Let’s decorate Easter eggs!
Eggs, symbol of renovating life and fruitfulness, are typical of Easter celebration.
We’d like to suggest you how to paint eggs and give colour and fun to your Easter.
You can eat eggs, harden and painted with natural pigments, or you can better choose to set your creativity free using temperas, markers, leaves and beads, just empty your eggs before by making a hole on the top.
We recommend you the first technique, one hundred per cent natural and, obviously, powered by lemon juice.
Choose white shell eggs, dip them into a pot full of water (use a spoon to avoid unpleasant breaking) and add some drops of vinegar to give shells sparkling brightness.
Pick your favourite colour, keeping in mind that the tone density is given by a simple proportion between eggs number/amount of vegetal pigment.
Some specific hints:
- Cumin root, chamomile flowers, orange or lemon rind, carrot curls , tea or saffron: you’ll get a yellow pigment
- Nettle, ivy, spinach: if you prefer green
- Beetroot, turnip or blueberry: if you aim at the traditional red
- White onion skin: for an orange colour
- Red cabbage leaves: for blue shells
- Coffee: results in light brown.
Harden your eggs in water together with your preferred natural dye, for 15 minutes at moderate heat. Pull’em out and place gently on a plate. To obtain a more intense colour, one night in the refrigerator does the trick.
To draw lines and decorations use a tiny brush dipped in lemon juice, otherwise, drop some LIMMI on a saucer for an easy palette.
Last but not least, rub shells with a bit of butter to make them shiny and sparkling.
Just in case you want to paint with this method hardened eggs, before drawing, make sure that the water is cold to avoid any shell breaking.
The best Easter egg decorating ideas on the web
Every country has its tradition related to eggs
- In Bulgary shells are painted in red, symbol of good luck
- People from Denmark decorate eggs in yellow
- In Greece, Sweden and Russia red colour rules, since it’s the symbol of new life and Resurrection
- In Nederland decorated eggs hang from trees or are hidden in the garden. Well actually, it’s Easter bunny who hides lots of eggs in the garden and therefore the children have to find them out!
- In England, precisely in Preston town, they used to roll hard-boiled and painted eggs down steep hills
- In Italy, till ’50, on Easter holidays they used to play Rodolit, a mix between classical marbles beach and bowls games. The rules were simple: you had to roll painted eggs, a different colour for each player, on a path made of soil or sand. The player who succeded in hitting opponents’ eggs without breaking his owns won the game.
The egg painting tradition has rather ancient origins
It’s told that Mary of Magdala (Mary Magdalene) went to the Emperor Tiberius to announce Jesus’ resurrection. The emperor disbeliving replied: “I won’t belive you as long as the eggs in this
basket will became red.” Before he finished speaking all the eggs turned into an intense red, symbol of Christ’s Passion.
It’s even told that Virgin Mary had given Pontius Pilate a basket full of eggs, begging for her son’s release.
