Eggs, eggs everywhere!

Real eggs, this time, not the stitched ones.

We started out with wax resist eggs. This year, I wanted to do some blown eggs to replace the ones I gave away in the move, figuring they wouldn't survive it very well. *L*


After cleaning the eggs thoroughly, I used the largest needle I had to make holes on each end of the egg, with the one at the base somewhat larger, then blew out the contents. I was after 8 shells, which took 11 eggs. A few of them broke as I was making the holes. I counted on having at least 6 eggs by the time I was done. *L*







One they were all blown, they were washed thoroughly in soapy water. I made sure to get water into the shells and washed them out as thoroughly as I could. That was followed by a rinsing in vinegar water.






After they were done, I set them up to dry overnight. I made a drying rack with a piece of craft foam and cocktail toothpicks, with some paper towel for absorption.







The next day, the dyes were mixed quite early, as it needs to be cool before starting. In this picture, you can see the raw eggs the girls and I had done at Gawdessness' the day before. Raw eggs do very well for dying. The contents eventually dry up over the years. On the left are the blown eggs, while a kiska (size medium), beeswax and teacandle are ready and waiting.




As the dye cooled, I market most of the eggs in pencil. Here, you can see how an elastic band can be used to mark even lines.








I left a few eggs blank, while others were marked freehand.









A bit of wax is scraped into the wide end of the heated kiska, then carefully applied to the shells.

It was at this point, as I was bent over the counter, carefully applying the wax, and the cat decided to visit. She jumped up onto my back, then used me to get onto the fridge. Thank goodness I noticed her just before she jumped, so I was braced for it. *L* Later on, as I was well into other colours, she jumped down onto my back - and got comfy! That made things just a bit challenging. I had to get one of the girls to take her off so she wouldn't slide and scratch up my back as I straightened. LOL

Unlike raw eggs, blown eggs will not sink into the dye, so they need to be turned a few times while in the dye bath. The commercial packets of dye sold for wax resist methods colour the shells very quickly, and can be reused for years.






After a second bath in the dye, here are a few eggs drying before their next application of wax.









They're all done - and I still had eight! The easiest way to remove the wax is in the oven. A few layers of paper towel or newsprint on a baking sheet, then into a 200F or 250F oven, and the wax easily wipes off, though I did have to tuck the last two into the oven again, as the wax had cooled too much to wipe off by the time I got to them.



The finished eggs.

I think they turned out pretty good. :-D