Toddler treasure hunt – fundraising idea

I prepared a scavenger hunt for N’s party back in May which we didn’t use, but obviously have treasure hunts and the like on my mind, as when N’s nursery school were looking for fund raising ideas, I put a treasure hunt forward. It was obviously something a bit different for them, and everyone was really excited about it.

Last Sunday was the date, and luckily (after some very dubious weather on the Saturday), it was a beautiful day. I had been in charge of doing the treasure hunt sheets. I decided on a photo style hunt, where we had photos of places in the village that people had to find, and then mark on the map route where they’d spotted them. As I don’t know the village itself that well, it was a bit of a team effort, with the chair of the committee taking photos for me, me pulling it together and then having to check I’d got the order right.

The idea was to charge a nominal fee for children to do the treasure hunt, and they’d get a small prize for completing it. Alongside that, and to encourage more of the village along, we did a village bakery…well posh coffee and cakes. So the night before I was baking having changed my mind from a lemon cake (I wanted to do Nigella’s lemon and polenta cake but realised it doesn’t look pretty, and really needs a fork to eat it!), to Nigella’s Guinness gingerbread.

We decorated the village hall with bunting (yes, my trusty handmade bunting was put to good use again), gorgeous flowers picked from one of the committee’s garden in glasses vases. With a couple of tables of cakes, a good coffee machine, it was really lovely for people to sit, relax and eat.

With the weather being nice, there was a good number of families doing the treasure hunt. In fact so many that we ran out of prize medals. Oops. Note for next time, always get more than you think as they’ll always get used again another time. Luckily no one was too worried about that as there were cakes to be had. Lots of people commented how nice a walk it was, and a lovely idea to do something a bit different with the children. So all good feedback.

N went and did the treasure hunt with his best friend L and his family. Luckily N always seems to behave well with others, so it sounded like they had a lovely time spotting all the photos. Knowing N, he probably told them all about driving the combine or tractor as one path took them right by where he’s been taken to see the men working!

For him it was lovely to spend time out of nursery with his friend (think he grabbed himself a surrogate dad for the morning!), and for me I loved being involved with other people from the village and getting to know parents with children who’ll be at school with N (hopefully). Living just outside the village, we don’t tend to get that involved, and I’m not usually dropping off or picking up with the other parents, so it was great to have time to chat and get to know them.

N was very proud of his medal, although I think the cake topped his favourite thing on the day.

We made the money we needed to for the fundraising, and it went down a treat. So if you’re looking for a fundraising idea, it’s definitely worth thinking about.

I love gingerbread, and it was one of the first people were buying, so definitely a good traybake for events and afternoon tea.