Candy and Treats

• Candy and treats always make tasty fillers for Easter baskets. Treats like candy bars, taffy, bubble gum, mints, cookies and jelly beans are very popular with kids. You can buy candy or you can make your own. Making the treats yourself adds a personal touch to the Easter basket.
  
  Cookies are simple to make, and frosted cookies are especially popular with kids nowadays. Decorate the cookies to resemble Easter eggs or flowers and then wrap them in pastel-colored cellophane wrap.
  
  KidsKreate.com has a four-ingredient lollipop recipe that makes16 lollipops. You can wrap these in cellophane as well.
  
  Apply tags to some of the filler candy for a boutique look. Simply write the name of the candy on a card stock piece and tie it on the candy using ribbon.
  
  

Healthier Foods

• Healthy foods can be just as tasty as junk food. Candy apples, chocolate-dipped strawberries, bananas, oranges, gelatin cutouts, nut mixtures and string cheese are tasty alternatives to sugary sweets. Although some of the treats do contain sugar, they also provide some kind of nutritional value.
  
  Candy apples can be dipped in a sugar glaze or in caramel. They may also be rolled in nuts if desired. Cooks.com has an excellent candy apple recipe that calls for apples, sugar, water, cream of tartar, red food coloring, skewers and a candy thermometer.
  
  If you use fruit or cheese as fillers for your Easter basket, keep the basket in a cool, dry spot, such as the fridge. If you use gelatin cutout shapes, you will certainly need to keep the basket--or at least the cutouts--cold, otherwise the gelatin shapes will melt and get sticky.
  
  

Toys and Prizes

• Toys and prizes also work well as fillers in your Easter basket. Consider small toys such as dolls, cars, glow-in-the-dark sticks, temporary tattoos, pencils, Slinkys and rubber balls. Kids will love going through the assortment of toys.