Easter is coming in a few week and that means that kids across the world will wake up to a a fun Easter basket surprise. In my own childhood, my parents would often times fill that basket with fun treats for me and my four siblings. I remember crunching down on those chocolate bunny ears while singing the Peter Cottontail song.
Easter is actually the second largest candy-selling holiday behind Halloween. Each year there are over 16 billion jelly beans made, along with millions of chick marshmallows. These products not only contain tons of sugar, they are full of high fructose corn syrup and food dyes neither of which are good for our bodies. If your families loves these items, there are lots of online recipes for homemade versions that are not quite as unhealthy.
While chocolate is actually a great option for an Easter treat (it melts and is easily rinsed away with water), there are plenty of treats that are not so tooth friendly. Jelly beans, hard candies and anything sticky top that list. Encouraging parents and grandparents to fill Easter baskets with non-sugary treats is essential to avoiding dental cavities.
Treats like small games, play doh, slime, bubbles, jump ropes, playing cards, Legos, hair accessories, stickers and other small trinkets will provide hours of fun for your young ones and also distract them away from sugar overload.
Another great idea you can try is to do a non-candy Easter egg hunt. Instead of filling the colored plastic eggs with candy, you can fill each egg with a puzzle piece. Once all of the eggs are found your kids can spend time doing the puzzle. This is a fun idea that my own family has tried and, trust me, the kids love it!
You can also make Easter baskets experience based. They can have themes such as going to the beach, camping, seeing a movie or hiking. The baskets can be filled with everything your child needs to have fun doing one of those activities.
There are many ways to create good Easter memories without sacrificing good dental health! Hope your Easter is fun and tooth friendly!
