Tuesday, April 22, 2014

To dye for


Like most everyone else last week, we dyed Easter eggs in preparation for the big day. We celebrate Easter as the day our Savior conquered the grave, but we see no harm in getting a visit from the Easter Bunny and having egg hunts for the kiddos. We decorate the house with spring decor and dye eggs to our hearts content. Or at least we dye as many as we need for the potato salad and evil eggs*.

*Note: "Evil eggs" are so called because my youngest brother, as a wee lad, couldn't remember the name "deviled eggs". He just remembered they were bad, so they became "evil eggs" and have been that ever since.

I decided to try a couple of different ways of dyeing eggs this year, since I had seen a couple of new ways of trying things. Craig, Canon, and I used the usual color-tablet-in-water-with-vinegar method and got some pretty bright results. I didn't take any pictures of us in the process, probably because I was trying to be "in the moment" so...my bad.



However, our dear and favorite neighbor, Sonia, had previously sent me a new way of dyeing eggs (via facebook or pinterest) so I invited her over to help with that method the next day. It involves shaving cream and food coloring swirled together and is supposed to leave a marbled effect on the eggs.


The idea is to cover your pan with shaving cream, at least an inch thick. Then put a couple of drops of food coloring in it and swirl it around with a toothpick. It should look like this when you are done.


Next, you roll your eggs around until they are heavily saturated with shaving cream. Put them aside for 5-10 minutes while the color soaks into the egg.


The blue and green coloring worked great with this method, but the orange coloring wouldn't stick so Sonia decided to try a different way. I should note that she is a nurse and has surgical gloves out the wazoo, but guess what she didn't bring with her.


Note: Both of these egg dyeing methods are rather messy so if you work in the medical field don't plan on seeing any patients the next day unless you want to freak them out. Oh wait, sorry Sonia.


While Sonia was busy taking one for the team getting elbow deep in color, Canon was hard at work supervising. See?



The cracked egg in the back dove off of the table before we started and Canon didn't help it at all. You believe me, right?



Me thinks Canon didn't understand the whole "hold up an egg to show off your artistic skills" thing.


Personally, I think the hand crafting that Sonia did really came out well. The shaving cream method worked too, so I am thinking that we will be dyeing eggs with food coloring instead of those kits from now on.



Many thanks to Sonia for making this day so fun and memorable. We love you!



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