Virtual Egg Hunts Even Adults Can Join

Like making goodie bags for a birthday party or filling up holiday stockings, putting fun-sized candy and miniature toys into a plastic Easter egg recalls a cozy, Pinterest-y feeling. But just like Palm Sunday service and that Zoom call that could've been an email, every part of our lives has been kicked over to the internet. And that includes egg hunts.

If you are reading this, you are probably too old for an egg hunt. In fact, it's far more likely that you are putting one together for the little one in your life (or your friend's or relative's lives). Nevertheless, the thrill of finding an egg in the grass and pouring the egg-shaped malt balls into your hand like a pirate appraising a handful of gold coins is something we don’t easily outgrow. One advantage of the virtual Easter egg hunt is that it spares you the embarrassment of being the only adult in the hunt.

So whether you're the host trying to make the most out of the least or the unfortunate millennial tasked with figuring out how to throw a virtual egg hunt, here are some great virtual ones you can join.

Connect with your neighborhood or extended family to coordinate a remote egg hunt. Come up with a handful of places around the house that all participants can access in their own homes, Martha Stewart's website suggests places like a bike basket in a garage or "in the laundry room, huddled in the container of laundry pods." Print up a list of clues that lead the hunters from egg to egg, scavenger-hunt-style.

Hand it to the participants along with a smartphone: their task is to find all the eggs and snap pictures of them. The first one to find all the correct eggs and send the pictures to the designated group chat (an email chain is too work-adjacent to be fun), wins a special prize.

Say you don't have a house with a laundry room and garage to hide eggs in. If you live in an apartment, that would make for a very anticlimactic egg hunt, and that's if you managed to score the needed supplies in time. But if your egg-hunting tradition included hitting up local festivities, chances are they’ve been moved online. Like this one from Tumwater, Washington, or this one in Queens, New York. These are often month-long guessing games, where organizers share pictures of eggs, and whoever guesses the location wins a prize.

Disney Movie Insiders is doing a lot of the heavy lifting, too. In its egg hunt, you'll be searching through merch and T-shirts instead of bushes. Cadbury took it to the next level, as well, and developed an online platform where you can make a game, hide treasures IRL, and let the fun begin. 

Lastly, if you want to be fully immersed in a virtual Easter celebration, you might want to turn to Animal Crossing: New Horizons, where the cherry blossoms are blooming. Since April 1, the Nintendo game has been reeving up for Bunny Day; that includes a new visitor that will drop in and add Bunny Day cheer with six types of eggs hidden around the island, DIY recipes, and more.