When I was little, I believed in the Easter Bunny. I didn’t really believe in it past the age of five, but I wanted to believe. Not that there was some sort of rabbit running around putting candy into my easter basket, but that something magically enabled the candy to be there. I would come down to Easter brunch shouting “The Easter Bunny was here!” and clutching my little basket of goodies. The “Easter Bunny” also hid plastic eggs filled with small candies or coins in my backyard, which my brother and I would race to find. I knew that my father hid the eggs, but it was more fun to pretend.
My little fantasy had to end the year that he forgot to hide the eggs. When I wanted to out on the egg hunt, my dad told me that the Easter Bunny said he needed help and had asked my father to hide the eggs for him. Dad hadn’t quite gotten around to it yet. But all things must come to an end eventually and I still got candy, so I didn’t complain.
I still decorate easter eggs every year. I blow out the eggs so they’ll last then I dye them using food coloring. I like solid colored eggs, but sometimes I make swirled patterns by adding oil to the dye.
Swirled Easter Eggs
In each cup, put:
1 tsp vinegar
1/4 tsp vegetable oil
8-10 drops food coloring
1/3 cup boiling water
Lower egg carefully into cup. Remove when desired color is reached – a longer soak will result in a darker color.
Happy Easter.
Alice
March 25, 2005Very Pretty Eggs! I usually dye eggs every year, too, but this year I’m giving it a miss…although…your post makes me think that perhaps I shouldn’t. 🙂
Fatemeh Khatibloo-McClure
March 25, 2005Nu-unh.
You didn’t really make those… did you? They are so pretty.
nosheteria
March 25, 2005These eggs are beautiful! I dyed eggs every year as a child; my eggs were far from perfection though. But seeing this picture makes me think that now I should give it another shot.
Nic
March 25, 2005Yup – I did them all by hand. I’m glad you guys like them!
alan
March 25, 2005Nicole, what did you use to draw on the eggs that caused the dye to resist with such a clean white line?
Happy Easter!
Nic
March 25, 2005Alan – The technique is called Pysanky. It’s a traditional Ukrainian way of decorating eggs where you draw designs with wax, then dye the egg and melt off the wax to reveal white underneath. I don’t do as many of the super-intricate ones anymore for time constraints, but if you google it you can see some amazing designs.
Cathy
March 26, 2005Nic – they’re just beautiful! I want to make some too, but I may have to make some un-Easter eggs seeing as it’s about half an hour until Easter!
Rachelle
March 25, 2008Oh those are so neat! I will have to bookmark this to try next Easter!
Ankhorite
April 21, 2009You don’t need to kill yourself with pysanky. You can just use a white crayon from any crayon set, or rub with a white candle, or drip with a white candle, or… buy a box of 12 crayons, ALL WHITE. This place sells them, or just google the phrase “white crayons”:
http://www.discountschoolsupply.com/Product/ProductDetail.aspx?product=92
And you can use them on each layer of dye to get special effects. Here, take a look at an egg I made last week:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ankhorite/3434029958/in/photostream/
Nothing like the artistry of true pysanky, of course! But good enough for most of us, especially if we’re doing this with little kids. 🙂 Just buff the white crayon away when the eggs are dry and done; use a paper towel and rub quickly back and forth, to build up the warm friction that makes the waxy crayon go away.
If done on brown eggs, the underlying color revealed when the crayon is rubbed off will of course be brown.