Get creative and incorporate fun activities into your Easter long weekend to keep the kids entertained, and save your sanity.

Words Zoe Rice

Outdoor Easter

Easter is often the perfect time for a quick family camping getaway. Just because you’re laying low this year, doesn’t mean you can’t continue the tradition. Pitch a tent in the back yard, get the barbecue started for dinner and enjoy a night of games and stories, ready for a big sleep before the Easter Bunny visits. For more outdoor activities, Nature Play SA has put together a list of 25 things to do in autumn. Work your way of items on the list – most can be done right in your own back yard, and others alongcoastliness and forests.

Sprinkle some fun

There’s no such thing as too much chocolate, so give the little kids the relatively mess-free and stress-free task of creating chocolate freckles. Adelaide chocolatier Vicki Papazaharias from Adixions Luxe Chocolates shares her very easy recipe. She recommends using chocolate melts, but feel free to use plain Easter eggs if you have plenty left over.

Melt 200g of chocolate in the microwave at 15-second intervals until smooth. Fill a flat tray (such as a lamington tray) with a generous layer of hundreds and thousands. Spoon teaspoons of melted chocolate onto the hundreds and thousands. Allow to set, then lift out, turn over and the kids have their very own freckles!

The show must go on(line)

South Australia’s Windmill Theatre company has launched a digital platform on April 10. Windmill at Home is filled with bespoke content for children, based on their performance repertoire.
Content will include filmed readings of Ted Prior’s Grug books and Grugcercise at-home workouts, created by Windmill’s artists in their own homes.
Windmill’s artistic director Rosemary Myers says it’s a challenging time for many in the industry, especially the artists. “While not being able to perform onstage is difficult, we’re taking these circumstances as a creative challenge,” Rosemary says.
There are films and videos to watch and respond to, activities to inspire and movement-based tasks to get families active.

Above and beyond

This weekend, learn something new with the kids. Peruse NASA’s resources for kids and families – there are more formal STEM engagement tools for students and educators, as well as some really fun activities for everyone. Dial-a-Moon lets you download a high resolution image of the moon for any day in 2020. What child doesn’t like to imagine they’re an astronaut? Take isolation one step further with NASA’s tips to preparing for life on the International Space Station. Don’t stop there, visit the Exoplanet Travel Bureau and take a trip outside our solar system with fun interpretations of faraway imagined lands.

On safari

Adelaide Zoo and Monarto Safari Park have now gone digital. Keep up to date with what our local animals are doing with live streams from the giant panda cam, chimpanzee habitat cam, highlights video and more.