Planning an Amazing Family Easter Event!

Easter is just around the corner, and theres no better time to get to planning this years family Easter event for your kids ministry! This event could be as simple as an egg hunt, or as big as a family Easter event. This is a great way to invite families to your church, share the good news of Jesus and what he has done for us, and have a lot of fun together! Let’s plan a successful family Easter event!

Pick a date, time, and name: There is no ‘right’ answer when you are picking a date & time for your family Easter event. Think about whether you’d like to do an inside or an outside event – this might depend on where you are located and what the weather is like in the spring. You will want to pick a date that is sometime around Palm Sunday and Easter. Because there are children involved, make sure you plan around meals and naps. If you are going with a traditional egg hunt, Sunday after church would be a good option! If you are looking to plan a bigger event, a Saturday morning would work well! (I planned our event for a Saturday from 9-11am – games & activities were inside, and the egg hunt(s) were outside.)
- Event Name Ideas: Easter Eggstravaganza, Family Easter Event, Family Easter Party, Easter Family Fun Day, Family Easter Celebration, Egg-celent Easter Party
Recruit volunteers: Your main volunteer need for your family Easter event is going to be people to lead game/activity stations, people to donate treats & snacks, and people to donate plastic eggs & candy (if you are having an egg hunt). You can also ask for volunteers to help fill eggs before the event! Sign Up Genius is a great way to keep up with volunteer sign ups! Here are some great ways to recruit volunteers:
- Have a display table & sign up sheets set up outside your KidMin or the atrium/lobby.
- Put a blurb about the event & volunteer opportunities in your church newsletter, bulletin, Sunday announcements, or any other communications.
- Send invitations home with kids in your KidMin talking about the event and asking for volunteers.
Decide on activities/games: Once you have an idea of what kind of family Easter event you want to host, you can think about what kind of games and activities you’d like to include! Here are some great ideas!
- Egg Hunt – the classic activity at any Easter event! Hide plastic eggs filled with candy/little toys for children to collect! You may want to think about having multiple Easter egg hunts and staggering them throughout the morning. I decided to have two egg hunts – one for PreK and under, and one for K-5th. Check out our blog post on Egg Hunt Essentials!
- Face Painting – Ask a few talented people to do face painting. All you need is a table, chairs, face paint, brushes, baby wipes, water, and a page of design examples.
- Photo Booth – Create a photo booth area complete with decorations and props for families to use to get the perfect photo!
- Snacks – Set up a table filled with Easter treats! If your event is before lunch, you could have donut holes, clementines, muffins, and other delicious snacks – Make sure to have some coffee available for the adults!
- Game Stations – these could include Easter bowling, Ring Toss, Plastic Egg Toss, Duck Matching Game, or other simple games! Give out candy or something special like Easter temporary tattoos at the game stations. (Check out Oriental Trading for Easter games!)
- Activity Stations – these could include coloring pages, simple crafts, and other fun activity sheets!
Advertise your event: Create some graphics for your family Easter event and get to advertising! Make sure you check out Canva – it is a great tool for making graphics & social media posts!
- Place information in your church bulletin, newsletter, Sunday morning announcements, and on your church website.
- Have a vinyl sign/banner made for outside of your church – Make sure to include the event name, date, time, and your church website for more information. (Tip: Next year, see if you can get a smaller piece of vinyl printed to velcro over the past date/time so that you can reuse the main banner each year)
- Create event cards to set out by your display table & hand them out at the end of kids programming.
- Share event information & fun count down posts on your church’s (and/or kidmin’s) social media.
- Make an event on Facebook through your church’s Facebook page.
Connect with your community: Hopefully you have done the work of getting the word out about your family Easter event! Make sure you make the most of the opportunity to connect with your community at the event and after. Here are some ideas:
- Have information about your Easter services available somewhere at the event – maybe on the snack table. You can also set up a display for other KidMin events to get the word out (like VBS)!
- Collect information by having sign ups for the egg hunts, or by setting up a raffle table (or something similar, like a “Guess the number of _____ in the jar”). In the raffle, create sign up slips for people to enter to win a prize. Make sure the paper slip asks for their name, email, and phone number. Now you can reach out to the winner, and thank everyone for coming to your Easter Event – make sure to direct them to your church’s events page for more!
Final details: Now that you have done all of the prep work, here are a few things to do right before or on the day of your family Easter event!
- Send a reminder to your volunteers (and others) reminding them of when they need to get there and where they are serving.
- Set up the stations and decorate your space. Make sure if feels fun and inviting! Play some background music to add to the festivities.
- If your event is outside or you are hosting an egg hunt outside, use cones to block off any areas to thru traffic as needed.
- Make sure you have signage up for your all your game & activity stations. If you are serving food, consider setting up a few tables & chairs complete with plastic tablecloths and decor.