon held over a tealight. You can even make a home-made tool for drawing with the wax – a pin with a coloured tip can be stuck into the rubber at the end of a pencil to help you draw with the hot wax!
If you want to dye the eggs, you can leave them in a jar of coloured liquid overnight. Natural colourings include the water drawn from boiling cabbage (this turns eggs a beautiful shade of blue) or water with turmeric (for a lovely yellow colour)! There are many YouTube videos to give you more ideas!
Bake Easter Treats
If you like baking, there are delicious Easter treats to make at home. Hot cross buns are delicious sweet buns studded with dried fruit and gently spiced with cinnamon and allspice. Eaten warm or toasted and buttered, they are a treat for everyone! If you are feeling more adventurous you can make a Simnel cake which uses similar flavours but in a cake rather than a bun. It also has additional marzipan shaped into balls to decorate the top of the cake. You can make your own free Easter event by baking seasonal treats and inviting friends and family to enjoy them together.
Watch a Free Passion Play
Passion Plays tell the real story of Easter and are one of the most popular free Easter events for all to enjoy. For many people, the best way to learn about the true meaning of Easter is to see it acted and Passion Plays do exactly that! The Easter story is about Jesus and we learn about him as a real person who healed the sick and gave food to starving people and protected children and made them laugh. He brought freedom from despair and gave joy to many people. Find out what happened to him and why he allowed himself to be put to death even though he was innocent.
Professional actors often work with large volunteer casts to rehearse for many months ahead of Easter. They work together to explore the life and death of Jesus Christ and how to bring the Gospel accounts to life through performance. The final performances take place during the Easter weekend or during Holy Week and everyone is invited to watch. This year there will be a play in Princes Street Gardens in Edinburgh, with Edinburgh Castle as a backdrop and on the city walls of Derry. You can also find a performance in Bonn Square in Oxford and in Forbury Gardens in Reading, and many other locations. Find out if there is one near you by using our interactive map and list here.
Image courtesy of Keith Blundy | aegies.com
