Easy DIY Natural Easter Basket

Are your Easter bunny plans in order? Try these tips to create a more natural Easter Basket this year that’s healthier for kids. Many egg dyes contain chemicals that aren’t safe for kids— including food dyes linked to ADHD and hyperactivity. But in minutes you can make dyes from frozen fruits and veggies that are already in your freezer. Then fill your upcycled Easter basket with truly natural chocolates, and deliver a healthier surprise this holiday.

Natural Easter Basket

Rather than buying new, consider reusing a basket you already have in your home—even plastic fruit baskets can work great. Add shredded newspaper comics (use a paper shredder or cut with scissors) for a great upcycled touch!

Fair Trade Chocolates

Despite Hersheys defense of its sustainability efforts in comments—after more than 500 Mommy Greenest readers petitioned for change—the facts remain that fair trade, organic chocolates like this cute, smiling chocolate bunny, these organic peanut-butter filled eggs and these giftable bunny bars nix pesticides and unfair labor practices that can  make chocolate so not sweet. Because there’s nothing more tragically ironic than third-world children forced to labor to make chocolate for first-world kids.

DIY Egg Dye

Check your labels: Many dyes contain chemicals that aren’t safe for kids, such as propylparaben—an endocrine disruptor, which messes up your hormones—and sodium lauryl sulfate, a bubble-making ingredient used in cleaning and personal care products, as well as food dyes linked to hyperactivity.  Do you really want your kids to be eating that?

Instead, try this quick-and-easy egg dyeing technique using frozen fruits and veggies which are probably in your freezer already!

My assistant Chloe joined me to make our DIY natural Easter egg dyeing video.

What worked for you? I’ve already heard about boiling onions skins to make yellow and frozen cranberries for pink. Leave me a comment below—I’d love to add to our rainbow!