natjtan As my Mum say’s, Easter’s late this year! However I’m early sharing some easy plastic free/r Easter gift ideas.
Easter’s roots are with the pagan spring festivals of new life and birth as the world awaked from winter, hence the Easter bunny, chicks, eggs and flowers. As a kid I could never workout the deal with eggs sitting through Easter service. There was no mention of eggs, chocolate or chicks as the wooden pew got more uncomfortable. The gifts….!
Flowers
This year I got my Mum and sister grow your own potted flowers in cute terracotta pots. Only plastic the seed wrapper (or it could be foiled backed paper). These were fairly inexpensive, €2 each from Hema. Both my mum and sister have gardens so these will be great transfer plants later in the year.
Potted flowers or plants in terracotta pots make great plastic free Easter gifts as do fresh flowers (in paper packaging of course!). Fresh flowers are ideal for those who aren’t good at looking after plants. Potted plants and fresh flowers are always prefect for balconies or those who have neither a balcony or a garden. Plants always brighten up a place and bring nature indoors!
Chocolate
I can’t think of another holiday where chocolate goes hand in hand more than Easter! Look for foil wrapped eggs minus all the plastic packaging. I found these again in Hema for my nephews. They had packs of eggs in plastic bags and I’m sure the loose eggs arrived in plastic too. However sometimes it’s you as a consumer to stop the plastic going with you. For loose chocolate eggs find cute cardboard boxes, paper bags, bamboo, wood, sea grass or fabric baskets for wrapping (make sure they don’t come in plastic!). Even mugs make great Easter egg baskets! The Hema eggs came with their own cute cardboard box. To protect the eggs from any damage in the post/mail, I reused some packing tissue paper to fill the box out.
I always thought Easter was low key in Spain purely for the fact they don’t really do Easter eggs. In the UK shelves are filled with eggs usually a month before Easter. Here maybe 2 weeks before with more chocolate bars than eggs hit the shelves. Way fewer shelves that the UK. Eggs have got more popular in recent years but Spain’s biggest Easter purchases are palms for Palm Sunday and Semana Santa. Then I have no idea what the Spanish do for Easter as for me it’s a puente or long weekend. I usually keep myself to myself around most celebrations and Catalonia does things differently to the rest of Spain. I know many towns in the South go all out with parades. I do know if it’s beach weather, the beaches will be packed. Already the seasonal chiringuitos are setting up on the beaches in time for Easter.
How do you celebrate Easter? Do you send gifts? My sister usually makes me something. Last year it was cute felt chicks. My mum sends me Oreo cookies as she knows they’re dairy free!
Easter is (or was when I was a child) purely a religious celebration in Spain. It’s all procesiones and going to the church on Sunday. I don’t think I ever had chocolate eggs in Cáceres.
However as you know in Catalonia they have the “mona” on the Monday after Resurrection Sunday and children get a cake and chocolate figurines. I wasn’t supposed to get any as my godparents are not Catalan but sometimes I got it from my non-godmothers Catalan aunts, hehe. I fondly remember a dark chocolate big bunny I got once.
It’s crazy the whole country celebrates differently. I hope you’ve had chocolate eggs by now!
Erm, no I didn’t know kids get cake and chocolate figurines on Easter Monday in Cataliona. I thought like the UK they got them on Easter Sunday. It explains the small selection fancy eggs and figurines I used to see in El Corte Ingles. Now most supermarkets have small eggs but nowhere near the size of UK Easter Eggs! Lindt chocolate rabbits are popular. I remember one year as a kid I received a Smarites Chocolate Rabbit. My mum would only let me have pieces of it every now and then. It was always placed up high where I couldn’t reach it. I remember being so excited to finally have some of it, only for it to have ants! Uff.